German, Slavic & Eurasian Studies

An introductory course of the spoken and written language. Aims at the acquisition of basic structures, vocabulary, and sound systems. For students with no previous study of the language.

Continuation of an introductory course of the spoken and written language. Aims at the acquisition of basic structures, vocabulary, and sound systems.

This course introduces German literature and culture while also serving as an introduction to the seminar method of instruction. The course is writing-intensive, with emphasis given to improving students' writing skills through the careful analysis of specific texts.

This course is taught as part of the Summer Berlin Program and is designed as an introductory course for students who have not acquired any formal knowledge of German before enrolling at the University Notre Dame. We will develop skills in the five areas of proficiency: aural comprehension, speaking, reading comprehension, written expression, and cultural competency.

In this course, students will develop written and oral communication skills useful for the German business world. They will become acquainted with various aspects of German business culture and will examine key cultural differences in business practices. The course will include readings and discussions on Germany's role as a global and EU business player.

In this course, students will build on and develop their communicative abilities acquired in Beginning German I and II. The four-skills approach (speaking, listening, reading, and writing) is centered on authentic texts, recordings, videos, and other images. The course includes grammar review, concentrated vocabulary expansion, and intensive practice.

In this bridge course, students will strengthen and refine the four linguistic skills (speaking, listening, reading, and writing). Students will work toward greater fluency, accuracy, and complexity of expression. They will debate, analyze, and express opinions. Materials and class discussions will center on a cultural topic that will carry through the entire semester.

In this seminar we want to discuss the processes and historical contexts of creating, maintaining and challenging alterity in the European Middle Ages with a special focus on the lives of Jewish Europeans. We will also compare the relationship of Jews to societies ruled and dominated by Christians and Muslims with the experiences of other (supposedly or real) marginalized groups like so called heretics and "pagans".

This lecture course examines some of the most important events, ideas, and personalities that shaped late Imperial, Soviet, and post-Soviet periods of Russian history during the last one hundred years: from the outbreak of the First World War and the Revolutions of 1905 and 1917 through the Great Terror of the 1930s, the experience of the Second World War and the emergence of the Soviet Empire, late Stalinism and post-Stalinist developed or mature socialism, the collapse of the communist rule and the disintegration of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s, as well as Russia's uneasy transition "out of Totalitarianism" and into Putin's authoritarianism during the first fourteen years of the twentieth-first century. The course is designed for history majors as well as for students in other disciplines with or without background in modern Russian and East European history.

A vampire stalks you through a dark tunnel. A mad scientist gives human form to an android. Regimented masses march beneath monumental swastikas. Some of the most enduring images of the twentieth century were crafted by German filmmakers. They filmed in the shadow of the First World War, in the midst of economic turmoil, in the service of the Nazi dictatorship, and in a Germany divided by the Cold War. They used cinema to grapple with the legacies of military defeat, to articulate their anxieties about industrial modernity, to envision utopian futures, to justify the murder of millions, and to come to terms with these monstrous crimes. This course will integrate the disciplinary insights of history and film studies to examine how Germans confronted the upheavals and traumas associated with modernity, the utopian fantasies and cataclysmic horrors of the twentieth-century. Together, the class will pursue three major objectives. First, students will learn about the most important events and developments of modern German history. They will examine how shifting economic, cultural, and political realities shaped the German film industry, and how filmmakers used their work to understand and intervene in their social, political, and cultural issues of their day. Second, students will learn to critically analyze films. They will learn how the structural components of a film - choices in composition, editing, and sound-mixing - craft meaning through immersive spectacles that speak to audiences on multiple intellectual and emotional levels. Students will explore how filmmakers deploy these techniques to produce awe-inspiring entertainments, sophisticated instruments of propaganda, and radical social critiques. As historical artifacts, films reflect the society which created them. But students will also consider how films, as works of art, survive beyond their historical context, and are reinterpreted by new audiences with new priorities. Finally, students will practice the skills of historical literacy. They will digest, analyze, and criticize important scholarship (secondary literature). They will discern the relevance of particular interpretations for important debates. They will use sustained analysis of films as primary sources to develop, articulate, and defend their own historical interpretations and arguments.

In this class, we will consider existentialism as a European phenomenon that for our purposes begins in the early and mid-nineteenth century with Søren Kierkegaard and Fyodor Dostoyevsky and continues in the works of several German and French thinkers such as Friedrich Nietzsche, Karl Jaspers, Martin Heidegger, Jean Paul Sartre, Simone de Beauvoir, Albert Camus and Simone Weil. We will consider some of the principal themes of existentialism - the primacy of authenticity, the pervasiveness of "dread" or Angst, the inescapability of the absurd - and explore them through a number of representative works of philosophy, literature and film.

In this class we will examine the relationship of philosophy and narrative and the impact of narrative on change in ourselves and in the outside world. Although western philosophy is seen as the primary apologist of pure rationality, it had a close relationship to literature throughout times, beginning with Plato and his dialogues. However, there has often been (and still is until today) a fight between philosophers engaging in literary style (think for example of Rousseau) and those who condemned this form of writing as a "pseudo-science" (as did Voltaire, Rousseau's arch-rival).Our goal is to take a close look at this quarrel, the different ways of philosophizing and the arguments around it, asking ourselves how knowledge comes about and what makes a rational argument different from a literary, especially narrative, form of discovery. During this journey we will discuss the how, what-for, and why of philosophy and of literature. For this we will take on an interdisciplinary perspective, which will include not only philosophical thinking but also psychology and literature itself. Students with a love of literature, prospective philosophers interested in the intersection of literature and narrative, and prospective majors in English, foreign languages and literatures, and psychology might find the course especially attractive.

What tortures us [...] is an opinion, and every evil is only as great as we have reckoned it to be. In our own hands we have the remedy. Let us [...] deceive ourselves". (Seneca) Is this good advice to take to heart in our lives? Does self-deception make us happy? Or does it pose dangers to our moral integrity, so that sincerity should always be our ideal? In this course, we will look at important answers to these questions. We will also discuss what other philosophical conundrums are associated with self-deception and what solutions to them have been proposed in the literature - by contemporary thinkers and by thinkers of the tradition.

This is the discussion section for GE 20410

Over the last decade or so, there has been a new and prominent wave of "New Atheism," often promoted in popular books that reach a wide and, apparently, appreciative audience. Yet, atheism is as old as religion itself, and in the Western tradition has roots that extend into the earliest recorded history. In this class we will consider atheism on its own merits - its arguments, values, and intentions - but also as a historical phenomenon, tracing its original expressions and especially its rise during the "modern" period beginning in the 17th and 18th centuries. We will thus focus on Spinoza, Hume, d'Holback, Ludwig Feuerbach, Schopenhauer, Nietzsche, and among the "New Atheists" Daniel Dennett, Sam Harris, Richard Dawkins, and Christopher Hitchins. This course will be taught in English.

This course is taught as part of the Summer Berlin Program and is designed for students who have begun learning German on campus before attending the summer program. We will work intensively to further develop the five skills areas of proficiency: aural comprehension, speaking, reading comprehension, written expression, and cultural competency.

By calling into question the pervasive inequalities throughout history and within the dominant capitalist economic system, by challenging the very foundation of Western philosophy and culture, and by interrogating our psychological conception of ourselves, Karl Marx, Friedrich Nietzsche, and Sigmund Freud respectively have undeniably changed our world by revolutionizing the way we think about it. These three emerged from the intellectual and political tumult of the 19th century with new visions of humanity and its place in the world. This course will serve as an introductory guide for students to these revolutionary thinkers’ ideas as presented in their writing, placing it in its intellectual-historical context while also exploring its consequences for the present by looking at its resonance in contemporary culture. We will analyze these philosophers both in terms of their individual contributions to philosophical discourse as well as their collective position as the “masters of suspicion” in the words of the French philosopher Paul Ricœur, inaugurating a new age of skepticism toward the traditional underpinnings of Western culture from social organization, religion, and morality to human agency and the very act of thinking.

In consultation with the instructor the student will work on introductory German language grammar and syntax

Violence and bloodshed have long been central to the modern conception of the middle ages. In recent film and literature, the perceived "realism" of a given work tends, by and large, to correspond directly with the willingness of the creators to depict brutality. Even in the medievalism of popular fantasy, the depiction of violence in all its varied forms, from the battlefield to the bedchamber, has been justified and excused by claims of representing past realities of common experience. This course will question just how violent the middle ages were, and for whom. More importantly, it will seek to understand how the varied cultures and peoples of medieval Europe conceptualized and understood violence themselves, and what role it played in their lives and imaginations. In the course of our investigation, we will explore literary narratives of vengeance and crusade and farcical tales of household bloodshed. We will read law codes and sermons attempting to regulate and channel violence. We will read accounts, justifications, and repudiations of torture, execution, and mercy. We will read about peace-making and peace- breaking, and the stories that were told about it. We will question what constitutes violence, and how violence relates to shifting categories of gender, class, and group identity. In all of this, we will seek to identify the differences and similarities between their conceptions of violence and our own can teach us not only about them, but about ourselves.

A historical overview and critical analysis of the impact of selected, eminent women from the German-speaking world from the Middle Ages to the present including, among others, Hildegard von Bingen, Hannah Arendt, and Angela Merkel. The course analyzes how their contributions and actions have shaped cultural, political, scientific, and social discourse, structures, and institutions in Germany and beyond. While the emphasis is on German culture and society, the course work encourages students to explore and make connections to women from other cultures and societies who have shattered glass ceilings and made a mark on their world. Taught in English.

Why did one of the most cultivated European nations in a few years be transformed into probably the most murderous totalitarian system of history? Aim of the course is to study, first, several aspects of the Weimar republic that render the transition to National Socialism less enigmatic. We will read the Weimar constitution, study several of the works of the leading jurist Carl Schmitt, who both intelligently interpreted the constitution and later became a fanatic supporter of Nationalsocialism, and look at literary and filmic expressions of the slow dissolution of bourgeois morality. We will, secondly, read Joachim Fest's biography of Hitler, Hannah Arendt's classical study of totalitarianism, and Robert Paxton's Anatomy of Fascism, which offers a comparative perspective. Students will be encouraged to reflect on the question of whether a repetition of the events in 1933 is possible.

The years between the First and Second World Wars in Germany, 1918-1933, was a period of tremendous cultural and social experimentation. All of the arts—literature, painting, music, film, architecture—experienced radical transformations, in which artists broke with centuries of traditions and explored new ways of expression and shaping the environment. Politically it was a time of great change as well, with competing ideologies transforming the way people thought of themselves in relation to each other and to society and the state at large. In this class, we will explore some of the major movements, works, and people that characterize this extraordinary decade and a half of transition and upheaval. Topics and figures we will consider are Expressionism, Bauhaus, New Objectivity, Atonal music, Fritz Lang, Bertolt Brecht, Klaus Mann, Irmgard Keun, Marlene Dietrich, Hermann Hesse, Christopher Isherwood, Käthe Kollwitz, Georg Grosz, Otto Dix. Taught in German.

Film festivals are pivotal in shaping film history, curating (trans)national film canons (Vallejo 2020), and discovering new filmmakers. They foster industry networks and cultural dialogues and serve as platforms for negotiating identities and experiences. The rapid growth of film festivals and their increasing function within the production, distribution and exhibition of film has led to the rise of film festival studies (De Valck & Loist 2009; Iordanova 2013). This seminar introduces students to key theories and methods in film festival studies (de Valck, Kredell & Loist 2016; Ostrowska & Falicov 2024). The first part covers the history and theories of film festivals, examining them as networks and ecosystems. This section will also cover methodological approaches in the study of festivals. The second part focuses on specific festivals, analyzing their role in negotiating identities and shaping film history, the formation of audiences and communities through curation and exhibition practices. Attendance at film festivals during the semester is encouraged.

According to the stereotype of Medieval Europe this was a uniform, purely Christian society, but of course the reality was much more complex. During the 1,000 years of history under consideration, ‘Europe' needs to be reframed as part of the ‘Eufrasian world zone', as at least Europe, Western Asia and North Africa were closely connected through migrations, trade and expansions. For example: We know for sure that Jewish people from Israel/Palestine already migrated to cities in the Western part of the Roman Empire in the first and second centuries A.D., but it is unclear whether these communities persisted throughout the so-called Barbarian Invasions north of the Pyrenees or Alps, respectively. From the 11th century onwards, Jewish life is well attested in most parts of the Euro-Mediterranean area. In this seminar we will mainly investigate the history of Jewish people living under Christian rule in Western Europe as well as under Muslim rule in the Iberian Peninsula and in the Eastern Mediterranean. Most written source materials, which are still extant today, were produced by Christians (or Muslims respectively) who either ruled over their Jewish subjects or who most likely recorded atrocities against their heterodox neighbors. Very often these sources are distorted through an inversion of perpetrators and victims. They therefore need to be read with greatest attention and care. It is one aim of the seminar to enable students to deconstruct these distortions and reconstruct the real power relations which shaped the events and their recordings. This of course also holds true for other individuals and groups which were presented as ‘others' to the respective mainstream society. As religion played an important role as a marker of identity and group formation throughout this period, we will also address the portrayal of alleged heretics and so-called ‘pagans' in Christian sources. But we will of course also listen to medieval Jewish voices and scrutinize their portrayal of the surrounding societies and their actions. We will use these medieval examples to critically analyze and discuss how these societies dealt with individuals and groups which they perceived and constructed as ‘other'. Finally, we will also discuss if certain forms and phenomena of anti-Jewish discrimination and violence might justly be understood as premodern forms of Anti-Semitism.

Germany is globally recognized as a leader in the fields of renewable energy, sustainable development, and environmental protection. But how did this come about? In this course, we will examine the roles that culture and history play in shaping human attitudes towards the environment. Our case studies will range over two centuries, from damming projects in the Rhine valley at the start of the nineteenth century to the Chernobyl nuclear disaster at the end of the twentieth. We will study novels, films, and philosophical essays alongside works by leading environmental historians. Over the course of the semester, students will develop a richer understanding of German environmentalism that also includes an awareness of its dark sides, such as the role that nature conservancy played within Nazi ideology. This course will be taught in English.

Gothic, the subject of this course, might be considered a distant relative of not only English but also modern German, Dutch, and the various Scandinavian languages. It is in fact the oldest recorded Germanic language, and was spoken, in one form or another, by related groups who spread southward, eastward, and westward across Europe from the first to the sixth centuries, remaking much of the political landscape but leaving a very small written record. Gothic survives primarily in a late-fourth-century translation of the New Testament, prepared by Ulfila, an Arian bishop of the Goths. This is primarily a language course, in which we will learn the grammar of Gothic and translate passages from the New Testament and the Skeireins (a fragmentary commentary on the Gospel of John). We will also ponder the peculiar purple manuscript with silver script in which Ulfila's translation survives (the Codex argenteus), speculate on the character of the Crimean Gothic recorded over a millennium after Ulfila's death, explore the structural relations among Gothic and the other Germanic languages, and discuss the conceptual roles the Goths have been made to play in the formation of European states, Germanic ethnicity, nationalism, horror fiction, and modern racial separatist movements. No prior knowledge of an older language is required, although, since this is a language course, curiosity and an agile mind are.

In the wake of the Holocaust, the German author Gunther Grass concluded that we now finally knew ourselves. The Holocaust changed everything. Nazi Germany murdered more than six million men, women, and children in a systematic effort to exterminate the Jews of Europe. Its shocking and spectacular barbarism shattered comfortable ideas about European civilization and called into question the essential goodness of humanity. It compelled scholars to search for new ideas about evil, new words like "genocide" simply to place and comprehend the scale of the slaughter and devastation. Politics, art, culture, and even religions would be fundamentally and irrevocably transformed by the Holocaust. This course will investigate why Nazi Germany attempted to systematically exterminate the Jews of Europe, explore why so many Germans either participated in or accepted this act of mass violence, and consider why other Europeans so often assisted them. It will investigate the legacies of the Holocaust; how survivors and their families attempted to rebuild their lives in the wake of horror, how Germans variously struggled to come to terms with what they, their countrymen, or their ancestors had done, and how various understandings of the Holocaust have shaped political, cultural, and social discourses around the world. Along the way, students will practice the skills of historical literacy. They will digest, analyze, and criticize scholarship (secondary literature). They will discern the relevance of particular interpretations for important debates. They will use sustained analysis of primary sources to develop, articulate, and defend their own historical interpretations and arguments.

In this course, students will learn to challenge the easy association of "German" with the contemporary country of Germany by considering the extraordinary diversity of what "German" meant before the modern country was founded. Students will examine German-speaking Central Europe from the Middle Ages until the beginnings of modern Germany, focusing primarily on literary works in their historical context. The course's historical outlook gives students the tools to critically examine today's discourses of national identity, race, and German tradition by understanding how the meaning of "German" has transformed over time. This course is taught in German.

This course offers an overview of major developments in the literary and cultural history of German-speaking Europe. The course explores significant figures and works of literature, the visual arts, music, and philosophy as well as their interrelationship and historical contextualization. Students read, discuss, and analyze selected texts in German representing all genres, and become familiar with fundamental techniques of interpreting literary works and cultural artifacts. This course is taught in German.

This course introduces students to the society, politics and culture of contemporary Germany. The main focus is on Germany after 1989, but we will contextualize our analysis by looking back as far as 1945 and by drawing comparisons to other German-speaking countries as well as the United States. Topics include social values and the German Basic Law, government and media, as well as issues currently in the news. We will also look at selected literary works, essays, and films in German in order to become familiar with fundamental techniques of interpretation. This course is taught in German.

Poisoned Kremlin critic Alexey Navalny, currently lying in a Berlin hospital for treatment, provides only the latest image of the nexus of Germany and Russia in matters relating to authoritarian oppression of minorities and opposition groups. Yet their intertwined history of racism, authoritarianism, and persecution of ethnic minorities has been the object of intellectual study for decades: Hannah Arendt, Ernst Nolte, Jurgen Habermas, and more recently, Timothy Snyder are some of the leading scholars who have elucidated the ways in which these cultures intersect in both promoting and confronting mono-ethnic authoritarianism. Part cautionary tale, part success story, this course examines select case studies from the polities of Russia and Germany (with shorter units on Poland, Hungary, and Belarus) in their ongoing struggles with authoritarian, racist, and anti-democratic legacies. Given notorious histories of oppression and persecution of ethnic, religious, and other minorities--haunting images of Soviet gulags, German concentration camps, and of the KGB and the Gestapo spring all too readily to mind--these countries provide potentially valuable lessons in thinking about racism and police brutality in our own time. In the postwar and post-Unification/post-Soviet periods, these countries continue to face these issues in stark and sometimes creative ways--with varying degrees of success. We will be concerned to respect both the historical and cultural particularity of these cultures, and to draw upon this material to enrich our thinking about anti-racist reform in the contemporary world. We draw upon a variety of materials: historical documents, constitutional studies, film and television, literature, political and sociological data, journalistic interventions, including social media.

This is a lecture course that will offer students an opportunity to delve into the dark history of Germany and Europe between the First World War and the Cold War. At the center of this course is the National Socialist movement, which dominated Germany from 1933 to 1945 and left its imprint on the world thereafter. The hope is that students become familiar with the movement's intellectual and cultural origins, the political contingencies that made it successful, and the policies that made it popular and feared in Germany and beyond. Topics will include Social Darwinism and racial pseduo-science, the Treaty of Versailles and Weimar Germany, the rise of National Socialism to power, and Nazi society and culture. In addition, we will look at how Nazi politics were received and imitated in central and Eastern Europe and how Adolf Hitler's international politics could appeal to peoples beyond Germany's borders. Students will also learn about the systematic and organized killing of peoples and groups in Europe under occupation, including six million Jews and the Holocaust. The course will conclude with the postwar occupation regimes in Germany and Europe, the erasure of complicity with Nazism in the subsequent histories of Europe, and the failed attempts at deNazification and justice for the regime's victims.Friday sections will consist of smaller discussion groups that will discuss the content of the lectures in part. Most importantly, students will read primary source material, including laws, witness statements, memoirs, and important scholarly debates. The Friday sessions will thus give students the opportunity to directly analyze accounts and sources. These skills will then be assessed in a document analysis paper and on our midterms and final exams.

Catholic Great Power. Medieval Holdover. Sick Man on the Danube. Prison of the Peoples. Laboratory of the Apocalypse. The Habsburg Empire has been called many things, but I bet you never have heard of it. But I bet you have heard about the Austrian Archduke, Franz Ferdinand, whose assassination sparked the outbreak of the First World War; or maybe your parents made you listen to Mozart as a child in the hopes that you'd be brilliant. What you probably don't know, because historians have generally forgotten it, is that the Habsburg Monarchy stood at the center of Europe and European politics and culture for nearly four hundred years. Germans, Croatians, Slovenes, Poles, Jews, Czechs, Slovaks, Serbs, Bosnians, Romanians, Italians, Ukrainians and (last but not least) Hungarians all played a role in the longevity and vibrancy of this multinational Empire. In this course, we will explore the history of this great continental empire from its modern origins during the reign of Maria Theresia (1740-1780) to its collapse and dismemberment in the First World War. In the process we will learn much about the history of Europe itself and about what becomes common knowledge and what does not. Our topics will include Enlightened Absolutism, the French Revolution, Liberalism, German Unification, Music and Culture, modernity, economic development, Jewish emancipation and identity, and finally the First World War.

This course begins with Prussia's initial challenge to Austria's dominance in central Europe; it ends with the unification of Germany under Bismarck's Prussia--and Austria's exclusion from it. In addition to covering the on-going Austro-Prussian rivalry in Germany, the course will consider German History in a broad central European perspective that covers the variety of what was German-speaking Europe. We will cover the cultural, social, and political transformations of the period. Specific topics may include Enlightened Absolutism and the emergence of the 'enlightened' police state, the influence of the French Revolution in the German-speaking lands, as well as the revolutions of 1848 and the struggle for German Unification. Additionally, we will cover larger long term processes such as the emergence of civil society, political transformations such as the growth of German Liberalism and Nationalism and the emergence of Socialism, and German contributions to larger cultural and intellectual fields such as the Enlightenment and Romanticism.

This course examines modern Germany from national unification in 1871 to the recent unification of the two Germanies and beyond. We will investigate cultural, political, and social dimensions of Germany's dynamic role in Europe and in the world. Topics include Bismarck and the founding of the Second Reich, World War I and the legacy of defeat, challenge and authority in the Weimar Republic, the National Socialist revolution, war and Holocaust, collapse of the Third Reich, conflict and accommodation in East and West Germany, and unification and its aftermath. Class format will combine lectures with discussion of readings from political, social, literary, and diplomatic sources.

This course is designed to teach practical and useful German conversation for everyday life. Learn how to navigate situations such as ordering a beer, shopping for food, buying concert tickets, introducing yourself to your roommate in Berlin, negotiating with a landlord, or just everyday conversational skills. We´ll invite native speakers of German from all over campus to talk about Germany, Austria, Switzerland; political and cultural issues; as well as topics concering business and economics. We´ll watch German news and discuss current events, such as the recent European refugee crisis. All levels welcome, see instructor with any concerns or questions.

In this special course designed for inquisitive international economics / romance language majors, students will attend a number of lectures, panels, and seminars on campus during the semester, with a follow-up discussion for each led by either a visitor or a member of the economics or romance languages faculty. Before each session, students will be expected to complete a short reading assignment. At each follow-up session, the students will submit a 1-2 page summary and analysis of the talk, with a critical question for discussion. The goal is to encourage students to enrich their major experience by participating in the intellectual discussions that occur amongst ND and visiting scholars across the campus, distinguished alumni, and professionals in the field.

How did the medieval Church’s great women mystics create a space where they could connect with God? Despite enclosure in convents, many medieval nuns held religious authority and contributed to the life and literature of the Catholic tradition. Paradoxically, the convent was a privileged space of female culture, where women authors and mystics flourished. This course will explore the spaces, both architectural and spiritual, where medieval nuns explored their relationship with God and wrote to help the souls of others. Focusing on Germany and on remarkable women such as Hildegard of Bingen, students will contextualize medieval women's mysticism in its historical milieu, including the realities of female enclosure, the daily round of convent life, and liturgical worship. We will compare mysticism in the convent to the writings and social context of women mystics in the city or at noble courts. In Spring 2025, this course will make a class trip to Germany during Spring Break to visit the sites of medieval convents and continuously active communities of nuns. Students must apply to the instructor to participate in this course through this link: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLScWLeIUFi2zg62YPv5LJnrrrFZjr56zztYaq_eC2zZxL3AB7A/viewform?usp=sf_link

Although occupying a central position in the cultural, legal, literary, and political history of Europe, the Holy Roman Empire remains far too frequently sidelined within Anglophone surveys of the medieval period. This course is designed to serve as a corrective to this tendency, repositioning the Western Empire in all its diversity and geographic range at the heart of European development during the crucial millennium of the Middle Ages and its aftermath. Using a combination of primary and secondary sources, we will follow the development of the Empire in conception and reality from its Carolingian beginnings, through the heights of the Ottonian Renaissance, the fraught Salian age, and up through the great conflicts of the Staufer period, ending with the interregnum of the late-thirteenth century, during which an empire without an emperor was forced to both redefine and reinvent itself. In this course we examine what the empire was and was not during the early centuries of its existence. To what extent was the empire understood to be a revival or extension of the Western Roman Empire? To what extent was Voltaire's 18th-century indictment of the empire as "neither holy, nor Roman, nor an empire" an accurate assessment? What relevance does the early history of an institution long famed as a political anachronism have for us today? Focusing on primary sources, we will trace both the institutional and cultural development of the empire and its varied peoples over the course of the Early and High Middle Ages, comparing our own interpretations with those of scholars both past and present. In so doing, we shall also seek to contextualize the history of the Holy Roman Empire alongside the contemporary kingdoms of France and England, while consciously eschewing normative models of institutional, legal, and (proto-)national development.

The epic narrative poems produced in Middle High German around the beginning of the thirteenth century stand amongst the greatest literary monuments of the Middle Ages. These tales have served as the inspiration for countless great works across the centuries, including the great operas of Richard Wagner, the films of Fritz Lang. What is more, the rediscovery of these narratives during the 18th and 19th centuries played a crucial role in the development of modern Philology and Medieval Studies as academic disciplines. Even divorced from their later legacy, these tales have lost little of their narrative power as entertainment and continue to be read for enjoyment to the present day.

Fairy tales are a staple of popular culture with roots in the folklore tradition. In this course we will investigate the enduring transnational popularity of the fairy tale and the extent to which they reflect child-rearing, political or social norms across cultures. We will read and analyze classic European fairy tales in their historical and cultural context, as well as discuss the theoretical function and meaning of fairy tales. Taught in English.

As soon as Europeans began exploring and colonizing the so-called New World, Germans were there. Germans came to the Americas as conquistadors, settlers, refugees, missionaries, and merchants. The German colony in Venezuela was disastrously short-lived, but Germans came to play a significant role in the colonization of North America through the settlement of Pennsylvania. This course introduces students to the varieties of German presence in the Americas from the 16th to the 18th centuries. Topics may include the colonization and conquest of South America, German interactions with Indigenous communities, German missionaries to the enslaved peoples in the Caribbean, the role of German immigrants in early anti-slavery and pacifist movements, and the origin and afterlife of the language called Pennsylvania Dutch. This course will be taught in English.

This course will provide an opportunity for students and faculty to explore various aspects of Germany's current policies toward refugees and immigrants. It includes a one-week trip to Berlin prior to the start of the semester. In Berlin, the group will meet with federal, state and local governmental officials, civil society groups, and representatives of international organizations. The issues to be explored include: Germany's policies toward asylum-seekers, the relationship between these policies and the European Union, policies to integrate refugees and migrants into German society, and the political impact of these policies. The on-site Berlin seminar is designed to assess the efficacy of current policies, and identify best policy practices going forward. Includes two pre-departure sessions (one planning session, one webinar), and 5-7 follow-up sessions during the first half of the semester, culminating in a poster exhibit to disseminate our findings.

In this course we will use the City of Berlin as our classroom to explore German history since the end of World War II. Major historical and political moments will include the Cold War, Confronting National Socialism and the Holocaust, Reunification, and Multi-Ethnic Germany.

The course provides a comprehensive overview of the Energiewende - Germany's effort to reshape its energy system, industry, and building sectors into a nuclear-free, low-carbon economy. We will apply a range of analytical methods (economic assessment tools, legal analyses and political science) to shed light on different facets of the Energiewende, and to help understand the public and academic debates around it. We will discuss the technological, social, ethical, legal and political implications in the German context.

In this course we will sample from Berlin's great theaters—the Staatsoper, the Komische Oper, the Berliner Ensemble (the "Brecht theater"), the Maxim Gorki, the Grips, as well as other venues. The pre-departure assignment will involve reading the plays we will see. We'll meet in advance of each production to discuss staging, text adaptations, acting, dramaturgy, etc. Right after each performance we'll meet again briefly to discuss any issues that require clarification or comment. Then we'll have a follow-up classroom session later in the week to discuss selected matters performance, theme, etc. We'll take advantage of special back-stage tours and meetings with actors and directors. Students write a targeted 1-2 pp. review of each performance.

Berlin is the ideal place for studying the development of architecture and design and their interrelationship. The city houses famous museums like Werkbundarchiv - Museum der Dinge, Bauhaus Archiv, Kunstgewerbe Museum (Museum of Applied Arts) and Bröhan-Museum (Museum of Art and Design). The urban landscape is marked by an architecture created by great architects like Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, who also designed the famous Barcelona Chair. The historical overview starts with the 19th century and continues via Deutscher Werkbund (German Association of Craftsmen) towards the 20th century with the Bauhaus, and finally the latest developments in architecture and design in the 21st century.

In this course, taught as part of the summer abroad programs, we will explore topics related to post-1945 history and politics as they affected European society. In addition to assigned readings and coursework, we will use what we learn at the abroad sites and on excursions to inform our understanding of and discussion of contemporary European issues.

Offered at the International Study Center in Heidelberg University, Germany, this course consists of advanced language study abroad at the C1 level. This course is designed as a language course for international students taking regular coursework at the University Heidelberg. In addition to advanced topics in German grammar, vocabulary enhancement is one of the principal goals of the course.

Intensive study with a faculty member in the student's area of interest. Normally, only available to majors.

The years between the First and Second World Wars in Germany, 1918-1933, was a period of tremendous cultural and social experimentation. All of the arts—literature, painting, music, film, architecture—experienced radical transformations, in which artists broke with centuries of traditions and explored new ways of expression and shaping the environment. Politically it was a time of great change as well, with competing ideologies transforming the way people thought of themselves in relation to each other and to society and the state at large. In this class, we will explore some of the major movements, works, and people that characterize this extraordinary decade and a half of transition and upheaval. Topics and figures we will consider are Expressionism, Bauhaus, New Objectivity, Atonal music, Fritz Lang, Bertolt Brecht, Klaus Mann, Irmgard Keun, Marlene Dietrich, Hermann Hesse, Christopher Isherwood, Käthe Kollwitz, Georg Grosz, Otto Dix. Taught in German.

Having led the European response to the refugee crisis instigated by the Syrian Civil War, Germany provides an instructive though by no means typical case study. This course provides an opportunity for students to explore various aspects of Germany's current policies toward refugees and immigrants and to place them within a wider European context. Via Zoom, the group will meet with federal, state and local governmental officials, civil society groups, and representatives of international organizations. The issues to be explored include: Germany's policies toward asylum-seekers, the relationship between these policies and the European Union, policies to integrate refugees and migrants into German society, and the political impact of these policies. The seminar is designed to assess the efficacy of current policies, and identify best policy practices going forward. At regular intervals, we will have the opportunity to place our findings within a broader comparative context that includes U.S. refugee policies.

German political thought is more rooted in philosophy than the Angloamerican tradition; at the same time it was involved in, and reacted to, the most horrific experience of 20th century totalitarianism, National Socialism. We will read books by the three greatest political theorists of the Weimar republic, Hans Kelsen, Hermann Heller, and Carl Schmitt, study Martin Heidegger's rectorate speech, look at Hannah Arendt's totalitarianism theory, and read two political philosophies from the Federal Republic, Habermas' Between Facts and Norms and my own Morals and Politics.

What will money look like when our society is fully cashless? How will we pay for services, and what will we exchange? How will we work - or will we work at all - when most tasks are automated, and how will we earn a living? When AIs develop self-awareness, could they get baptized? And what on earth are we going to do with all of our trash? In this course, students explore questions like these through recent science-fiction short stories. The course examines the ways in which German-language authors are imagining the world of the (fairly) near future. Taught in German.

“Saget mir ieman wâz ist minne?” (Can anyone tell me: What ist love?) – that is a question not only Minnesänger Walther von der Vogelweide asks himself. “Flugzeuge im Bauch” (Airplanes in your tummy) is what German songwriter Herbert Grönemeyer might offer for an answer. The course will introduce you to German love songs from about the 12th century until today. Get to know different historical concepts of what love might be and how tricky emotions can be turned into speech and song. Our discussions will cover formal aspects (rhymes, metre, strophes), stylistic and rhetorical devices, speech roles, gender stereotypes, and of course: concepts of love and how we can sing and talk about them. We will also cover medial aspects of these songs and will embark on several excursions to places like the Hesburgh Library and the Raclin-Murphy Museum. Please note that the course is being taught in German.

This seminar taught in German centers on a close reading of Thomas Mann's novel "Doctor Faustus", considered one of the greatest literary works of the twentieth century. Doctor Faustus alludes to a wealth of other materials, and our discussions will thus also cover the history of the Faust myth, the origins of Nazism, the philosophy of Nietzsche, and other topics.

This course explores how and why German-speaking authors of the 20th and 21st century, respectively, have adapted Middle High German texts for their contemporary audiences. We will discuss representative texts from a variety of literary genres ranging from a children's book (Hoppe) to young-adult/all-ages fiction (Grzimek) to literature for an adult readership (A. Muschg) and compare them to their source texts.

German literature, which is deeply interwoven with philosophy and religion, offers abundant challenges to our understanding of self, society, and the sacred. Together we will analyze prose works that offer students a range of genres and styles. Three or four works will be chosen from among the following: Hölderlin’s Hyperion, a novel of despair and reconciliation that is both lyrical and philosophical; Heine’s brilliant and witty essay Zur Geschichte der Religion und Philosophie in Deutschland; Büchner’s absorbing novella fragment Lenz; Stifter’s gripping and perplexing tale Abdias; Storm’s dramatically compelling frame narrative Der Schimmelreiter; Theodore Fontane’s Effi Briest, a beautiful novel of character that indirectly confronts the social norms of late nineteenth-century Prussia; and Kafka’s Der Prozess, a work that interweaves comedy, horror, and complexity. We will spend considerable time on literary aspects of the works and will engage in comparison and contrast of diverse themes, including identity crises, concepts of social critique and historical change, and challenges to our understanding of God.

How can we work for a more just world? Major works of German film and literature insightfully depict a variety of paradigmatic scenarios of social injustice, suggesting ways these conditions might be ameliorated and perhaps even overcome. Topics include: misogyny; child-murder; prostitution; poverty; workers’ rights; just distribution of resources; wealth and income inequality; the status of minority, migrant and refugee populations; religion and the state (Jewish emancipation and oppression); and the individual’s striving for freedom within an authoritarian regime. This upper-level course taught in German, surveys major works of German literature and film from the 18th to the 21st centuries that prominently engage themes of social engagement.

Germany, Austria, and Switzerland have one of the world’s richest traditions of drama as well as arguably the greatest theorists of drama. We will discuss selected masterpieces of German drama (and film), paying particular attention to the ways in which each of our works breaks expectations and advances what we might call an inverted world. The course will explore historical developments, but our primary focus will be close analysis of the works, including their ambiguities and their wrestling with tragic and comic modes of understanding the world, including interpersonal and social conflicts. Likely authors include Lessing, Schiller, Büchner, Hofmannsthal, Brecht, and Dürrenmatt. Some attention will also be given to distinctive German theories of tragedy and comedy, including the singular contributions of Hegel. The seminar will be taught entirely in German.

The topic of this team-taught graduate seminar (crosslisted for qualified advanced undergraduates) will be the thought and work of Richard Wagner and Friedrich Nietzsche and their complex relationship. Neither figure needs an introduction: they both exerted extraordinary influence in their respective realms, reaching far into the twentieth century and beyond, and both left legacies that became entangled in some of the worst developments of the past one hundred years. We plan to focus, however, on the works themselves: Wagner's operas, particularly Der Ring des Nibelungen, Die Meistersinger von Nurnberg, Tristan und Isolde, and Parsifal; some of Wagner's musicological and cultural-critical writings, such as Opera and Drama and Religion and Art; Nietzsche's own books, beginning with his very first one, The Birth of Tragedy out of the Spirit of Music (1871), which was inspired by and dedicated to Wagner, and concluding with the scathing denunciation of him in The Case of Wagner, written in 1888, the last frenzied year before Nietzsche's mental breakdown. The course materials will all be in English. We will also offer a one-credit companion reading course on selected texts in the original German, discussing them with particular emphasis on their grammatical and stylistic qualities. This reading is intended to help students who already know some German to develop their capacities and to encourage those who have not yet begun studying German to do so.

In this seminar, students will examine the intersection of various disciplines and topics depending upon the instructor's specialty. In addition to language and literature, topics may include culture, history, politics, film, feminist studies, music and other related disciplines. The course may be repeated.

Intensive study with a faculty member in the student's area of interest. Normally, only available to majors.

Intensive study with a faculty member in the student's area of interest. Normally, only available to majors.

Intensive study with a faculty member in the student's area of interest. Normally, only available to majors.

Spring semester course for the 2-semester senior thesis in German Studies. Students will receive a letter grade

German majors who wish to graduate with honors may write a senior thesis. For those German majors who elect to write a thesis, several requirements must be met: (1) The student must have a GPA of 3.5 or higher in the major, (2) the thesis must be at least 30 pages long, and (3) the thesis must be written in German. The student writing a thesis enrolls in GE 48499 and receives one course credit (three credit hours) for the course. Although the thesis is graded by the advisor (to receive honors, the thesis must receive a grade of B+ or higher), a second faculty member reader acts in advisory role to the advisor. The thesis is due the week after spring break, and the student is strongly advised to begin thinking about it and start conferring with the advisor before the October break of the fall term.

This course introduces German literature and culture while also serving as an introduction to the seminar method of instruction. The course is writing-intensive, with emphasis given to improving students' writing skills through the careful analysis of specific texts.

This course will examine the work that arose out of one of the most important periods in the history of philosophy, typically dubbed “German idealism.” These thinkers were obsessed with freedom: freedom of thought and religion, freedom in politics, and going so far to say that human beings are, in their very essence, free. And true to their commitment to the freedom of thought, they imagined humankind rising out of its immaturity, putting aside all traditional metaphysics that was detached from reality, and finally achieving sturdy and reasonable self-assurance of the workings of nature and society. However, in this, a great problem arose: if the world was absolutely determined in some scientifically demonstrable shape, how could humanity, which is a part of that fixed picture, be free? Freedom seems to suggest that a complete science is impossible, and a complete science risks abolishing human freedom. This is the question we will be examining through four important philosophers: Immanuel Kant, J. G. Fichte, F. W. J. Schelling, and G. W. F. Hegel. They each took a novel approach to solving this problem of freedom and nature, and we will examine them in turn. Kant decided reason, a faculty of the mind, had to hold itself back from making any claims about how the world really is in itself, thus making room for freedom. Fichte insisted that a philosophical system of freedom can only be rooted on the self's absolutely free self-relation. Schelling saw the world as one of basic polarity, and against the human subject was the freely developing process of nature, and each limits and intertwines with the other, seeking harmony. Hegel believed that freedom itself has developed through human cultural history and only in recent history has freedom reached its highest phase of development. In examining these thinkers, we will consider their historical context and take a close look at the debates they all had with one another. Each of them was at time a collaborators with another before philosophical disagreements forced them apart. We will draw out these arguments and examine their strengths and weaknesses. By the end, we will consider whether their debates and arguments remain relevant to current manifestations of the freedom-nature debate.

A vampire stalks you through a dark tunnel. A mad scientist gives human form to an android. Regimented masses march beneath monumental swastikas. Some of the most enduring images of the twentieth century were crafted by German filmmakers. They filmed in the shadow of the First World War, in the midst of economic turmoil, in the service of the Nazi dictatorship, and in a Germany divided by the Cold War. They used cinema to grapple with the legacies of military defeat, to articulate their anxieties about industrial modernity, to envision utopian futures, to justify the murder of millions, and to come to terms with these monstrous crimes. This course will integrate the disciplinary insights of history and film studies to examine how Germans confronted the upheavals and traumas associated with modernity, the utopian fantasies and cataclysmic horrors of the twentieth-century. Together, the class will pursue three major objectives. First, students will learn about the most important events and developments of modern German history. They will examine how shifting economic, cultural, and political realities shaped the German film industry, and how filmmakers used their work to understand and intervene in their social, political, and cultural issues of their day. Second, students will learn to critically analyze films. They will learn how the structural components of a film - choices in composition, editing, and sound-mixing - craft meaning through immersive spectacles that speak to audiences on multiple intellectual and emotional levels. Students will explore how filmmakers deploy these techniques to produce awe-inspiring entertainments, sophisticated instruments of propaganda, and radical social critiques. As historical artifacts, films reflect the society which created them. But students will also consider how films, as works of art, survive beyond their historical context, and are reinterpreted by new audiences with new priorities. Finally, students will practice the skills of historical literacy. They will digest, analyze, and criticize important scholarship (secondary literature). They will discern the relevance of particular interpretations for important debates. They will use sustained analysis of films as primary sources to develop, articulate, and defend their own historical interpretations and arguments.

This interdisciplinary course explores the FIFA World Cup as a global phenomenon that transcends sport. Focusing on the upcoming men’s FIFA World Cup 2026, co-hosted by the United States, Mexico, and Canada, students will examine how such a tournament can shape international identities, global economies, and societal change. From its origins in the early 20th century to its role in contemporary geopolitics, the course investigates key tournaments, legendary players, and landmark moments that have defined the game and the self-understanding of European nations like (West) Germany. Special attention will be given to the role of the World Cup in shaping national identity within the European context, as well as its impact on fan culture, international cooperation, media representation, and economic development. Students will work with a variety of sources, including documentaries, social and traditional media, academic and literary texts, and match footage.

This is the lab section for GEST 20410.

A weekly tutorial required for students registered for GEST 30401 Nazi Germany, Nazi Europe or its cross-lists.

This is the discussion section for GEST 20410.

By calling into question the pervasive inequalities throughout history and within the dominant capitalist economic system, by challenging the very foundation of Western philosophy and culture, and by interrogating our psychological conception of ourselves, Karl Marx, Friedrich Nietzsche, and Sigmund Freud respectively have undeniably changed our world by revolutionizing the way we think about it. These three emerged from the intellectual and political tumult of the 19th century with new visions of humanity and its place in the world. This course will serve as an introductory guide for students to these revolutionary thinkers’ ideas as presented in their writing, placing it in its intellectual-historical context while also exploring its consequences for the present by looking at its resonance in contemporary culture. We will analyze these philosophers both in terms of their individual contributions to philosophical discourse as well as their collective position as the “masters of suspicion” in the words of the French philosopher Paul Ricœur, inaugurating a new age of skepticism toward the traditional underpinnings of Western culture from social organization, religion, and morality to human agency and the very act of thinking.

This is a lecture course that will offer students an opportunity to delve into the dark history of Germany and Europe between the First World War and the Cold War. At the center of this course is the National Socialist movement, which dominated Germany from 1933 to 1945 and left its imprint on the world thereafter. The hope is that students become familiar with the movement's intellectual and cultural origins, the political contingencies that made it successful, and the policies that made it popular and feared in Germany and beyond. Topics will include Social Darwinism and racial pseduo-science, the Treaty of Versailles and Weimar Germany, the rise of National Socialism to power, and Nazi society and culture. In addition, we will look at how Nazi politics were received and imitated in central and Eastern Europe and how Adolf Hitler's international politics could appeal to peoples beyond Germany's borders. Students will also learn about the systematic and organized killing of peoples and groups in Europe under occupation, including six million Jews and the Holocaust. The course will conclude with the postwar occupation regimes in Germany and Europe, the erasure of complicity with Nazism in the subsequent histories of Europe, and the failed attempts at deNazification and justice for the regime's victims. Friday sections will consist of smaller discussion groups that will discuss the content of the lectures in part. Most importantly, students will read primary source material, including laws, witness statements, memoirs, and important scholarly debates. The Friday sessions will thus give students the opportunity to directly analyze accounts and sources. These skills will then be assessed in a document analysis paper and on our midterms and final exams.

What does it mean to be a successor state to the Nazis? Can one live in hope, and yet still take honest account of a genocidal past? How might cinema be deployed to bring about the elusive Communist utopia, a true democracy; or, conversely, how could it figure as a means to protest an authoritarian government or decry oppressive social conditions? These are questions posed not only by postwar Germans--in the East and West--but by people the world over. Yet the particular "German" contexts of the two Cold War states and now of the Berlin Republic are unmistakable and continue to exert a particular fascination for filmmakers from around the world. This course will treat a dozen great films that attempt to record history, make history, and sometimes even defy history. We will treat film not merely as a reflection of politics, but as a potential intervention that may still be relevant to contemporaries. Directors include: Wim Wenders, Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Margarethe von Trotta, Volker Schlöndorff, Billy Wilder, and others. Fulfills major requirements for FTT (including the International Cinema requirement), as well as those of German Studies.

Lab section for GEST 30649.

In this special course designed for inquisitive international economics / romance language majors, students will attend a number of lectures, panels, and seminars on campus during the semester, with a follow-up discussion for each led by either a visitor or a member of the economics or romance languages faculty. Before each session, students will be expected to complete a short reading assignment. At each follow-up session, the students will submit a 1-2 page summary and analysis of the talk, with a critical question for discussion. The goal is to encourage students to enrich their major experience by participating in the intellectual discussions that occur amongst ND and visiting scholars across the campus, distinguished alumni, and professionals in the field.

An introduction to the ways in which the Holocaust has been remembered and examined through literature, from early survivor narratives to second-generation works and the recent culture wars in the wake of the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, 2023. Contingent upon funding, the course will include a study tour to Berlin and to Auschwitz, where we will visit memorials and documentation sites, speak to representatives of Jewish organizations, and get a better sense for the continuities of Jewish life in Central Europe throughout the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. All expenses for this study tour will be covered by the University, and students must be able to commit to the entirety of the trip. Students interested in the course should fill out the following form: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLScxxY1dgFgdKWO2VwYuBAX_LgP8U-E9UxGGu7FTZ2mv3f-slw/viewform?usp=header Authors covered might include Primo Levi, Elie Wiesel, Ruth Klüger, Art Spiegelman and Helen Epstein, while theorists covered could include Hannah Arendt, Raoul Hilberg, Shoshana Felman, Marianne Hirsch, and Michael Rothberg.

The epic narrative poems produced in Middle High German around the beginning of the thirteenth century stand amongst the greatest literary monuments of the Middle Ages. These tales have served as the inspiration for countless great works across the centuries, including the great operas of Richard Wagner, the films of Fritz Lang. What is more, the rediscovery of these narratives during the 18th and 19th centuries played a crucial role in the development of modern Philology and Medieval Studies as academic disciplines. Even divorced from their later legacy, these tales have lost little of their narrative power as entertainment and continue to be read for enjoyment to the present day.

With a focus on Germany, this course treats contemporary European responses to the influx of migrants and refugees. It includes a weeklong residential stay in Berlin during spring break (departing campus March 6, returning March 15, 2026). Enrollment only via competitive essay to the Nanovic Institute. Applications are due on November 11, 2025. Application can be found here: https://nanovicnd.submittable.com/submit/339123/europe-confronts-the-refugee-challenge-spring-2026.

In this course we will use the City of Berlin as our classroom to explore German history since the end of World War II. Major historical and political moments will include the Cold War, Confronting National Socialism and the Holocaust, Reunification, and Multi-Ethnic Germany.

The course provides a comprehensive overview of the Energiewende - Germany's effort to reshape its energy system, industry, and building sectors into a nuclear-free, low-carbon economy. We will apply a range of analytical methods (economic assessment tools, legal analyses and political science) to shed light on different facets of the Energiewende, and to help understand the public and academic debates around it. We will discuss the technological, social, ethical, legal and political implications in the German context.

In this course we will sample from Berlin's great theaters—the Staatsoper, the Komische Oper, the Berliner Ensemble (the "Brecht theater"), the Maxim Gorki, the Grips, as well as other venues. The pre-departure assignment will involve reading the plays we will see. We'll meet in advance of each production to discuss staging, text adaptations, acting, dramaturgy, etc. Right after each performance we'll meet again briefly to discuss any issues that require clarification or comment. Then we'll have a follow-up classroom session later in the week to discuss selected matters performance, theme, etc. We'll take advantage of special back-stage tours and meetings with actors and directors. Students write a targeted 1-2 pp. review of each performance.

Berlin is the ideal place for studying the development of architecture and design and their interrelationship. The city houses famous museums like Werkbundarchiv - Museum der Dinge, Bauhaus Archiv, Kunstgewerbe Museum (Museum of Applied Arts) and Bröhan-Museum (Museum of Art and Design). The urban landscape is marked by an architecture created by great architects like Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, who also designed the famous Barcelona Chair. The historical overview starts with the 19th century and continues via Deutscher Werkbund (German Association of Craftsmen) towards the 20th century with the Bauhaus, and finally the latest developments in architecture and design in the 21st century.

In this course, taught as part of the summer abroad programs, we will explore topics related to post-1945 history and politics as they affected European society. In addition to assigned readings and coursework, we will use what we learn at the abroad sites and on excursions to inform our understanding of and discussion of contemporary European issues.

This course is on Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason, his attempt to confront our finite minds with reason’s infinite demands. We will examine why Kant thinks reality depends partly on our minds and how this makes possible metaphysical knowledge about the general structure of space, time, quantity, quality, relation, and modality. We will consider why Kant denies such knowledge about the soul, the world, and God, thereby making room for rational faith within ethics and science. We will also ask whether metaphysics can stand as a science separate from physics and mathematics, and what it means to critique reason itself. No prior knowledge of Kant is required. We will read the text closely and discuss it critically, aiming to grasp its main arguments, its architectonic, and its mind-bending ambition.

An intensive survey of the two main strands of German philosophical thought in the twentieth century: phenomenology and critical theory. Readings from: Husserl, Heidegger, Gadamer, Lukács, Benjamin, Adorno, Marcuse, and Habermas. Topics include: the future of the idea of subjectivity, the relation of self to society, the role of art in self-understanding, the importance of history to philosophy, and the nature of the philosophical enterprise.

A consideration of classic anarchist and socialist texts, which pose direct challenges to capitalism and liberalism—e.g., Proudhon, Marx, Bakunin, Lenin, Kropotkin, and Luxemburg. We then turn to discuss more recent developments in anarchist and socialist thought. Topics include inter alia: theory of property, the relation of work to self, the nature of political institutions, globalism, human sociality.

This one-credit class is designed to prepare students for an easy transition into our Beginning Russian I course, which is offered in the fall. By the end of the semester, students will 1) use the Cyrillic alphabet with confidence, 2) understand the fundamentals of Russian phonetics and grammar, and 3) be able to speak and write briefly about their personal and university biographies. The course will be scheduled to accommodate student schedules. One credit; Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory.

This course is for Russian language students of all levels. It will focus on conversation, supplemented by viewings and discussion of Russian news, Russian music videos, cartoons and clips of movies and television. Since this course focuses on oral communication skills, there will be no written homework or readings outside of class time.

No prerequisite. Develops students' skills in listening, speaking, reading, and writing while also fostering an appreciation for Russian culture. Emphasis is placed on the acquisition of basic structures, vocabulary, and sound systems. Students will be encouraged to use their language skills to communicate and interact in a variety of situations and contexts.

Continuation of Beginning Russian I. Develops students' skills in listening, speaking, reading, and writing while also fostering an appreciation for Russian culture. Emphasis is placed on the acquisition of basic structures, vocabulary, and sound systems. Students will be encouraged to use their language skills to communicate and interact in a variety of situations and contexts.

What happens when a country abandons a three-hundred-year way of life, enters into repeated revolution and war, seeks heaven-on-earth, but achieves inferno and hell? Even more contradictory, perhaps, what happens when, at the same time, this country so revamps literature, film, painting, and dance that it leads the arts in Europe in the beginning of the twentieth century? "Russia in Revolution (1890-1925)" is an interdisciplinary, multi-media course on Russia in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Topics to be considered are the dynamics of revolution and war; the form and function of utopia and dystopia; the nature of imprisonment, liberation, and exile (physical, social, spiritual, and aesthetic); and, the nostalgia for Imperial Russia and the dismay at the new Soviet state. Other themes are: the "lost" man, woman, and child in the early twentieth century; the conflict between city and country, "old" and "new," Russia and the West; the interplay of "patriarchal," "maternal," and "messianic" voices; and. the role of memory and myth (archetypal, classical, and personal) A crucial component will be the tie of literature to film, painting, and dance in the critique of fin de siecle modernity and its implications for humankind.

This is an introductory course for complete beginners in Ukrainian. The course aims to provide a solid foundation in four major communicative skills: speaking, listening, reading, and writing. Students will learn to communicate effectively across cultural and linguistic boundaries while developing knowledge of the Ukrainian language, traditions, and culture. Emphasis is placed on the acquisition of basic structures, vocabulary, and sound systems. Students will be encouraged to use their language skills to communicate and interact in a variety of situations and contexts. Cultural awareness will be enhanced with authentic audio-visual materials, literary texts, and cultural artifacts. By the end of the course, students will be able to read short original Ukrainian texts and communicate on everyday topics. No prerequisite.

This course introduces students to Russian literature and culture while also serving as an introduction to the seminar method of instruction. The course is writing-intensive, with emphasis given to improving students' writing skills through the careful analysis of specific texts.

This is the first half of a two-semester review of Russian grammar designed to facilitate a near-native proficiency with the form and function of Russian nouns, verbs, and adjectives. Exceptional forms are stressed, and reading selections on contemporary Russian life and excerpts from literature are employed to improve comprehension and build conversational and writing skills.

This is the second half of a two-semester review of Russian grammar designed to facilitate a near-native proficiency with the form and function of Russian nouns, verbs, and adjectives. Exceptional forms are stressed, and reading selections on contemporary Russian life and excerpts from literature are employed to improve comprehension and build conversational and writing skills.

This lecture course examines some of the most important events, ideas, and personalities that shaped late Imperial, Soviet, and post-Soviet periods of Russian history during the last one hundred years: from the outbreak of the First World War and the Revolutions of 1905 and 1917 through the Great Terror of the 1930s, the experience of the Second World War and the emergence of the Soviet Empire, late Stalinism and post-Stalinist developed or mature socialism, the collapse of the communist rule and the disintegration of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s, as well as Russia's uneasy transition "out of Totalitarianism" and into Putin's authoritarianism during the first fourteen years of the twentieth-first century. The course is designed for history majors as well as for students in other disciplines with or without background in modern Russian and East European history.

Students work with a native speaker in small groups of two or three to activate and intensively practice the material covered in Intermediate Russian II. Although this course focuses on all modes of language learning - speaking, listening, reading, writing, and cultural proficiency - particular emphasis is given to improving students' speaking abilities.

Intensive study with a faculty member in the student's area of interest. Normally, only available to majors.

This year-long course is designed to significantly improve students' comprehension and self-expression skills in Russian, serving as a preparation for Russian literature courses in the original. The course will include an intensive review of Russian grammar; Russian stylistics, syntax, and grammar at the advanced level; reading and analysis of a wide range of 19th-century Russian literary texts; writing essays in Russian; and extensive work on vocabulary building and advanced conversation skills.

This year-long course is designed to significantly improve students' comprehension and self-expression skills in Russian, serving as a preparation for Russian literature courses in the original. The course will include an intensive review of Russian grammar; Russian stylistics, syntax, and grammer at the advanced level; reading and analysis of a wide range of 20th-century literary texts (including fiction, poetry, interviews, songs, and newspaper materials); writing essays in Russian; and extensive work on vocabulary building and advanced conversation skills.

What happens when a country abandons a three-hundred-year way of life, enters into repeated revolution and war, seeks heaven-on-earth, but achieves inferno and hell? Even more contradictory, perhaps, what happens when, at the same time, this country so revamps literature, film, painting, and dance that it leads the arts in Europe in the beginning of the twentieth century? "Russia in Revolution (1890-1925)" is an interdisciplinary, multi-media course on Russia in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Topics to be considered are the dynamics of revolution and war; the form and function of utopia and dystopia; the nature of imprisonment, liberation, and exile (physical, social, spiritual, and aesthetic); and, the nostalgia for Imperial Russia and the dismay at the new Soviet state. Other themes are: the "lost" man, woman, and child in the early twentieth century; the conflict between city and country, "old" and "new," Russia and the West; the interplay of "patriarchal," "maternal," and "messianic" voices; and. the role of memory and myth (archetypal, classical, and personal) A crucial component will be the tie of literature to film, painting, and dance in the critique of fin de siecle modernity and its implications for humankind.

Why do we tell stories? Myths and legends can help us understand what the people who created them have valued at different places and times. These texts have been interpreted as vessels of national identity, points of access to divine truth, indices of level of civilizational development, and pedagogical tools. They have also inspired some of the most compelling works of art ever produced. Students in this course will learn more about some of the many cultures of Eurasia, the world’s largest continent, spanning West Asia (the Middle East), Central Asia, and Eastern Europe, from these cultures' perspectives. They will read about what role Raven played in the creation of the world, learn the secret of the legendary Simorgh, and watch the tragic love story between a forest spirit and a human. They will consider the links between ancient folklore and contemporary fantasy. They will also have the opportunity to think about the role these stories play in the cultures that produced them and in their own lives. This class is co-taught by two scholars with different backgrounds: a historian of West Asia and the United States and a specialist in the literature of Russia and the former Soviet Union. In this class, students will learn how scholars in different disciplines (including not just literature and history but also folklore and anthropology) might approach the same works very differently and learn how to articulate their own scholarly positions. Assignments include a folklore collection, an in-class presentation on one of the cultures studied, and a creative adaptation of a myth. Students will also be graded on class participation and given weekly online reading quizzes.

Lonely, lost, wondering about the meaning of it all? Tolstoy has the answers! “War and Peace in Literature and Life (in English)” is an in-depth survey of the major fiction of one of the world’s greatest and most provocative writers and thinkers. Topics to be discussed: the evolution of the Tolstoyan hero and heroine within the contest of the writer’s fiction, as well as with the social and literary polemics of the age; the interplay of “patriarchal,” “matriarchal,” and “messianic” voices; the dynamics of Russian soul and soil; the conflict between city and country, “old” and “new,” nobleman and peasant, Russia and the West; and, Tolstoy’s political, theological, and epistemological visions, in particular, his theory of history, his defense of love, marriage, and family, his endorsement of “rational egoism,” his distrust of “great men” in life, and most importantly, his tried-and-true program for happy and productive lives.

Poisoned Kremlin critic Alexey Navalny, currently lying in a Berlin hospital for treatment, provides only the latest image of the nexus of Germany and Russia in matters relating to authoritarian oppression of minorities and opposition groups. Yet their intertwined history of racism, authoritarianism, and persecution of ethnic minorities has been the object of intellectual study for decades: Hannah Arendt, Ernst Nolte, Jurgen Habermas, and more recently, Timothy Snyder are some of the leading scholars who have elucidated the ways in which these cultures intersect in both promoting and confronting mono-ethnic authoritarianism. Part cautionary tale, part success story, this course examines select case studies from the polities of Russia and Germany (with shorter units on Poland, Hungary, and Belarus) in their ongoing struggles with authoritarian, racist, and anti-democratic legacies. Given notorious histories of oppression and persecution of ethnic, religious, and other minorities--haunting images of Soviet gulags, German concentration camps, and of the KGB and the Gestapo spring all too readily to mind--these countries provide potentially valuable lessons in thinking about racism and police brutality in our own time. In the postwar and post-Unification/post-Soviet periods, these countries continue to face these issues in stark and sometimes creative ways--with varying degrees of success. We will be concerned to respect both the historical and cultural particularity of these cultures, and to draw upon this material to enrich our thinking about anti-racist reform in the contemporary world. We draw upon a variety of materials: historical documents, constitutional studies, film and television, literature, political and sociological data, journalistic interventions, including social media.

The claim that Russians and Ukrainians are one people, “a single whole,” has been resounding in Russian mass media, film, and other discourses for the last two decades. Putin took a pronounced colonial turn with his return to the Presidency in 2012, describing Russia as a state-civilization, in which Russians and Ukrainians are joined in “spiritual unity.” History thus serves as a justification for the Russian invasion of Ukraine. This course will look at historical facts and cultural artifacts of Russia and Ukraine to determine the roots of Russia’s current aggression in Ukraine. Among others, the course will discuss the following questions. Is Kyivan Rus part of Russian or Ukrainian history, or neither? Does Ukraine have its own history and culture that is distinct from Russian? Are Ukrainians divided into Russian-speakers (aspiring to join Russia) and Ukrainian-speaking nationalists (aspiring to EU)? The course will examine the origins, points of intersection and divergence of Ukrainian and Russian cultures through the lens of history, art, and literature from the Christianization of Rus (10th century) to the present time. We will look at the history of Russian imperialism, centuries of appropriation of Ukrainian cultural achievements, annihilation of Ukrainian traditions, extermination of Ukrainian intellectuals, and the politics of Russification with the purpose to see how the current events reflect a tendency that has already existed for centuries.

This lecture course examines some of the most important events, ideas, and personalities that shaped late Imperial, Soviet, and post-Soviet periods of Russian history during the last one hundred years: from the outbreak of the First World War and the Revolutions of 1905 and 1917 through the Great Terror of the 1930s, the experience of the Second World War and the emergence of the Soviet Empire, late Stalinism and post-Stalinist developed or mature socialism, the collapse of the communist rule and the disintegration of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s, as well as Russia's uneasy transition "out of Totalitarianism" and into Putin's authoritarianism during the first fourteen years of the twentieth-first century. The course is designed for history majors as well as for students in other disciplines with or without background in modern Russian and East European history.

This lecture course examines some of the most important events, ideas, and personalities that shaped late Imperial, Soviet, and post-Soviet periods of Russian history during the last one hundred years: from the outbreak of the First World War and the Revolutions of 1905 and 1917 through the Great Terror of the 1930s, the experience of the Second World War and the emergence of the Soviet Empire, late Stalinism and post-Stalinist developed or mature socialism, the collapse of the communist rule and the disintegration of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s, as well as Russia's uneasy transition "out of Totalitarianism" and into Putin's authoritarianism during the first fourteen years of the twentieth-first century. The course is designed for history majors as well as for students in other disciplines with or without background in modern Russian and East European history.

Over the last two decades of Putin's presidency, Russia's geopolitical strength and imperial ambition were placed at the center of Russia's political line. Military incursions in the neighboring countries have expanded Russia's territorial claims and reasserted its aspirations to former Soviet spheres of influence. While Russian identity continued to be imperial after the disintegration of the Soviet Union, Ukrainians set off on a journey of building their national identity. The course considers how post-Soviet cinema revives tropes and aesthetic tendencies of the earlier periods, such as stark depictions of the self and Other, spiritual superiority and monumentalism, as well as updates them for a contemporary context. The class explores the Putin-era Russian cinema and Ukrainian national cinema of the last two decades in the light of the common past that these two countries share and how the past is reshaped for the present. No previous knowledge of Russian is required, the course is taught fully in English.

This lecture/discussion course explores how historical actors, writers, artists, filmmakers, and historians, over the last century, have portrayed and interpreted the 1917 revolution. We will also explore how the centenary of this defining event is being commemorated in Putin's Russia.

Russia under the tsars was a vast empire, a land of stunning achievement and immense inequality, mired in backwardness yet also a laboratory of modernity. Through works of scholarship, art, and cinema, and writings by Russians from the 18th to the early 20th centuries, we will explore how women and men, peasants and aristocrats, conservatives and revolutionaries, experienced the power and contradictions of the Romanov empire.This is a seminar. There will occasional lectures, but mostly we will have oral discussions about the readings, Russian historical films, and works of art that depict the everyday life of diverse groups in imperial Russian society.There are many ways of knowing the world - scientific, artistic, and other ways. Ours will be historical. This means that we will examine how the totality of life changed over time. We will consider the past from many angles, for instance, politics, culture, and the social order. We will discuss interpretations proposed by historians, analyze the primary sources on which they are based, and construct our own interpretations. We will not render facile judgments on the people of the past, but we will also explore what their legacy means for us today. We will examine imperial Russian history from three distinct perspectives: What do we know about the actual course of imperial Russian history? What are the original sources on which our knowledge is based? What role do artistic representations of this era play in modern Russian culture?

This course will examine the history of Russia from its medieval origins until the age of Catherine the Great in the 18th century. We will begin with the genesis of Orthodox Slavic civilization in medieval Kievan Rus and that state's destruction in the Mongol invasion. Then we will study the rise of the tsardom of Muscovy and the fateful developments that nearly doomed it in the 16th-17th century: the reign of Ivan the Terrible, the Time of Troubles, the imposition of serfdom, the schism of the Orthodox Church, and widespread popular revolts. Lastly, we will see how Peter the Great and his 18th century successors attempted to stabilize the social order, Westernize the upper classes, and make Russia a great European power.

This is the lab (film screenings) for RU 30357.

Students work with a native speaker in small groups of two or three to activate and intensively practice the material covered in Intermediate Russian II. Although this course focuses on all modes of language learning - speaking, listening, reading, writing, and cultural proficiency - particular emphasis is given to improving students' speaking abilities.

This course is limited to students who are concurrently enrolled in RU 40102: Advanced Russian II. Students work with a native speaker in small groups of two or three to activate and intensively practice the material covered in Advanced Russian II. Although this course focuses on all modes of language learning - speaking, listening, reading, writing, and cultural proficiency - particular emphasis is given to improving students' speaking abilities.

In this special course designed for inquisitive international economics / romance language majors, students will attend a number of lectures, panels, and seminars on campus during the semester, with a follow-up discussion for each led by either a visitor or a member of the economics or romance languages faculty. Before each session, students will be expected to complete a short reading assignment. At each follow-up session, the students will submit a 1-2 page summary and analysis of the talk, with a critical question for discussion. The goal is to encourage students to enrich their major experience by participating in the intellectual discussions that occur amongst ND and visiting scholars across the campus, distinguished alumni, and professionals in the field.

The course is designed for students of advanced level of Russian who are looking to deepen their proficiency through specialized study. This course explores complex aspects of the Russian language, such as advanced grammar, nuances of style and syntax, as well as cultural and idiomatic expressions. Each semester, the course will focus on different themes or topics, ranging from contemporary Russian literature, film, media, or art to advanced translation techniques. The course provides an interactive environment where students can engage in sophisticated conversational practice, detailed textual analysis, and extensive writing exercises. Students will work with authentic Russian texts, multimedia, and other resources to enhance their understanding and appreciation of the language in real-world contexts.

In 1987, the Soviet Union was the largest political entity on the planet. Four years later, it had vanished from the map entirely. In this interdisciplinary course, you will learn about the ‘new Russia’ that has emerged in the three decades since this stunning collapse. Drawing on an array of resources in English translation, you will explore the politics, media, and culture of the post-Soviet period: from the lawless years of the “wild 90s” under Boris Yeltsin to the return of totalitarianism under Vladimir Putin and his brutal invasion of Ukraine. In so doing, your study of contemporary Russia will lead us to discuss some of the most pressing questions in global politics today. What is the nature of truth and power in Putin’s dystopian propaganda state? Should the current leadership in Russia be described as a fascist regime or neo-Soviet? And, perhaps most importantly, how did Russia’s democratic experiment ultimately end with the launch of the largest war in Europe since 1945—and what lessons might this failure hold for America and the rest of the world?

Armenia, one of the oldest countries on the Silk Road and the first nation to adopt Christianity as a state religion, possesses a rich literary and cultural heritage in which one finds localized variants of devices, themes, and, broadly speaking, cross-cultural tropes. Armenia’s geographic location has also posed a hindrance to its self-determination: Arab, Persian, Ottoman, and Russian empires have shaped, reformulated, and at times suppressed literary and cultural traditions. Like the best writers of any nation, the Armenian greats have concentrated their efforts on universal themes and concepts such as suffering and strength, death and determination, sadness and joy, proving again and again that literature, like the human self it often takes as its subject, is not sui generis. In this course, we will examine Armenian literary works in their historical, intercultural, and colonial contexts, tracing these patterns through prose and verse. In this course, students will cultivate skills in close reading, critical thinking, and writing through various assignments that target these areas of growth. The written assignments in this course will help students exercise their ability to advance an argument based on textual evidence in writing and become astute interpreters of ideas presented in the assigned texts. Course discussions, in- class workshops meant to improve argumentative writing, and critical essays (expository, creative, and research) will familiarize students with literary theory and critical tools useful for the analysis of literary works and cultural elements. Moreover, specific assignments in this course will allow students to approach the topics at hand less conventionally and more creatively through art, music, or other media, approaching each text comparatively and interdisciplinarily to broaden students’ horizons in order to understand other cultures in a wider context.

In this interdisciplinary course, students will trace the development of Christian theology and culture in Eastern Europe—from the baptism of Rus in 988 to the classic novels of Dostoevsky and Tolstoy, and from the liturgical theology of Alexander Schmemann to the religious cinema of Putin’s Russia. Throughout the course, students will grapple with the “accursed questions” that have long defined Russian religious thought, while also examining the diverse and divergent images of Christ put forward by Russia’s greatest theologians, artists, philosophers, and writers.

What happens when, in the eighteenth, nineteenth, and twentieth centuries, a country turns away from more than seven hundred years of an intensely religious culture and embraces secularization, socialism, and science? How does it adapt medieval ideals to modern political, social, and economic structures? How does it err in false messianism, men-gods and cults? How is it called back to religious tradition and truth by indigenous writers, particularly in images and ideas of the Evil One (physical, social, supernatural, psychological, theological, and existential; romantic, modern, and most-modern)?  Finally, how does it resurrect religious consciousness after nearly seventy-years of socio-political atheism? "Russia Seeks God: Theology, Literature and the Arts" is an interdisciplinary, multi-media course on the national spiritual tradition from medieval to modern times. Topics to be discussed are the Russian idea of God, Jesus, the Virgin Mary, the angels and saints; the understanding of Satan and devils; the nature of dvoeverie or "dual" meld of Christian and folk beliefs; the workings of religious prophets and communities (genuine and false); the dynamics of wandering and pilgrimage (internal and external); the appeal to myth (Christian and pagan) and to other faith-systems (Judaism, Buddhism);  the tie between church and state: and the expression of faith and spirituality in literature, art, architecture, music, and ritual. The course is designed to sharpen students' aesthetic and analytical capabilities, improve their reading comprehension, and strengthen their written and oral skills.

The philosopher Mircea Eliade, in his classic work, The Sacred and the Profane (1957), states: “Man becomes aware of the sacred because it manifests itself, shows itself, as something wholly different from the profane” (10). Seemingly oppositional modalities, the sacred and the profane are central to the poetics of Fyodor Dostoevsky, the author of such works as Crime and Punishment, The Idiot, and The Brothers Karamazov. Dostoevsky, who for a lifetime preoccupied himself with pro and contra states of being and action, complicates the bearing of oppositionality itself. Idiots, madmen, ascetics, holy fools, buffoons, schismatics, zealous monks,self-sacrificing women, and other eccentric personalities make up Dostoevsky’s oeuvre and speak to his enduring interest in a broader understanding of the sacred and the profane, which in this course, we will examine as umbrella categories to better understand the ways in which the author complicates the relationships between them. Could this direction help us elucidate Dostoevsky’s approach not only to ethical issues and life’s “accursed questions” but also to eccentricity and otherness in general? Closely studying the contradictions and instances of symbiosis arising in each of these categories within their historical, religious, socio-cultural, and medical contexts will help us in our endeavor, as well is provide insight into our own fascination with this celebrated writer of human personality for whom perhaps the sacred was also a way of orientation in chaos.

A multifaceted investigation into the philosophical, psychological, theological, and political determinants of Dostoevsky's most complex novel. Discussions highlight a variety of themes, from the author's visionary political predictions and rejection of materialism to his critique of rationalism and mockery of literary convention.

Was the Soviet Union a "workers paradise" or an "evil empire?" Nearly three decades after this country transformed into what we now call "post-Soviet space," the legacy of the USSR looms large in international politics and culture. This course will offer students an introduction to Soviet history through film, which Lenin famously called "the most important of the arts," and literature, which Soviet writers used to "engineer human souls." Since the 1917 Revolution, art has had a close relationship to the Soviet state. At the same time, writers and filmmakers with individualistic and even rebellious tendencies have created some of the twentieth century's greatest masterpieces, including Dziga Vertov's Man With a Movie Camera and Mikhail Bulgakov's Master and Margarita. In this class we will explore how this tense relationship between art and the state developed in the first half of the twentieth century. Since cultural context is an important lens for our analysis, each artistic work will be accompanied by historical readings about the period in which it was produced, as well as artistic manifestos and contemporary reviews, when relevant. All films will be shown with subtitles and all readings offered in English. Students of the Russian language have the option of discussing the course material in Russian once a week with the instructor in a group for an additional course credit.

No prerequisite. Freed from the constraints of Soviet-era censorship, in the transitional years (1990-2005) Russian filmmakers exploited the unique qualities of the film medium in order to create compelling portraits of a society in transition. The films we will watch cover a broad spectrum: reassessing Russia's rich pre-Revolutionary cultural heritage as well as traumatic periods in Soviet history (World War II, the Stalinist era); grappling with formerly taboo social issues (gender roles, anti-Semitism, alcoholism); taking an unflinching look at new social problems resulting from the breakdown of the Soviet system (the rise of neo-fascism, the war in Chechnya, organized crime); and meditating on Russia's current political and cultural dilemmas (the place of non-Russian ethnicities within Russia, Russians' love-hate relationship with the West). From this complex cinematic patchwork emerges a picture of a new, raw Russia, as yet confused and turbulent, but full of vitality and promise for the future. Short readings supplement the film component of the course. Film screenings optional; films will also be available on reserve.

Intensive study with a faculty member in the student's area of interest. Normally, only available to majors.

This course helps students improve their reading proficiency in Russian by developing strategies for efficiently deciphering sophisticated texts, reviewing grammar, and exploring the art of translating from Russian into English. The reading list consists of works and excerpts from the canon of Russian literature as well as some non-fiction.

This course surveys modern Russian traditions and culture from the perspective of the most significant Russian cities. Topics include a brief history of each city, its cultural heritage, and its contributions to Russian literature and modern society. Through lectures and discussion, we will consider cities in European Russia (St. Petersburg, Moscow, Ryazan', Kaliningrad), Siberia (Irkutsk, Novosibirsk), and the Russian Far East (Vladivostok, Khabarovsk, Yuzno-Sakhalinsk). We will learn which of them gave birth to a widely popular intellectual club, which one was visited by a famous Russian writer after an eighty-two day journey, which was the place where an extremely popular Russian band started its career, etc. We will uncover these and other gems of Russian culture by listening to songs, reading poems, training our brains playing smart games, and many other activities full of Russian Spirit. (In English)

This year-long course is designed to significantly improve students' comprehension and self-expression skills in Russian, serving as a preparation for Russian literature courses in the original. The course will include an intensive review of Russian grammar; Russian stylistics, syntax, and grammar at the advanced level; reading and analysis of a wide range of 19th-century Russian literary texts; writing essays in Russian; and extensive work on vocabulary building and advanced conversation skills.

This year-long course is designed to significantly improve students' comprehension and self-expression skills in Russian, serving as a preparation for Russian literature courses in the original. The course will include an intensive review of Russian grammar; Russian stylistics, syntax, and grammer at the advanced level; reading and analysis of a wide range of 20th-century literary texts (including fiction, poetry, interviews, songs, and newspaper materials); writing essays in Russian; and extensive work on vocabulary building and advanced conversation skills.

This course is limited to students who are concurrently enrolled in RU 40101: Advanced Russian I. Students work with a native speaker in small groups to activate and intensively practice the material covered in Advanced Russian I. Although this course focuses on all modes of language learning—speaking, listening, reading, writing, and cultural proficiency—particular emphasis is given to improving students' speaking abilities.

This course is limited to students who are concurrently enrolled in RU 40102: Advanced Russian II. Students work with a native speaker in small groups of two or three to activate and intensively practice the material covered in Advanced Russian II. Although this course focuses on all modes of language learning - speaking, listening, reading, writing, and cultural proficiency - particular emphasis is given to improving students' speaking abilities.

Love and death are overwhelming experiences that, in many ways, define our orientation in and toward the world. At the same time, love and death are not always describable within the framework of language. Nevertheless, authors have tried to capture some of their essence for centuries. In this course, we will be reading Russophone short stories from the 19 th through the 21 st centuries that grapple with these two philosophically beguiling ideas. Authors like Gogol, Dostoevsky, Korolenko, Babel, Teffi, and others ask: Does love exist and can it be knowable or comprehensible? Is death a self-evident end, or are we always already beings moving toward death from the moment we are born? We will explore these rich themes as offered by Russophone writers in their philosophical, political, historical, and social contexts. All readings and discussions will be in Russian.

This course surveys the generic richness, stylistic innovation, and political intrusion into literature that defined Russian literary culture in the first six decades of the 20th century. It introduces such movements/periods as Symbolism, Acmeism, Futurism, the "fellow travelers," socialist realism, and the "thaw." Readings, discussions, and written assignments are in Russian and English.

This course is an introduction to the life and works of the great Russian poet Alexander Pushkin, often called the Father of Russian Literature. Through a reading and discussion of selections from Pushkin's lyric verse, narrative poetry, drama, and prose, students will gain an appreciation for Pushkin's extraordinary literary imagination and innovativeness, as well as his significance for the history of Russian literature as a whole. Attention will be given to Pushkin's evolving understanding of his role as Russia's national poet, including such themes in his work as the beauty of the Russian countryside, the poet's sacred calling, political repression and the dream of civic freedom, Russia's relationship to East and West, the dialectic between chance and fate, St. Petersburg and the specter of Revolution, and the subversive power of art. Prerequisite: Russian 40102 or permission of the instructor.

Russia under the tsars was a vast empire, a land of stunning achievement and immense inequality, mired in backwardness yet also a laboratory of modernity. Through works of scholarship, art, and cinema, and writings by Russians from the 18th to the early 20th centuries, we will explore how women and men, peasants and aristocrats, conservatives and revolutionaries, experienced the power and contradictions of the Romanov empire. This is a seminar. There will occasional lectures, but mostly we will have oral discussions about the readings, Russian historical films, and works of art that depict the everyday life of diverse groups in imperial Russian society. There are many ways of knowing the world - scientific, artistic, and other ways. Ours will be historical. This means that we will examine how the totality of life changed over time. We will consider the past from many angles, for instance, politics, culture, and the social order. We will discuss interpretations proposed by historians, analyze the primary sources on which they are based, and construct our own interpretations. We will not render facile judgments on the people of the past, but we will also explore what their legacy means for us today. We will examine imperial Russian history from three distinct perspectives: - What do we know about the actual course of imperial Russian history? - What are the original sources on which our knowledge is based? - What role do artistic representations of this era play in modern Russian culture?

From its inception in 1703 on the banks of the Neva River, St. Petersburg has embodied Russia's search for a national identity. Founded by Peter the Great as Russia's "Window on the West," it has been championed by those who wished to ally Russia more closely with Western Europe and vilified by those who viewed Western influence as undermining native Russian values. From the early nineteenth century on, numerous writers and artists have focused explicitly on the dual nature of the city. In this course, we will discuss some of the key works in this tradition with the goal of assessing Russia's uneasy relationship with the West and the symbolic importance of St. Petersburg within Russian culture. Prerequisite: RU 40102 or permission of the instructor.

Description: In this course, we will develop speaking, reading, listening, and writing skills by studying late and post-Soviet culture from an interdisciplinary range of perspectives: film, literary texts, historical writings and lectures from contemporary Russian academics, and newspaper articles. It should prepare students for advanced work in Russian in the area of their choosing. A regular number of class sessions will be devoted to either recent news articles or materials related to students' personal interests.

This course guides Russian students in developing one of the most important - but most challenging - skills they will need as language learners: navigating the specialized discourse of SMI, or mass media. Students will learn to navigate the changing Russophone media landscape and regularly discuss how various organs present current events in class. In addition, the course will examine how documentary and journalistic modes of knowledge inform Russian artistic culture, from the revolutionary documentary filmmaking of Dziga Vertov to the Nobel Prize-winning writing of Svetlana Alexievich to the influential graphic journalism of the cartoonist Victoria Lomasko.

Intensive study with a faculty member in the student's area of interest. Normally, only available to majors.

Intensive study with a faculty member in the student's area of interest. Normally, only available to majors.

Intensive study with a faculty member in the student's area of interest. Normally, only available to majors.

Thesis writers work closely with their advisor, who guides them through the bulk of their research and the initial stages of writing the thesis. Goals to be accomplished in the first semester include the submission of a thesis statement and one-paragraph introduction by October 1, a two-page prospectus and an annotated bibliography by November 15, and ten pages of the thesis by the end of the semester.

Working closely with an advisor, the student completes the research and writing of the honors thesis. Goals to be accomplished in the second semester include the submission of the completed thesis to the advisor in mid-March (the first Monday after Spring Break), submission of the final draft of the thesis incorporating the revisions suggested by the advisor (Monday of the last full week of classes), and the candidate's oral defense of the thesis before the faculty of the Russian section (approximately one week after the submission of the final draft).

This one-credit class is designed to give students an opportunity to learn the basics of Ukrainian. By the end of the semester, students will 1) use the Cyrillic alphabet with confidence, 2) understand the fundamentals of Ukrainian phonetics and grammar, and 3) be able to speak and write briefly about their personal and university biographies. The course will be scheduled to accommodate student schedules. One credit; Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory.

This is an introductory course for complete beginners in Ukrainian. The course aims to provide a solid foundation in four major communicative skills: speaking, listening, reading, and writing. Students will learn to communicate effectively across cultural and linguistic boundaries while developing knowledge of the Ukrainian language, traditions, and culture. Emphasis is placed on the acquisition of basic structures, vocabulary, and sound systems. Students will be encouraged to use their language skills to communicate and interact in a variety of situations and contexts. Cultural awareness will be enhanced with authentic audio-visual materials, literary texts, and cultural artifacts. By the end of the course, students will be able to read short original Ukrainian texts and communicate on everyday topics. No prerequisite.

This course introduces students to Slavic and Eurasian literature and culture while also serving as an introduction to the seminar method of instruction. The course is writing-intensive, with emphasis given to improving students' writing skills through the careful analysis of specific texts.

The course offers an in-depth exploration of Ukraine's dynamic societal structures and vibrant cultural landscape. Students will engage with key themes such as national identity, political developments, social transformations, and cultural expressions in the post-Soviet era. Through diverse perspectives and case studies, the course aims to provide a comprehensive understanding of Ukraine's evolving role in both regional and global contexts. Participants will have the opportunity to analyze the country's rich traditions alongside modern influences, fostering critical insights into Ukraine's unique cultural dimensions. In English. One credit; Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory.

The course invites students on an engaging journey through the diverse landscapes and cultures of nations that have emerged from the Soviet Union's dissolution. This course offers insights into the historical contexts, political evolutions, and cultural identities of these countries, while highlighting their unique challenges and achievements in the modern world. Students will gain a deeper appreciation for the rich tapestry of traditions, languages, and societies that define this fascinating region. The course will be scheduled to accommodate student schedules. Taught in English. One credit; Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory.

What was the Soviet Union? How does our understanding of Soviet history and culture change when we look through the lens of Kyiv or Kharkiv rather than Moscow or Leningrad? Why does Vladimir Putin refer to the origins of the Soviet Union in his war of aggression against today’s Ukraine? This course offers students a command of Soviet history and an unconventional exploration of politics and culture full of shock and surprise. It uncovers banned works, recovers lost films, and follows underground movements across Soviet Ukraine. We learn why the Soviet Union arose as a “union” of national republics and why it dissolved into a collection of nation-states. We also chronicle the long struggle and eventual triumph of the Ukrainian Catholic Church against the Kremlin. This urgent interdisciplinary course equips you with knowledge and skills that hold the key to understanding Russia's war on Ukraine, the gravest threat to Europe since World War II.

The claim that Russians and Ukrainians are one people, “a single whole,” has been resounding in Russian mass media, film, and other discourses for the last two decades. Putin took a pronounced colonial turn with his return to the Presidency in 2012, describing Russia as a state-civilization, in which Russians and Ukrainians are joined in “spiritual unity.” History thus serves as a justification for the Russian invasion of Ukraine. This course will look at historical facts and cultural artifacts of Russia and Ukraine to determine the roots of Russia’s current aggression in Ukraine. Among others, the course will discuss the following questions. Is Kyivan Rus part of Russian or Ukrainian history, or neither? Does Ukraine have its own history and culture that is distinct from Russian? Are Ukrainians divided into Russian-speakers (aspiring to join Russia) and Ukrainian-speaking nationalists (aspiring to EU)? The course will examine the origins, points of intersection and divergence of Ukrainian and Russian cultures through the lens of history, art, and literature from the Christianization of Rus (10th century) to the present time. We will look at the history of Russian imperialism, centuries of appropriation of Ukrainian cultural achievements, annihilation of Ukrainian traditions, extermination of Ukrainian intellectuals, and the politics of Russification with the purpose to see how the current events reflect a tendency that has already existed for centuries.

Over the last two decades of Putin's presidency, Russia's geopolitical strength and imperial ambition were placed at the center of Russia's political line. Military incursions in the neighboring countries have expanded Russia's territorial claims and reasserted its aspirations to former Soviet spheres of influence. While Russian identity continued to be imperial after the disintegration of the Soviet Union, Ukrainians set off on a journey of building their national identity. The course considers how post-Soviet cinema revives tropes and aesthetic tendencies of the earlier periods, such as stark depictions of the self and Other, spiritual superiority and monumentalism, as well as updates them for a contemporary context. The class explores the Putin-era Russian cinema and Ukrainian national cinema of the last two decades in the light of the common past that these two countries share and how the past is reshaped for the present. No previous knowledge of Russian is required, the course is taught fully in English.

In this special course designed for inquisitive international economics / romance language majors, students will attend a number of lectures, panels, and seminars on campus during the semester, with a follow-up discussion for each led by either a visitor or a member of the economics or romance languages faculty. Before each session, students will be expected to complete a short reading assignment. At each follow-up session, the students will submit a 1-2 page summary and analysis of the talk, with a critical question for discussion. The goal is to encourage students to enrich their major experience by participating in the intellectual discussions that occur amongst ND and visiting scholars across the campus, distinguished alumni, and professionals in the field.

In this interdisciplinary course, students will trace the development of Christian theology and culture in Eastern Europe—from the baptism of Rus in 988 to the classic novels of Dostoevsky and Tolstoy, and from the liturgical theology of Alexander Schmemann to the religious cinema of Putin’s Russia. Throughout the course, students will grapple with the “accursed questions” that have long defined Russian religious thought, while also examining the diverse and divergent images of Christ put forward by Russia’s greatest theologians, artists, philosophers, and writers.

Dostoevsky’s fascination with Shakespeare and his inquiry into the “accursed questions” began when only a teenager. Both authors are interested in the visibility of action as a manifestation of subterranean issues, what seems and what appears, and the psychic drama reflective of political and cultural problems that their characters internalize. In this course, we will explore the complex layering that allows the two authors to explore and comment on the dialectical relationship between human beings, the self’s interaction with the self, and the role of art for the audience. Can the two authors’ works be considered life manuals where they lay out the poetics of existence? We will be looking at some of their works, including Crime and Punishment (Dostoevsky), Hamlet (Shakespeare), and others, as processes where the first step is to identify societal issues as riddles, followed by the acknowledgment that a certain riddle is a worthy pursuit.

Was the Soviet Union a "workers paradise" or an "evil empire?" Nearly three decades after this country transformed into what we now call "post-Soviet space," the legacy of the USSR looms large in international politics and culture. This course will offer students an introduction to Soviet history through film, which Lenin famously called "the most important of the arts," and literature, which Soviet writers used to "engineer human souls." Since the 1917 Revolution, art has had a close relationship to the Soviet state. At the same time, writers and filmmakers with individualistic and even rebellious tendencies have created some of the twentieth century's greatest masterpieces, including Dziga Vertov's Man With a Movie Camera and Mikhail Bulgakov's Master and Margarita. In this class we will explore how this tense relationship between art and the state developed in the first half of the twentieth century. Since cultural context is an important lens for our analysis, each artistic work will be accompanied by historical readings about the period in which it was produced, as well as artistic manifestos and contemporary reviews, when relevant. All films will be shown with subtitles and all readings offered in English.