COMMENT: Farewell to citizens' cultural exchange
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By Kirsikka Moring
In the budget of the Ministry of Education, sharp cuts have been made in a section whose amusing title is "certain grants". The money had been used to provide money for civic organisations, which are sometimes known as "friendship societies".
It is paradoxical that the European Union's cultural subsidies put an emphasis specifically on civil society, and it would seem that there are moves to get rid of it in Finland.
Moves are under way to cut back more than EUR 700,000 of the more than EUR 1.9 million previously earmarked for cultural cooperation. More than EUR 1.1 million have been crossed out of funding for the various organisations involved in international cooperation. What are all the things that threaten to go out with the bathwater?
Under threat are the Nordic cooperation organisation Pohjola-Norden, the Finnish-American Society, the Tuglas Society, which promotes knowledge of Estonian culture in Finland, and the M.A. Castrén Society and the Finnish-Russian Society, which have brought attention to the many cultures in the vast country that is Russia.
The role of the Castrén Society is indispensable. Its events bring in performers from both sides of the Urals, from the Volga Republic, and from remote places in Siberia.
The society has also sent Finnish language teachers to universities where languages related to Finnish are taught. At those universities they teach, and they learn about the local culture, and pass on the knowledge to Finland. Without their activities, our understanding of the new culture of Russia would continue to be at about the level that it was in the Soviet era.
When we add to that list the possible closing down of the Finnish Institute for Russian and East European Studies, we might just forget the populous and colourful world that lies behind Finland's eastern border.
Helsingin Sanomat / First published in print 27.9.2006
More on this subject:
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KIRSIKKA MORING / Helsingin Sanomat
kirsikka.moring@hs.fi
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