Undergraduate Bulletin
Spring 2025
HUR: Russian Literature and Culture Courses in English
HUR 141: The Age of Empire
A survey in English of major Russian writers of the 19th century, including Pushkin, Dostoevsky, and Tolstoy. A brief history of Russian literary masterpieces in the context of world literature and of major cultural movements such as the Renaissance, the Enlightenment, and Romanticism.
DEC: B
SBC:
HUM
3 credits
HUR 142: Culture and Revolution
Introduction to the major texts of modern Russian literature. Topics include the social and aesthetic rebellions of writers confronted with political oppression (labor camps, prisons, Stalin's reign of terror) or with outdated literary tradition. Typical cultural modes of rebellion, including avant-garde prose and poetry as well as popular forms of carnival and folk laughter, are explored in literature, theater, and film.
DEC: B
SBC:
HUM
3 credits
HUR 231: Saints and Fools
An introduction to literature about the lives of saints and the holy fool tradition in major texts of Russian and English literature. Emphasis is placed on the ways authors have used fundamental religious values of humility, the transcendent irrational, and kenosis to confront their own times. Authors considered range from monks to Dickens, Dumas, Chaucer, Gogol, and Pushkin; films include Murder in the Cathedral and Forrest Gump. This course is offered as both EGL 231 and HUR 231.
Advisory Prerequisite: one D.E.C. B or HUM course
3 credits
HUR 232: Rebels and Tyrants
An exploration of literary rebels and tyrants central to Russian and Anglo-American traditions. The subversive tactics of such writers as Shakespeare, Dostoevsky, Sir Walter Scott, Solzhenitsyn, and Salinger are appraised in the light of the dominant social, political, and aesthetic systems they confront. This course offered as both EGL 232 and HUR 232.
Advisory Prerequisite: one D.E.C. B or HUM course
3 credits
HUR 235: Crime and Punishment in World Literature
An exploration of the nature of crime and punishment in literature, including readings from Dostoevsky, Dickens, and Nabokov on the depiction of criminals, villains, acts of violence, and the moral code of their time.
Advisory Prerequisite: one D.E.C. B or HUM course
3 credits
HUR 241: Russian Cinema
A survey of contemporary Russian cinema in a historical, cultural, and political context. Students learn methods of reading and analyzing film content and style. Topics include: cinematic techniques, major events in the Soviet and Russian history, and discussions of various cultural and social issues. All films have English subtitles.
3 credits
HUR 249: Russia Today
Contemporary cultural trends viewed in terms of their historic social and political context. Recent responses to historical change such as the breakup of the Soviet Union and its relation to the forces that brought about the Russian Revolution, the new economic order, and the search for Russian national identity are explored in literature, the arts, and media.
3 credits
HUR 341: Russian Literature and the West
A topics course given in English on a major Russian author or literary movement in relation to European or American literature. Semester supplements to this Bulletin contain specific description when course is offered. May be repeated as the topic changes. May be used to satisfy comparative literature major elective requirements with permission of major department.
Prerequisite: U3 or U4 standing
Advisory Prerequisite: One literature course at the 200 level or higher
DEC: GSBC: HFA+
3 credits
HUR 393: Literary Analysis of Russian Texts
Selected topics in literary analysis focusing on the work of one or more Russian authors in translation. Semester supplements to this Bulletin contain specific description when course is offered. May be repeated as the topic changes.
Prerequisite: One literature course at the 200 level or higher
DEC: G
SBC:
HFA+
3 credits
HUR 475: Undergraduate Teaching Practicum I
Work with a faculty member as an assistant in one of the faculty member's regularly scheduled classes. The student is required to attend all the classes, do all the regularly assigned work and meet with the faculty member at regularly scheduled times to discuss the intellectual and pedagogical matters relating to the course. In HUR 476, students assume greater responsibility in such areas as leading discussions and analyzing results of tests that have already been graded. Students may not serve as teaching assistants in the same course twice. This course does not count toward the major or minor in Russian.
Prerequisite: U3 or U4 standing; permission of instructor and language coordinator
SBC: EXP+
3 credits, S/U grading
HUR 476: Undergraduate Teaching Practicum II
Work with a faculty member as an assistant in one of the faculty member's regularly scheduled classes. The student is required to attend all the classes, do all the regularly assigned work and meet with the faculty member at regularly scheduled times to discuss the intellectual and pedagogical matters relating to the course. In HUR 476, students assume greater responsibility in such areas as leading discussions and analyzing results of tests that have already been graded. Students may not serve as teaching assistants in the same course twice. This course does not count toward the major or minor in Russian.
Prerequisite: U3 or U4 standing; permission of instructor and language coordinator
SBC: EXP+
3 credits, S/U grading
