Interview with Professor Robert Phillips: Are Internet and Politics a Good Couple?

Apr 24, 2012 | in Academic Interviews, News, Noteworthy | Comments Off Robert Phillips Jr. is an Associate Professor of Political Science at American University in Bulgaria. Among his research interests are mass media and the impact of the internet on politics. In this talk some of the ways in which the internet and politics may co-exist will be explored. The questions of whether or not politics affects internet and internet affects politics will be also addressed.  Let’s start with Internet’s growing tendency to release more and more private...
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Obedience, Barbarisation and Soldier’s Choice

• Author: Kiril Kossev (Professor of Economic History at AUBG)
• Subtitle: Incompleteness of the rationality framework to model soldier’s decision making process in following immoral orders and taking part in acts of atrocity.

Mar 22, 2012 | in Noteworthy, Professor Papers | Early on a July morning in 1942 the men of Reserve Police Battalion 101 were informed by their nervous commanding officer that their orders, coming from the highest authority, were to execute the Jewish women, children and elderly men in a Polish village. He gave a chance to any older members of the unit to step aside if they did not feel up to the task. Only a dozen did so. These men, together with others who later on either explicitly refused to shoot Jews or managed to evade the order,...
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Interview with Prof. Castagneto: Does AUBG need American Studies Major?

Feb 16, 2012 | in Academic Interviews, News, Noteworthy | Professor Castagneto, we know that you are actively involved in the development of the American Studies major at AUBG. Could you please share with us your opinion about the importance of this new program? Why do you think AUBG needs this major? Well, actually there is a series of reasons why AUBG needs theAmerican Studies major. First of all, for an American university it sounds quite weird not to have any program describing American culture and society. If we look at other American...
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Multiculturalism: Opposition and Defense

• Author: Tamta Gelashvili (Junior, BUS and POS majors)

Jan 24, 2012 | in Noteworthy, Philosophy, Student Papers | Liberalism is a political philosophy committed to the fundamental values of freedom and equality. However, different branches of liberalism understand and interpret these values differently; for this reason, these branches have developed slightly varying perceptions of the way a just and fair society should be organized. A single viewpoint is even harder to develop nowadays; rapid globalization and diversification of societies make it more difficult for liberals to agree upon an appropriate way...
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Internationally Recognized!

Jan 23, 2012 | in Editor's Note, Headline | Dear readers! We are glad to announce that we have received an ISSN number. This means that from now on Thoth is internationally recognized as an undergraduate academic journal published by AUBG and incorporated into the global network of scholarly editions. Don’t miss the opportunity to have your works published. Submit your articles!
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Modern Psychology in Support of Nussbaum’s Universalist Approach

• Author: Miraslau Shpakau (Senior, HTY major)

Jan 8, 2012 | in Philosophy, Student Papers | In her Non-Relative Virtues: An Aristotelian Approach Nussbaum accused some virtue ethicists of the “abandonment of the project of rationally justifying a single norm of flourishing life for all human beings and a reliance on [local norms].” In her essay she defined the framework in which the problem of cultural relativity in virtue ethics can be solved. She expressed her conviction that “ethical progress” can take place only in the form of specifying the appropriate and inappropriate...
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The Dependence Effect: Does Advertising Create Artificial Wants?

• Author: Jaba Shalamberidze (Senior, BUS major)

Dec 23, 2011 | in Philosophy, Student Papers | There is no such thing as “an artificial want,” all wants are natural. A Need is something that humans are born with. Abraham Harold Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs distinguishes 5 levels of it: Physiological, Safety, Love and Belongingness, Esteem, and Self-actualization needs.[1] “A want” is simply an extension of a need. A rich Wall Street businessman and a janitor from Queens are born with the same set of needs, what differentiates them is their capability and preference to satisfy...
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Interview with Prof. Sean Homer: On the “Occupy Wall Street” Movement, Marxism Today and Slavoj Žižek

• Author: Khafiz Kerimov (Sophomore, HTY and POS majors)

Dec 9, 2011 | in Academic Interviews, Philosophy | Sean Homer is currently Associate Professor of Literature at the American University in Bulgaria. He has published a wide variety of works on the topics of critical and cultural theory, psychoanalysis and Western Marxism. Thus – in the light of the character of the protests at the Wall Street – it seemed only natural to ask Professor Homer to share his thoughts on the movement with us. However, the interview not only enhances one’s understanding of the protests, but also...
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Interview with Prof. Serguey Ivanov: Was There a “Mainstream” Christianity?

• Author: Miraslau Shpakau (Senior, HTY major)

Dec 8, 2011 | in Academic Interviews, History | Serguey Ivanov is a professor of Religion at AUBG whose lectures are devoted to breaking numerous misconceptions and stereotypes about religion in general and Christianity in particular. This interview is about a wide-spread misbelief in the primordial existence of “right” interpretation(s) of Jesus’ teaching and “wrong” interpretations, erroneous deviations from the mainstream “correct opinion”. Professor Ivanov is talking about the roots of this...
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Weimar: The Failure of Democracy

• Author: Kerim Atayev (Alumnus 2011)

Dec 3, 2011 | in History, Student Papers | Introduction. Germany prior to World War I Henig Ruth in his book the Weimar Republic, 1919-1933 writes about Germany as “a dynamic, but deeply divided society” (1). Indeed, if we think about German Empire before engaging in the First World War, it was the Europe’s most dynamic and fast growing industrial power. The author states that “Coal production had increased since 1871 by 800 percent and the output of 277 million tons in 1914 almost rivaled the British volume of output, far...
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