Demetrius Grigolaya

This Website was created as a project for the J-50, "Electronic Information Sources," class. One of the assignments in this class was an information Treasure Hunt. We searched Internet, various databases and online catalogs to find different sources of information, related to a particular issue.

Below you can find: the essay, explaining what topic I investigated for the class, some of the books and Internet sources and another essay on an Internet issue, Recent Attempts of Internet Censorship in Belarus.

Few months ago I was visiting a couple, who are Russian-speakers as I am, in Minneapolis.

They are both just 25. What may be surprising is that they already bought a house, two cars, had prestigious jobs downtown Minneapolis after having spent in the U.S. a mere year and two (the immigration service did not issue a visa for Lena, the wife).

And they did not seem to be an exception for me, since I met a lot of Russians in America, young and affluent.

One evening Nikita gave me a book by Thomas Stanley and William Danko, The Millionaire Next Door. He pointed me to the chapter that dealt with a percentage of millionaires among people from different ethnic backgrounds.

And… ethnic Russians had the highest, 22 percent, more than one in a five.

A lot of questions arouse: what about income differences - I heard a lot about misery of people who just came to New York or Chicago, maybe few wealthy persons distort the whole picture, how one can explain that - education? previously accumulated wealth? cultural traditions?, what about other ethnic groups, that stand close - say, Hungarians and Scots, and those far below on the income ladder.

So here is the topic I want to explore: "Income differences and ethnic backgrounds in the U.S.: why and how?"

I am going to answer the following questions. How much of any difference may be attributed to unexplained factors, somehow closely associated with a person's ethnicity; what are these differences? What are the reasons for that?

You cannot reasonably argue that some ethnicities are just better; there should be some subtle and unexplained differences that somehow came to associate themselves in this country with culture, history of different people in the U.S. and other factors that I am not even able to think about right now.

And are these differences something temporary or more persistent throughout American history?

And the final question, how Americans benefit and may benefit even more from this diversity of culture.

The first and obvious audience for my paper and eventually the website are people who associate themselves with different cultural backgrounds and want to understand this differences.

Another part of the audience is anybody who cares about his or her financial future and wants to go beyond clear-cut explanations already provided.

Sources: Books

Graham, Hilary, ed.Understanding health inequalities. Buckingham [England] ; Philadelphia : Open University Press, 2001, 2000.
Note: contains several chapters dealing with wealth.

Call number at HSL Books-5th Floor, WA 30 U55 2001.

Ratcliff, Richard et al., eds. The politics of wealth and inequality. Greenwich, Conn. : JAI Press, 1995.

Call number at Davis Library, JA76 .R46 vol. 5.

Silbiger, Steven. The Jewish phenomenon : seven keys to the enduring wealth of a people. Atlanta, Ga. : Longstreet Press, c2000.

Call number at Davis Library, HQ536 .I49 1997.

Stanley, Thomas & Danko, William. The millionaire next door : the surprising secrets of America's wealthy. Atlanta, Ga. : Longstreet Press, c1996.

Call number at Davis Library, HC110.S3 S73 1996.

Waters, Mary C. "Immigrant families at risk: factors that undermine chances for success." In Immigration and the family : research and policy on U.S. immigrants. Mahwah, N.J.: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 1997.

Call numbers at Davis Library, HQ536 .I49 1997;
at HSL Ethnic Health-1st Floor, HQ 536 I33 1997.

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The call numbers for the books are at the following libraries.

Davis Library. The Walter Royal Davis Library is the central library for the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Visit the Davis Library website and the "About Davis Library" webpage.

HSL. Health Science Library at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Visit Health Science Library website.

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Internet Sources

Title of the web page: U.S. Census Bureau, Ancestry.
Web address: http://www.census.gov/population/www/ancestry.html
Brief description. Among other things contains various statistical data on selected characteristics by ancestry group: education, income and poverty, labor force.
Source of the web page: U.S. Census Bureau of U.S. Department of Commerce.

Title of the web page: About Arab Americans.
Web address: http://www.aaiusa.org/arabamericans/index.htm
Brief description. Contains articles and statistical data analysis about Arab American community. Arab Americans is one of the most educated groups in the U.S., Egyptian American being most educated and second most wealthy ethnic group.
Source of the Web page: Arab American Institute, USA.

Title of the web page: More Famous Hungarians.
Web address: http://www.hungary.org/users/hipcat/famous2.htm.
Brief description. Famous Hungarians: from Joseph Pulitzer to George Soros.
Source of the Web page: Hungarian Cultural and Information Center.

More websites below.

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An essay on a Net controversy.

Recent Attempts of Internet Censorship in Belarus

The government of Belarus successfully censored various Internet sites on the very day of the last presidential election, September 9, 2001. Internet users in Belarus lost access to several news sites, run by the acting president Lukashenka's critics.

Opposition and indepenent media in Belarus and then Western media reported the incident.

"Internet users here abruptly lost access today to between 12 and 20 Web sites run by Mr. Lukashenko's critics. They included the Goncharik [the presidential candidate from the united opposition] campaign site; the Internet version of a leading independent newspaper, Belaruskaya Delovaya Gazeta; and the popular news briefing posted daily by the antigovernment group Charter 97," the New York Times reported (1).

On the election day and the day before, which were Sunday and Saturday, Belorusskaya Delovaya Gazeta (see note 1 below) posted a message, which demanded different officials, without actually naming them, stop sending bomb threat response groups, fire department and other inspectors, which reportedly jeopardized live internet coverage of the election (2). "Back off! We are just covering election," it said. BDG used different mirror sites and broadcasting centers across the Belarusian capital Minsk to back-up the only live coverage of the election from Belarus, according to the message.

But it did not prevent the coverage from being stopped, at least for Belarusian Internet users.
"As of the night of 8 September, the records of some independent media and NGOs were deleted from the DNS zone BY, including .bdg.by, .home.by, .irex.minsk.by, .unibel.by, article19.by, domash.by. In the afternoon of 9 September, some IP web addresses located abroad were blocked," Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty reported (3). These organizations experienced problems with receiving e-mails, according to various media reports.

The web sites available from abroad and blocked on the election day included those providing special coverage of the Belarusian elections, according to Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty.

The censorship effort was successful because of the monopoly by the Internet-provider Belpak. Belpak is controlled by the state through the nationwide telephone monopolist Beltelecom and is able to effectively block all the Internet traffic from and into Belarus.

"We were expecting problems. We complained to Beltelecom which gave us no explanation. I think it is a decision of the Security Council which controls the Internet," said Alexander Pankratov, one of he senior production managers at Belorusskaya Delovaya Gazeta (see note 2 below) , in an interview to Agence France-Presse (4).

The incident seems not reported by Belarusian official, pro-Lukashenka, media. Security service officials denied any role, though the domain .by is supported by the State Center for Information Security of the Belarus Security Council of President of the Republic of Belarus (http://www.tld.by), according to Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty.

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Essay sources and notes

(1) "Belarus Leader Claims Big Election Victory, But Many Doubt It," The New York Times, September 10, 2001, p.A8. Also Available [Database]: Academic Universe Lexis-Nexis [Accessed September 16, 2001].
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(2) BDG-Online, the front page. Available [Online] www.bdg.by [Accessed September 9, 2001].
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(3) "Election Day: Tight Restrictions On Internet Access," Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, September 19, 2001, Volume 1 Number 30. Available: http://www.rferl.org/mm/default.asp [Accesses September 19, 2001].
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(4) "Belarus opposition web sites blocked on election day," Agence France Presse, September 9, 2001, International News section. Available [database]: Academic Universe Lexis-Nexis [Accessed Spetember 16, 2001].
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Notes

(1) Belorusskaya Delovaya Gazeta (Belarusian Business Newspaper) is a Belarussian Russian-language newspaper, Belarusian and Russian two official languages in the country. The transliteration of the newspaper's name as "Belaruskaya Delovaya Gazeta" by The New York Times is NOT appropriate since it mixes in itself one Belarusian word "Belaruskaya" ("Belarusian"), one Russian word "Delovaya" ("Business" as an adjective), and one word which is the same in Russian and Belarusian "Gazeta" ("Newspaper").
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(2) Alexander Pankratov was incorrectly identified by Agence France Presse as "one of the senior editors" at Belarusian Business Newspaper. He is actually a production manager with varying responsibilities both in paper and Internet editions of the newspaper, along with other senior managers.
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Websites

Title of the webpage: Scandal: Virtual "Curtain" (in Russian)
Web address: http://bdg.press.net.by/2001/09/2001_09_11.1030/30_4_2.shtml
Brief description. The article on the event from Belorusskaya Delovaya Gazeta, involved in the conflict, by one of the senior production managers Alexei Nadenenko, available free of charge any time after the publication.
Source of the Website: Belorusskaya Delovaya Gazeta.

Title of the webpage: The Authorities Won The Game With The Opposition (in Russian)
Web address: http://www.irex.minsk.by/promedia/press/gazeta.article.asp?146720
Brief description: The article on the event from Belorusskaya Gazeta, a Belarusian analytical weekly and a rival spin-off from Belorusskaya Delovaya Gazeta.
Source of the Web site: International Research and Exchange Board (IREX) in Belarus.

Title of the webpage: Media archive (in Russian)
Web address: http://www.irex.minsk.by/promedia/press/index.asp
Brief description: A media archive, which allows search in Belarusian newspapers, for example, for "Internet AND election" for after September 9, 2001.
Source of the Web site: International Research and Exchange Board (IREX) in Belarus, project ProMedia, supported by the Department of State of the United States of America.

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