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Culture Quotes
"It seems that the days of public modesty and concern about how we look are far from us. I will not say they are gone forever, in culture nothing is forever."
8
"We're famous" iggy whispered so low that Fang could barely hear him."So's Swine Flu" Fang whispered back."
8
"The young Cambridge group the group that stood for "freedom" and flannel trousers and flannel shirts open at the neck and a well-bred sort of emotional anarchy and a whispering murmuring sort of voice and an ultra-sensitive sort of manner."
8
"The education I received was a British education, in which British ideas, British culture, British institutions, were automatically assumed to be superior. There was no such thing as African culture."
8
"A large American automobile came crawling close to us, and we could hear from behind its thick windows the deep bass of the radio, and the nasty words of a hateful song.It seemed like so much of modern music, a din to drive human beings mad."
8
"It was a subtle refinement of God to learn Greek when he wished to write a book " and that he did not learn it better."
8
"Jim Crow, moreover, was seen executing his world-renowned dance, in gingerbread."
8
"I have read more about Oprah Winfrey's ass than I have about the rise of China as an economic superpower. I fear this is no exaggeration. Perhaps China is rising as an economic superpower because its women aren't spending all their time reading about Oprah Winfrey's ass."
8
"It was a red-flannel chest-protector, one of those large quasi-hygienic objects that with pills and medicines take the place of beneficial relics and images among the Protestant peoples of Christendom."
8
"All those things for which we have no words are lost. The mind-the culture-has two little tools, grammar and lexicon: a decorated sand bucket and a matching shovel. With these we bluster about the continents and do all the world's work. With these we try to save our very lives."
7
"India's openness to new ideas is manifest in the Rig Veda: ??? ?????? ?????? ????? ??????? Let noble thoughts come to us from all sides."
7
"My idols are Janis Joplin and Annie Lennox, who are neither of them from the typical pop culture."
7
"Don't tell anyone, but on the pagan day of the sun god Ra, I kneel at the foot of an ancient instrument of torture and consume ritualistic symbols of blood and flesh. ...And if any of you care to join me, come to the Harvard chapel on Sunday, kneel beneath the crucifix, and take Holy Communion."
7
"Her accent's funny, different from mine, different from anyone in Prentisstown's. Her lips make different kinds of outlines for the letters, like they're swooping down on them from above, pushing them into shape, telling them what to say. In Prentisstown, everyone talks like they're sneaking up on their words, ready to club them from behind."
7
"Culture, religion, and education, are conspiracies to standardize worldviews."
6
"It's a good country for myths. Things seem to take root here."
6
"Americans have an inability to relax into sheer pleasure.Ours is an entertainment seeking-nation, but not necessarily a pleasure-seeking one....This is the cause of that great sad American stereotype- the overstressed executive who goes on vacation, but who cannot relax."
6
"Cookery means, English thoroughness, French art, and Arabian hospitality; it means the knowledge of all fruits and herbs and balms and spices; it means carefulness, inventiveness, and watchfulness."
6
"Old words are reborn with new faces."
5
"The Frenchman works until he can play. The American works until he can't play; and then thanks the devil, his master, that he is donkey enough to die in harness. But the Englishman, as he has since become, works until he can pretend that he never worked at all."
5
"International Yoga Day is a reflection of the largest knowledge based peoples' movement the world has ever seen."
5
"I see Lord Buddha in the 21st Century across national borders, across faith systems, across political ideologies, playing the role of a bridge to promote understanding to counsel patience and to enlighten us with tolerance and empathy."
5
"There have been great societies that did not use the wheel, but there have been no societies that did not tell stories."
5
"Unfortunately, unapproachable leaders create a tense environment that may prevent their people from bringing their best strengths and talents or challenges and solutions forward."
5
"Note for Americans and other aliens: Milton Keynes is a new city approximately halfway between London and Birmingham. It was built to be modern, efficient, healthy, and, all in all, a pleasant place to live. Many Britons find this amusing."
5
"Then there was the whole concept of coal mining, which is a culture unto itself, the most dangerous occupation in the world, and which draws and develops a certain kind of man."
5
"Literature decays only as men become more and more corrupt."
5
"Have you ever seen a man, woman, or child who wasn't eating an egg or just going to eat an egg or just coming away from eating an egg? I tell you, the good old egg is the foundation of daily life. Stop the first man you meet in the street and ask him which he'd sooner lose, his egg or his wife, and see what he says!"
5
"The sign was spray-painted in Arabic and English, probably from some attempt by the farmer to sell his wares in the market. The English read: Dates-best price. Cold Bebsi. "Bebsi?" I asked."Pepsi," Walt said. "I read about it on the Internet. There's no 'p' in Arabic. Everyone here calls the soda Bebsi.""So you have to have Bebsi with your bizza?""Brobably."
5
"It would be mortifying to the feelings of many ladies, could they be made to understand how little the heart of a man is affected by what is costly or new in their attire... Woman is fine for her own satisfaction alone. No man will admire her the more, no woman will like her the better for it. Neatness and fashion are enough for the former, and a something of shabbiness or impropriety will be most endearing to the latter."
5
"Foreign behavior? What the fuck are you talking about? Foreign behavior? Have you read Things Fall Apart? Ifemulu asked, wishing she had not told Ranyinudo about Dike. She was angrier with Ranyinudo than she had ever been, yet she knew that Ranyinudo meant well, and had said what many other Nigerians would say, which was why she had not told anyone else about Dike's suicide attempt since she came back."
5
"Menfolks listens to somebody because of what he says. Women don't. They don't care what he said. They listens because of what he is."
5
"Sometimes Alton Darwin would talk to me about the planet he was on before he was transported in a steel box to Athena. 'Drugs were food,' he said. 'I was in the food business. Just because people on one planet eat a certain kind of food they're hungry for, that makes them feel better after they eat it, that doesn't mean people on other planets shouldn't eat something else. On some planets I'm sure there are people who eat stones, and then feel wonderful for a little while afterwords. Then it's time to eat stones again."
5
"Beginning with Santa Claus as a cognitive exercise, a child is encouraged to share the same idea of reality as his peers. Even if that reality is patently invented and ludicrous, belief is encouraged with gifts that support and promote the common cultural lies. The greatest consensus in modern society is our traffic systems. The way a flood of strangers can interact, sharing a path, almost all of them traveling without incident. It only takes one dissenting driver to create anarchy."
5
"No," he said, "look, it's very, very simple ... all I want ... is a cup of tea. You are going to make one for me. Keep quiet and listen." And he sat. He told the Nutri-Matic about India, he told it about China, he told it about Ceylon. He told it about broad leaves drying in the sun. He told it about silver teapots. He told it about summer afternoons on the lawn. He told it about putting in the milk before the tea so it wouldn't get scalded. He even told it (briefly) about the history of the East India Company."So that's it, is it?" said the Nutri-Matic when he had finished. "Yes," said Arthur, "that is what I want.""You want the taste of dried leaves in boiled water?""Er, yes. With milk.""Squirted out of a cow?""Well, in a manner of speaking I suppose ..."
5
"When you touch someone who authentically represents a tradition, you not only touch his or her tradition, you also touch your own."
5
"The key to understanding any people is in its art: its writing, painting, sculpture."
5
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