RU3001 Advanced Russian Language 1, Part 1

This module is mandatory for all Honours programmes containing a Russian element, except for programmes which include RU3101. It is designed to build on the level of language competence attained at the end of RU2002, RU2004 and RU2006. The module deals with grammar, the practical problems of translation from and into Russian, and introduces essay-writing in Russian. Oral tuition forms an important element of this module.

RU3002 Advanced Russian Language 1, Part 2

This module is mandatory for all programmes containing a Russian element, except for programmes which include RU3101 or RU3102. It is designed to build on the language proficiency acquired in RU3001. It deals with grammar, the practical problems of translation, and essay-writing in Russian. Oral tuition forms an important element of the module.

RU3005 Advanced Russian Translation 1

This module is designed to build on the language proficiency attained through a period of study in Russia, either on RU3101 or ML3106 (in Russia). The module is based around the study of the finer points of Russian grammar, advanced translation from and into Russian, essay-writing in Russian, and small-group oral classes.

RU3021 Russian Poetry of the Golden Age

The module is designed to develop the knowledge of Russian literature acquired at sub-honours level, and in particular to examine Russian poetry of the early nineteenth century. It begins with the theory of versification, after which the most important poets of the early nineteenth century are studied, together with key texts in Russian. These include Pushkin's lyric poetry and novel in verse Eugene Onegin, and the poetry of Lermontov and Derzhavin.

RU3022 The Nineteenth-Century Russian Novel

The module is designed to build on the knowledge of Russian literature acquired at sub-honours level, and in particular to examine the genre of the novel as it developed in the nineteenth century. The most important writers of the period are studied, including works by Gogol, Turgenev, Dostoevsky and Tolstoy. Historical and literary context is provided through consideration of the Slavophile / Westerniser debate and literary realism.

RU3024 A Special Russian Author of the Nineteenth Century

The module is designed to build on the knowledge of nineteenth-century Russian literature acquired at sub-honours level, with particular concentration on one major author. Authors offered may include: Pushkin, Gogol, Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, or Chekhov, examining especially those works that are not covered in sub-honours modules. Independent study will form a major element of the module.

RU3025 Russian Fiction 1880 - 1917

The module is designed to build on the knowledge of modern Russian literature acquired at sub-honours level, concentrating on the genre of short prose from the 1890's to the Bolshevik Revolution. It focuses on the fiction of leading realist and neo-realist writers, including Chekhov, Gorkii, Sologub, Andreev and Bunin. All works are studied in Russian.

RU3026 Russian Modernist Ficition 1900 - 1940

The module is designed to build on the knowledge of modern Russian literature acquired at sub-honours level, concentrating on the counter-tradition of 'modernist' or experimental fiction from Symbolism to 'Oberiu' (The association of Real Art).

RU3027 Soviet Fiction 1917 - 1940

The module is designed to build on the knowledge of Soviet literature acquired at sub-honours level, concentrating on the prose genres. It focuses on the work of four leading writers of the 1920s and early 1930s: Zamiatin, Babel, Olesha and Bulgakov. All works are studied in Russian.

RU3030 A Special Russian Author of the Twentieth Century

The module is designed to build on the knowledge of twentieth-century Russian literature acquired at sub-honours level, with particular concentration on one major author and examining especially those works that are not covered in sub-honours modules. Authors offered may include Mandel'shtam, Maiakovskii, Belyi, Solzhenitsyn, etc. Independent study will form a major element of the module.

RU3041 Early Nineteenth-Century Russian Intellectual History

The module is designed to add to the dimensions of language and literature a study of the intellectual movements (philosophy, political ideas, religious thought and literary criticism in particular) in Russia in the first half of the nineteenth century. The most important representatives of the Russian intelligentsia of the period are studied, including the Slavophiles and Westernisers, the Decembrists, and early representatives of Russian religious thought.

RU3042 Late Nineteenth-Century Russian Intellectual History

The module is designed to add to the dimensions of language and literature a study of the intellectual movements (philosophy, political thinking and religious thought in particular) in Russia in the late nineteenth century. The most important representatives of the Russian intelligentsia of the period are studied, including Chernyshevsky, Fedorov, Soloviev, Dostoevsky, Tolstoy and Shestov.

RU3101 Russian Integrated Year Abroad

The objective of the module is language learning and cultural familiarisation through a study placement in Russia. Placements will be as students in Russian at a Foreign Language department at universities or in Language Schools. Formal learning and assessment are through a supervised project chosen in consultation with the module co-ordinator, who will provide more detailed guidelines. The project essay will be 4,000 words in Russian to be received in the Department by May 4th.

RU3102 Semester of Study in Russia

This module is offered subject to the availability of a suitable venue and to the consent of the Head of School. It is an optional part of the degree programme for students who have not spent a year in Russia as part of a degree With Integrated Year Abroad. The module is intended to develop students' skills in all aspects of the modern Russian language through extended residence and study in the country, offering total immersion in the culture. The syllabus is designed in co-operation with a university or other institution in a Russian-speaking environment. The project essay will be 4,000 words in Russian to be received by the Department by July 15th. The examination is sat in Week 1 of the first semester of the following academic year.(Guidelines for printing and binding dissertations can be found at: http://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/printanddesign/dissertation/)

RU3103 Self-Access Summer in Russia

The module is designed to provide residence in Russia with an academic structure, and is intended for students who are unable to take either an integrated year or a semester of residence in Russia. It will take place in the summer of the Junior Honours year. The module will be a period of residence in Russia lasting a minimum of six weeks. A project essay of 2,500 words in Russian must be submitted by September 10th of the year in which the residence takes place.

RU3105 Integrated Year Abroad: Semester of Study in Russia

This module is offered subject to the availability of a suitable venue and to the consent of the Head of School. It is an optional part of the degree programme for students who spend their WIYA year in Russia and one other country. The module is intended to develop students' skills in all aspects of the modern Russian language through extended residence and study in the country, offering total immersion in the culture. The syllabus is designed in co-operation with a university or other institution in a Russian-speaking environment. The project essay will be 4,000 words in Russian to be received by the Department in July. (Guidelines for printing and binding dissertations can be found at: http://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/printanddesign/dissertation/)

RU3106 Integrated Year Abroad: Semester of Study in Russia

This module is offered subject to the availability of a suitable venue and to the consent of the Head of School. It is an optional part of the degree programme for students who spend their WIYA year in Russia and one other country. The module is intended to develop students' skills in all aspects of the modern Russian language through extended residence and study in the country, offering total immersion in the culture. The syllabus is designed in co-operation with a university or other institution in a Russian-speaking environment. The project essay will be 4,000 words in Russian to be received by the Department in July. (Guidelines for printing and binding dissertations can be found at: http://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/printanddesign/dissertation/)

RU3110 Advanced Russian Translation 2

This module builds on the written and spoken language skills developed in RU3005 by students who have spent a period of study in a Russian-speaking environment. Spoken Russian is improved through small group tuition with a native Russian language instructor. There are regular translation exercises grammar classes and oral presentations.

RU4101 Advanced Russian Language 2

This module is mandatory for all Honours programmes containing a Russian element. It is designed to build on the level of language competence attained at the end of RU3002, RU3102 and RU3110. It deals with the practical problems of translating from and into Russian and with essay writing. Oral tuition also forms an important element of this module with the emphasis on single-person reports and group discussions.

RU4102 Advanced Russian Oral Skills

This module is the Oral part of RU4104 Communication Skills and is designed for students pursuing a triple-language or triple-subject degree whose modular programme does not allow them to opt for RU4104. It concentrates on developing the ability to communicate confidently in a broad range of possible situations in different areas of social life. The materials used include texts on a broad variety of topics on contemporary issues in different styles, including contemporary Russian literature, newspapers and magazine articles etc, as well as audiotapes and videotapes.

RU4104 Russian Communication Skills

This module aims to give students confidence in communicating in Russian in a range of contexts, both spoken and written. Classes follow a given theme each week, on which are based student debates, role-plays and written work. Particular attention is given to the expression of emotional and attitudinal standpoints with concrete applications to everyday social situations.

RU4128 Soviet Literature 1940 - 1991

The module is designed to impart an understanding of Soviet and post-Soviet literature of the last fifty years. The module begins with an account of the theory of Socialist Realism and an analysis of one work by a Socialist Realist writer (Erenburg). Attention then switches to post-Socialist Realist writing, including a novel by Solzhenitsyn, a play by Vampilov, and short stories by Tatyana Tolstaya. All works are studied in Russian.

RU4130 Issues in Russian Cultural Memory

This module investigates contemporary Russian culture and society by examining its relationship with the Soviet past, the institutions of memory that mediate this relationship and the cultural practices that inform it. Students will be introduced to a number of critical ideas in memory scholarship, including ‘sites of memory’ [lieux de mémoire], institutions of memory, the falsification of memory, collective amnesia, aphasia, and others. While the module focuses on issues in Russian cultural memory, particularly memory of the post-Stalin and perestroika eras, the theory and criticism studied ranges more widely, including French and British theorists and practitioners. In seminars, students will engage with memoirs, diaries, oral testimony, films, documentaries, and online archives to explore the narrative and aesthetic consequences of the historicising impulse in contemporary Russian culture.

RU4131 Russian 'Village Prose': 1953 - 1980

This module is designed to familiarise students with one of the most ideologically important bodies of literature published in the post-Stalin period, Soviet ‘Village Prose’. Students will read works by a number of the most influential writers to have contributed to the genre, including Vasilii Belov, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, Vasilii Shukshin, and Valentin Rasputin, and engage with the para-literary criticism that emerged around the literary movement. In order to locate the texts within their social and cultural contexts the module will begin with two introductory sessions devoted to the question of urban and rural transformation and its literary treatment. Thereafter, the module will be taught through seminars that examine the themes of urban-rural opposition, village byt, nature, childhood and memory, a number of which will be student-led and introduced by student presentations. Many of the primary texts are available only in Russian and so discussion throughout the module will make reference to the Russian originals.

RU4140 The Russian Silver Age: Art and Time

This module examines a number of key works in music, literature, visual arts, philosophy and poetry from Russia's so-called 'Silver Age'. All the artists studied are united by a fascination with time, and the role of art in the life of historical humanity. Students not only gain a detailed knowledge of the works under consideration, but also of the creative processes that gave birth to them. By looking at the creator's understanding of her work, and of the fate of that work in the world around her, students will gain an invaluable insight into the ideas and impulses behind one of the most exciting periods in European art.

RU4142 The Fantastic in Nineteenth-Century Russian Literature

The fantastic is a genre which interrogates the boundaries between the natural and the supernatural in order to provoke interpretative ambiguity. Developing out of the romantic tradition and alongside the rise of the realist novel, the fantastic enjoyed considerable popularity in Russia and was practised by many of its most notable writers. This module builds on the knowledge of nineteenth-century literature acquired at sub-honours level as students read examples of the fantastic by such writers as Pogorel'skii, Pushkin, Zagoskin, Gogol', Odoevskii, Lermontov, Turgenev, Dostoevskii, Garshin and Chekhov. Analysis of the chosen texts will make reference to theories of the fantastic proposed since c.1950 as well as to narrative theory.

RU4198 Dissertation on a Russian Topic

The dissertation offers students the possibility of personal advanced study on a topic on which they already have adequate basic knowledge and for which a suitable Supervisor can be found. Guidance will be offered on research methods and on presentation. The dissertation can be either a) a study of a given body of primary material in a given perspective, or b) a critical review of a range of secondary material on a given subject. It should be 5,000 - 6,000 words in length, be submitted in accordance with guidelines and deadlines, and normally be written in English. The topic must be formally agreed in advance with the potential supervisor. (Guidelines for printing and binding dissertations can be found at: http://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/printanddesign/dissertation/)

RU4199 Long Dissertation a Russian Topic

The dissertation offers students the possibility of personal advanced study on a topic which they already have adequate basic knowledge and for which a suitable Supervisor can be found. Guidance will be offered on research methods and on presentation. The Dissertation will, as a rule, consist of a study of a given body of primary material in a given perspective. Its length should be 10,000 words maximum, and it should be submitted in accordance with guidelines and deadlines, and normally be written in English. The topic must be formally agreed in advance with both the research co-ordinator and the potential supervisor.(Guidelines for printing and binding dissertations can be found at: http://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/printanddesign/dissertation/)

RU4201 Directed Readings in Central and East European Languages 1

This module involves an introduction to the study of one of the following languages: Bulgarian, Croatian, Czech, Macedonian, Polish, Serbian, Slovak, Slovene, Upper and Lower Sorbian, or Ukrainian. This module will involve intensive study of the phonology, morphology, syntax, and lexicon of the language chosen. The student will, after completion of the module have achieved a sufficiently high level of reading knowledge to allow him/her to read and understand academic and every-day documents in the target language.