Наука и жизнь (Science and Life). a Russian émigré magazine, was published in New York from March 1923 to July 1924.
I have copied all the issues from a microfilm at the New York Public Library. See PDF attached here.
An article by Sorokin appeared in the December 1923 issue (see attached).
— posted by Roger W. Smith
November 1923
C. Peter Timmer review of Hunger as a Factor – American J of Sociology
Posted here (PDF above):
review of Pitirim A Sorokin, Hunger as a Factor in Human Affairs; translated by Elena P. Sorokin
reviewed by C. Peter Timmer
American Journal of Sociology, Vol. 82, No. 4 (January 1977), pp. 912-914
I disagree with the conclusions drawn by Timmer at the end of the review with respect to Sorokin’s conclusions (reached by Sorokin in the book’s concluding pages) about the relationship between hunger and statism.
— posted by Roger W. Smith
October 2022
Pitirim A. Sorokin
The Reconstruction of Humanity
The Beacon Press, 1948
dedication, The Reconstruction of Humannty
posted by Roger W. Smith
October 2022
Walicki Zniewolony umysł po latach PL-ENG
Posted here (Word document above) are the original Polish and an English translation by Angelina Weimann of an except from the following book:
Andrzej Walicki
Zniewolony umysł po latach
Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Czytelnik. 1993
Rozdział: „Rosja” (fragment)
Andrzej Walicki
Captive Mind After Years
Warsaw: Wydawnictwo Czytelnik
Chapter: “Russia” (excerpt)
Andrzej Walicki (1930 2020) was a Polish historian and a professor at the University of Notre Dame. He specialized in philosophy of sociopolitics, history of Polish and Russian philosophy, Marxism, and liberal thought. He was one of the scholars who formed the “Warsaw school of the history of ideas.”
Angelina Weimann: “Walicki made a detailed study of Russian philosophy. It was not always well received because Poland, due to historical facts (the Russian partitions, Stalin’s regime, the USSR), is not an ideal place for the study of great Russians. However, thanks to Russia, many Polish scholars, including Sorokin’s teacher, Leon Petrażycki, received an excellent education and would become international scholars.”
See Andrzej Walicki, The Slavophile Controversy : History of a Conservative Utopia in Nineteenth-Century Russian Thought (Notre Dame Press, 1989)
— posted by Roger W. Smith
October 2022
Acknowledgment: I wish to thank Angelina Weimann for sharing this excerpt in the original with me; and for offering to do an English translation.
Roger W. Smith, ‘A Few Words About Prof. P. A. Sorokin’ IN RUSSIAN
Roger W. Smith, ‘A Few Words About Prof. P. A. Sorokin’ – The New Review, No. 308
Posted here (Word document above) is my article “A Few Words About Prof. P. A. Sorokin,” which I submitted to the Russian language journal (published in New York ) The New Review.
I have also posted the Russian text of the entries in the issue of The New Review (No. 308) that pertain to me.
And the original Russian of my article “A Few Words About Prof. P. A. Sorokin.”
It was published in the current issue, in a Russian translation by the journal’s editor, Marina Adamovich.
The following are the details of the publication,. of both this article and correspondence between Sorokin and Tolstoy’s author Alexandra Tolstoy, which was also published with credit to me.
Роджер Смит
несколько слов о проф. П. А. Сорокине
перевод с английского — М. Адамович
Новый журнал
Но 308, Сентябрь 2022
стр. 189-191
Roger Smith, Neskol’ko Slov o Prof. P. A. Sorokin (A Few Words about Prof. P. A. Sorokin), translated from the English by Marina Adamovich, The New Review No. 308 (September 2022), pp. 189-191
Переписка Александры Толстой и Питирима Соркина
Публикация — Roger W. Smith
Новый журнал
Но 308, Сентябрь 2022
стр. 192-196
Perepiska Aleksandry Tolstoy i Pitirima Sorkina (Correspondence between Alexandra Tolstoy and Pitirim Sorkin), published by Roger W. Smith, The New Review No. 308 (September 2022), pp. 192-196
— Roger W. Smith
September 2022
П.А. Сорокин САМОУБИЙСТВО, КАК ОБЩЕСТВЕННОЕ ЯВЛЕНИЕ, Рига 1913
P. A. Sorokin, Suicide as a Societal Problem. Riga 1913
— posted by Roger W. Smith
August 2022
И война, и революция представляют могучие факторы изменения поведения. Они «отвивают» от людей одни формы актов и «прививают» новые, переодевают человека в новый костюм поступков.
Являясь противоположностью мирной жизни, они прививают населению свойства и формы поведения, обратные первой… Мирная жизнь тормозит акты насилия, убийства, зверства, лжи, грабежа, обмана, подкупа и разрушения. Война и революция, напротив, требуют их, прививают эти рефлексы, благоприятствуют им всячески. Убийство, разрушение, обман, насилие, уничтожение врага они возводят в доблесть и заслугу: выполнителей их квалифицируют как великих воинов и бесстрашных революционеров, вместо наказания одаряют наградой, вместо порицания ‒ славой. Мирная жизнь развивает продуктивную работу, творчество, личное право и свободу; война и революция требуют беспрекословного повиновения («повинуйся, а не рассуждай», «подчиняйся революционной дисциплине»), душат личную инициативу, личную свободу («дисциплина», «диктатура», «военные суды», «революционные трибуналы»), прививают и приучают к чисто разрушительным актам, отрывают и отучают от мирного труда. Мирная жизнь внедряет в население переживания благожелательности, любви к людям, уважения к их жизни, правам, достоянию и свободе. Война и революция выращивают и культивируют вражду, злобу, ненависть, посягательство на жизнь, свободу и достояние других лиц. Мирная жизнь способствует свободе мысли. Война и революция тормозят ее. «Где борьбу решает насилие ‒ все равно: насилие ли пушек или грубое насилие нетерпимости, ‒ там победа мудрых, положительная селекция по силе мозга и самая работа мысли затрудняется и делается невозможной».
Both war and revolution are powerful factors in changes in behavior. They “unleash” from people actions in some form or other and “instill” new ones, dress a person in a new costume of deeds.
Manifesting themselves as the opposite of peaceful life, they instill in the population attributes and forms of behavior the opposite of the first … Peaceful life hinders acts of violence, murder, brutality, lies, robbery, deception, bribery and destruction. War and revolution, on the contrary, demand them, inculcate these reflexes, and favor them in every possible way. They elevate murder, destruction, deception, violence, and annihilation of the enemy to valor and merit: they qualify their implementers as great warriors and fearless revolutionaries, give rewards instead of punishment and glory instead of censure. Peaceful life fosters productive work, creativity, personal rights and freedom; war and revolution demand unquestioning obedience (“obey, not reason,” “obey revolutionary discipline”), stifle personal initiative and personal freedom (“discipline,” “dictatorship,” ”military courts,” “revolutionary tribunals”), inculcate and accustom to purely destructive acts, detach and wean from peaceful labor. Peaceful life instills in the population feelings of benevolence, love for people, respect for their lives, rights, property and freedom. War and revolution cultivate and nurture enmity, malice, hatred, encroachment on the life, freedom and property of others. Peaceful life promotes freedom of thought. War and revolution hinder it. “Where the struggle is resolved by violence ‒ it is all the same whether the violence of cannons or the brutal violence of intolerance ‒there the victory of intelligent, positive selection according to the power of the brain, and mental activity itself becomes difficult and impossible.”
— от Питирима Сорокина, Современное состояние России (Прага, 1922 г.), перевод Натальи С. Сергиевой и Роджера В. Смита (перевод в процессе)
from Pitirim Sorokin, Sovremennoye Sostoyaniye Rossii (The Present State of Russia, Prague, 1922), translated by Natalia S. Sergieva and Roger W. Smith (translation in progress)
*****************************************************
There is a timeless quality to much of Sorokin’s writings. The title of Yuri Doykov’s biography, Питирим Сорокин: Человек вне сезона (Pitirim Sorokin: A Timeless Man), is very apt. Consider the current invasion of Ukraine.
— posted by Roger W. Smith
August 2022
‘West going to dogs.’ says Sorokin (not so, rebuts Aiken) – Harvard Crimson 12-4-1946
Posted here (downloadable Word document above):
‘West going to dogs,’ Say Sorokin, Wellock; ‘Not So,’ Rebuts Aiken
The Harvard Crimson
December 4, 1946
A personal note: I took a course with Professor Aiken: “Nature and Value,” Humanities 12b, at Brandeis University. My father, Alan W. Smith, took Sorokin’s two semester course, Social Relations 1a and 1b, at Harvard College.
— posted by Roger W. Smith
July 2022
Harold O. J. Brown, ‘Regression and Renewal’ – Chronicles, January 1992
Posted here (downloadable Word document above):
Harold O. J. Brown
“Regression and Renewal”
Chronicles: A Magazine of American Culture
January 1, 1992
Harold O. J. Brown (1933-2007) was a professor of theology at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School in Deerfield, Illinois. He graduated from Harvard College in 1953 and earned two degrees from Harvard Divinity School and a Ph.D. from Harvard University.
— posted by Roger W. Smith
July 2022
‘In a Generous Spirit’ (Myra Page; excerpts)
Posted here (PDF above) are excerpts from In a Generous Spirit: A First-Person Biography of Myra Page, by Christina Looper Baker (University of Illinois Press, 1996)
Myra Page studied under Sorokin at the University of Minnesota.
*****************************************************
adapted from Wikipedia:
Myra Page was the pen name of Dorothy Markey (born Dorothy Page Gary, 1897–1993), an American communist writer, journalist, union activist, and teacher.
Page was born in Newport News, Virginia. She received a bachelor’s degree in English and history from Westhampton College (now the University of Richmond). She taught school in Richmond and then began graduate studies at Columbia University. She studied anthropology under Franz Boas, Melvin Herskovitz, and Franklin Giddings. She also took a class under John Dewey at Columbia’s Teacher’s College and attended courses given by theologians Harry Emerson Fosdick and Henry F. Ward at Union Theological Seminary. In 1920, she obtained a masters with a thesis that analyzed the effect of New York newspaper coverage on the Spanish–American War.
While a graduate student, she became active in the Young Women’s Christian Association (YWCA), which at that time championed reform in race relations. Influenced by Social Gospel, she “developed an antiracist consciousness and chafed against the restrictions imposed upon her as a southern white woman.” Upon completing her master’s degree in 1920, Page became a YWCA “industrial secretary” at a silk factory in Norfolk, Virginia and organized education for women workers.
Giddings had introduced Page to the Rand School of Social Science, where she had met Anna Louise Strong, Mary Heaton Vorse, and Scott Nearing. In 1921, she returned to New York from Norfolk and studied further under Nearing at the Rand School; at that time, she first read The Communist Manifesto.
She then took a factory job in Philadelphia and became a union organizer for the Amalgamated Clothing Workers Union (ACW). She worked at several jobs including pants seamstress and secretary. . In the spring of 1924, she returned to the New York area, became a teacher of American History in Teaneck, New Jersey, joined the American Federation of Teachers, and became one of its leaders.
In fall 1924, she got a teaching fellowship in the History Department of the University of Minnesota, chaired by F. Stuart Chapin. Pitirim Sorokin was a professor there. She married fellow teacher and fellow John Markey.
In June 1928, Page earned her Ph.D. in Sociology with double minor in Economics and Psychology from the University of Minnesota. In the fall of 1928, she accepted a teaching position at Wheaton College.
At the end of the 1929–1930 academic year, Page and her husband left Wheaton College. Page became a political journalist and writer and wrote for Communist publications such as the Daily Worker.
Page spent two years in Moscow, whence she wrote for American socialist journals as well as the Soviet communist publication Moscow News. She also wrote a novel Moscow Yankee (1935) there.
Upon their return to the States in 1933, Page and her husband lived in Brooklyn, New York. Page joined the editorial board of Soviet Russia Today, a Soviet-backed magazine, and the League of American Writers. In March 1937, she interviewed Andre Malraux for his views on the Spanish Civil War.
Page eventually left the Communist Party: “I left the Party in 1953, having lost faith that it could do the job it was supposed to do. My disillusionment was gradual… Gradually, we just plain lost confidence in the party.”
— posted by Roger W. Smith
July 2022
Pitirim Alexandrovich Sorokin 