After receiving his Ph.D. in Russian studies in 1968 Mr. Aman was invited to join the faculty of the University of Texas Slavic Department where he taught both undergraduates and graduate students ...ver maisAfter receiving his Ph.D. in Russian studies in 1968 Mr. Aman was invited to join the faculty of the University of Texas Slavic Department where he taught both undergraduates and graduate students for a number of years.
Appreciating that his temperament required a more intense form of activity he later joined a small international trading company that specialized in Soviet commerce at a time when there were only a very few American companies involved in that part of the world. This was the worst phase of the cold war when American citizens were unwelcome visitors to the Soviet Union, so the work offered challenges heretofore outside his experience. To a certain extent, Dr. Aman became a pioneer in opening the Soviet mind to real American attitudes and the American mindset to a different way of viewing Soviet life.
He later directed his own company in consulting with American firms interested in unlocking trade opportunities in the Soviet Union and Russian, Kazakh and Ukrainian entities desirous of tapping business potential in America. Still later he worked for various American companies contracted by the State Department for Government sponsored privatization and democracy development projects in former Soviet states.
Aman eventually spent around thirty years traveling to Soviet and ex-Soviet Republics; and lived and worked there for an accumulated nine years of his life. He spent more time in the Soviet environment than the vast majority of Americans and got to know and understand life there like very few others. “It All Started With Gogol” is his selection of a few of the endlessly fascinating adventures and experiences that occurred to him during this lengthy period of time.ver menos