TLÜ ÕIS

Russian Culture and Society

Course code

SKS7203.HT

old course code

Course title in Estonian

Vene kultuur ja ühiskond

Course title in English

Russian Culture and Society

ECTS credits

6.0

Assessment form

Examination

lecturer of 2023/2024 Spring semester

Grigori Utgof (language of instruction: Russian)

lecturer of 2024/2025 Autumn semester

Not opened for teaching. Click the study programme link below to see the nominal division schedule.

Course aims

Where does Russia end in the West? How many Russias did Sigismund von Herberstein list in his Rerum Moscoviticarum Commentarii (1549)? Is Russia now a single unity? And what about Russian society? And, by the way, can we say that a state and a society is one and the same thing? What is the role of language(s) in the social stratification and power relations within and between different groups? These are just a few questions this lecture course will address. Its primary goal is to challenge the monistic approach to writing and thinking about Russian culture of the past and of the present.

Brief description of the course

Russian society and Russian culture: a historic perspective. Reading and society in Russia. Culture as a social phenomenon, and the way it structures itself. Current trends in cultural studies: personal and family history, history of everyday culture, patterns of behavior, etc. Sociolinguistics: language as a part of culture and society.

Learning outcomes in the course

Upon completing the course the student:
- understands the way culture and the given society interrelate;
- distinguishes key problems in culture and society;
- is able to list cultural institutions;
- is able to co-operate with peer students;
- is able to apply latest research methods;
- is able to write a final essay on culture;
- is expected to expand their existing knowledge of Russian cultural history from the last Rurikids to the present;
- is expected to learn how to analyze everyday culture the way it is done nowadays, i. e. (above all) avoiding imperial and nationalistic bias and using different approaches.

Teacher

Grigori Utgof

Additional information

Kohustuslik kirjandus:
Лотман Ю. М. Память в культурологическом освещении // Лотман Ю. М. Избранные статьи: В 3-х тт. Таллинн, 1992. Т. 1. С. 200–202.

Успенский Б. А. Historia sub specie semioticae // Успенский Б. А. Избранные труды: В 2-х тт. М., 1994. T. 1. C. 50–59.

Asenduskirjandus:
Долинин А. А. «Гибель Запада» и другие мемы: Из истории расхожих идей и словесных формул. М., 2020.

Милюков П. Н. Очерки по истории русской культуры: В 3-х тт. СПб., 1896–1901.

Billington, J. The Icon and the Axe: An Interpretive History of Russian Culture. New York, 1970.

Study programmes containing that course