Course

RUS 101  Beginning Russian

Professor

Marina Kostalevsky

CRN

97099

 

Schedule

M T W Th    2:55 -3:55 pm      OLINLC 208

Distribution

Foreign Language, Literature & Culture

A course for students with little or no previous knowledge of Russian that introduces the fundamentals of the spoken and written language as well as Russian culture. We will emphasize conversation, reading, and written proficiency and encourage creative expression in autobiographical and fictional compositions. Audio-visual materials will be an integral part of the learning process. In addition to regular class meetings, students are required to attend a one-hour-per-week tutorial. Beginning Russian will be followed by an intensive 8-credit course in the spring semester and a 4-credit summer language and culture program in St. Petersburg, Russia.

 

Course

RUS 206   Continuing Russian

Professor

Elena Protsenko

CRN

97100

 

Schedule

Mon Tu Th 3:00 – 4:20 pm    OLINLC 115

Distribution

Foreign Language, Literature & Culture

This course is designed to continue refining and engaging students' practice of speaking, reading, and writing Russian. Students will expand their vocabulary and range of stylistic nuance by writing regular response papers and presenting oral reports. Increasing oral proficiency is a primary aim of this course, as well as developing reading and viewing strategies appropriate to the widest variety of written texts and Russian television and film. We will focus on the syntax of the complex Russian sentence and on grammatical nuances. The class will be conducted only in Russian.  

 

Course

LIT 2404   Fantastic Journeys and the Modern World

Professor

Jonathan Brent

CRN

97029

 

Schedule

Tu               7:00 -9:20 pm      OLIN 202

Distribution

Literature in English

Cross-listed:  Russian & Eurasian Studies

Related interest:  STS

The modern world has been characterized in many ways, as a time of unimaginable freedom, as well as existential angst, exile, loss of the idea of home, loss of the idea of positive heroes; a triumphant embracing of the “new” and the future, as well as the troubling encounter with machines and the menace of totalitarianism.   It was a time when barriers of all sorts began to crumble—barriers between past and present, foreground and background, high and low culture, beauty and ugliness, good and evil.  Artists and writers responded in many different ways across the world. The writers we will read in this class represent the fulcrum of creativity in America, Central or Eastern Europe and Russia.  Each lived at a different axis of modernity—where East met West, where the Russian Revolution provided a vibrant but terrifying image of liberation, where modern technological innovation produced endless possibilities of satirization of both the old world and the new, where ethnic and genocidal violence was developing under the surface of this innovation into the foreseeable European Holocaust. These writers have something powerful and unique to say about the advent of the modern period in the fantastic parallel worlds they created where machines take on lives of their own, grotesque transformations violate the laws of science, and inversions of normality become the norm.  Through their fantastic conceptions a vision of modernity emerges which questions the most basic presumptions of western civilization—in art, morality, politics, the psyche and social life—a vision for which the West still has no satisfying response. All readings are in English. We will read The Marvelous Land of Oz (L. Frank Baum), The Metamorphosis (Kafka), RUR (Capek), War with the Newts (Capek), Street of Crocodiles (Schulz), Sanatorium Under the Sign of the Hour Glass (Schulz), Envy (Olesha) The Bedbug (Mayakovsky). There will be 4 short papers for the course & one final paper.

 

Course

RUS 314  Russian Your Way:  Advanced Speaking and Writing

Professor

Elena Protsenko

CRN

97527

 

Schedule

Tu Th    10:30 – 11:50 am  Olin 308

Distribution

Foreign Language, Literature & Culture

The focus of this course is on the refinement of skills in written and spoken Russian on an advanced level. We will base our study of conversational Russian on examples from contemporary fiction and non-fiction as well as the most recent film materials available from Russia. Students will actively increase their vocabulary through participation in discussions on a range of topics and in role-playing situations based on “real life.” Our study of written skills will be based on analytical reading of contemporary Russian texts of various styles and genres. We will develop skills applicable to both individual written analysis and spoken analysis in group discussions in studying Russian syntax and its nuances. These approaches will enable students to develop their own writing style in Russian as well as improve fluency in expressing themselves. Students will be expected to write 1-2 essays per week on relevant topics. Conducted only in Russian.

 

Course

RUS / LIT 325    Body,  Mind, and Spirit in Dostoevsky

Professor

Marina Kostalevsky

CRN

97480

 

Schedule

Tu Th          1:00 – 2:20  OLINLC 120

Distribution

Literature in English

An exploration of Dostoevsky’s multifaceted world. Particular attention will be paid to the way the writer experiments with the themes of body and sexuality, intellectual pursuit and philosophy, spiritual quest and religion. Readings include three short stories: “Bobok,” A Gentle Creature,” “Notes from the Underground;” three novels: “Crime and Punishment,” “The Idiot,” “The Brothers Karamazov;” as well as Dostoevsky’s letters and excerpts from “A Diary of a Writer.” Analysis of ideas, devices and structures of these texts will be supplemented by reference to major critical and theoretical writings. The course is meant to provide both an approach to Dostoevsky and to existing scholarship on Dostoevsky’s art and techniques. All readings and discussions in English.

 

Course

RUS 420  Detskii mir / A Child’s World

Professor

Marina Kostalevsky

CRN

97528

 

Schedule

Wed  9:30 – 11:50 am  OLIN 302

Distribution

Foreign Language, Literature & Culture

Reading, discussion, and lexical analysis of Russian literature for children and about children. Texts include folk fairy tales, works by Pushkin, Odoevskii, Tolstoy, Chekhov, Sologub, Maiakovskii, Chukovskii, Kharms, Marshak, and Zakhoder. Weekly compositions or translations, reviews of grammar and syntax. Videotapes and films will be used for developing skills in language comprehension. Conducted in Russian.

(Descriptions of these Social Studies courses cross-listed in Russian & Eurasian Studies can be found in the primary course section.)

Course

HIST 168   Czarist Russia

Professor

Gennady Shkliarevsky

CRN

97024

 

Schedule

Wed Fri      1:30 -2:50 pm      OLIN 204

Distribution

History

 

Course

HIST 245   History of East Central Europe since WWII

Professor

Gennady Shkliarevsky

CRN

97023

 

Schedule

Tu Th          4:00 -5:20 pm      OLIN 205

Distribution

History

 

Course

PS 255  The  Politics of Russia and the Soviet Successor States

Professor

Jonathan Becker

CRN

97174

 

Schedule

Mon Wed   10:30 - 11:50 am  PRE 128

Distribution

Social Science