An examination of the transformation of the Russian Empire into the Soviet Empire. Topics include: the invention and unfolding of single-party revolutionary politics, the expansion of the machinery of state, the onset and development of Stalin's personal despotism, the violent attempt to create a noncapitalist society, the experiences and consequences of the monumental war with Nazi Germany, and the various postwar reforms. Special attention paid to the dynamics of the new socialist society, the connection between the power of the state and everyday life, global communism, and the 1991 collapse.

This seminar explores the history of Ukraine from the early 20th century through the present day. Though it covers a rather long period, this course is geared towards the contemporary events in the 21st century. We will try to understand how despite a relatively peaceful transition from communism to independence in the 20th century Ukraine became engulfed by a new war with unprecedented destruction. We start this seminar by setting up historical background of Ukrainian territories between the empire in the late 19th and the early 20th centuries. We will end the course with discussion and analysis of most recent events in Ukraine.

An examination of significant trends in Russian literature from the 2nd half of the 19th century to the Russian Revolution and a bit beyond. The course focuses on many masterpieces of 19th & 20th-century Russian literature. The works (mostly novels) are considered from a stylistic point of view and in the context of Russian historical and cultural developments. The course also focuses on questions of values and on the eternal "big questions" of life that are raised in the literature. Authors read include Turgenev, Dostoevsky, Tolstoy, Chekhov, Bely, Nabokov, and Kharms.

This course examines Soviet animation as a specific cultural phenomenon which tells of aesthetic, ideological, social, and psychological issues in the Soviet and post-Soviet countries. Topics to be discussed include Soviet political propaganda; national identity, gender, the influence of Disney cartoons and rock and roll and hippie cultures on the Soviet animation, "new lyricism" and computer animation. Students will continue developing higher-level Russian language skills in order to present and support their opinions, discuss and explain complex matters in detail, provide lengthy and coherent narrations. The course is conducted in Russian.

Exploration of the theme of madness in the works of Pushkin, Gogol, Dostoevsky, Tolstoy, and Garshin. Discussion of various meanings of madness: as romantic inspiration or confinement; as a reaction to a personal loss or a rebellion against the social system; as a search for the meaning of life or a fight against the world's evil; as craziness or holy foolishness. Readings, discussions, oral presentations, and written papers in Russian. Special emphasis is placed on active use of language and expansion of vocabulary. This course is envisioned as both a language and literature course.

Throughout the 20th century, Soviet cities were epicenters of political upheavals and intense artistic experimentation. They were sites of utopian urban planning, mass industrial labor, and monumental architecture. Yet, they were also spaces where the Socialist experiment became a lived, everyday reality through communal apartments, workers clubs, and public transit. This course explores the city through the century's most innovative novels, poetry, and short fiction. From avant-garde writers to non-conformist dissidents, we will trace key aesthetic currents as we examine the relationship between physical geography and cultural imaginary.

This course offers an introduction to contemporary Ukrainian literature. The political liberalization after the fall of the Soviet Union brought new freedoms of expression to the region but also an influx of globalization, consumerism, and capitalist modes of artistic production. We will examine how contemporary writers responded to communist and imperial legacies as they experimented with genres and carved out a new, national literature. We will also explore the interplay of regional, national, and linguistic identities. All works will be read in English.

The course will provide an overview of the most significant trends and periods in the development of Russian cinema from the 1960s until the latest blockbusters (2000s). The course will concentrate on the development of main genres and styles, major directors and productions, issues of art, race, gender, war and violence in Soviet, post-Soviet and new Russian cinema. All films will be screened with English subtitles.

This course will serve as an introduction to major Russian poets from Pushkin to the present. No prior knowledge of Russian literature is assumed. The focus of the course will be on close readings of individual poems, but the intention is, by generalization, to reach an understanding of the development of Russian literature as a whole. All readings will be in Russian, but discussion will be in English. There will be an additional (optional) hour for those wishing to discuss the poems in Russian.

We start with Tolstoy's artistic stimuli and narrative strategies, explore the author's provocative visions of war, gender, sex, art, social institutions, death, and religion. The emphasis is placed here on the role of a written word in Tolstoy's search for truth and power. The main part is a close reading of his masterwork The War and Peace (1863-68) - a quintessence of both his artistic method and philosophical insights. Each student will be assigned to keep a "hero's diary" and speak on behalf of one or two major heroes of the epic (including the Spirit of History). The roles will be distributed in accordance with the will of fate.

Analysis of works of one of Russia's most important contemporary writers. Focus on major novels, including "Pushkin House," the 1st Russian postmodernist novel. We explore his wide-ranging concerns, such as psychology; philosophy; science; other arts (including jazz & cinema); people's relationship to other biological species; integrity & societal and psychological obstacles to it. We examine him as a Petersburg writer. Focus also on his relationship to time, history, & other writers; his place in Russian & Soviet literature & culture.

This interdisciplinary course explores the history of city-nature relations, centering the intersection of industrialization, environmentalism and modernization known as urban greening. Particular emphasis is placed on urban greening outside Western traditions of capitalist urbanism. We will apply a framework of critical and comparative analysis to the question of how urbanists' visions for socialist urban landscapes have responded to community and environmental health hazards in the long 20th century. What lessons and warnings for present climate justice and mitigation efforts in urbanism can be taken from their attempts?