The course introduces students to major works of medieval and pre-modern East Slavic literary tradition, from the eleventh to the seventeenth century. The course has two major goals. The first is to build on students’ knowledge of Old Church Slavic and develop fluency in reading and interpreting medieval and pre-modern East Slavic texts. The second is to explore the role of written practices in the societies of Kievan Rus’ and Muscovy and the ways in which literary forms, genres, and practices changed over the course of this period.
Our readings will include chronicles, epic and heroic narrative, travel writing, letters, religious and didactic works, early secular tales, and poetry. We will read several major works (or excerpts from them) representing different periods and genres/registers/styles. Part of each meeting will be devoted to reading the original texts closely: translating difficult passages and working through the grammatical, lexical, and rhetorical and cultural problems they present.
Key themes will include the major texts of early East Slavic literature and their place in secular and religious life, the connection of early writing and medieval history, culture and art, the development and transformation of literary tradition, as well as the relationship between Church Slavonic and East Slavic vernaculars and the question of authorship and textual authority.
Undergraduate
Slavic 39M: Linguistic Diversity: Languages of the Former Soviet Union
Slavic 50: Introduction to Slavic Cultures
Slavic 100: Slavic Undergraduate Seminar
Ling 100: Introduction to Linguistics
Ling 111: Introduction to Phonology
Ling 130: Historical Linguistics
Slavic/Ling C137: Introduction to Slavic Linguistics
Graduate
Ling 211B: Advanced Phonology: Contrast
Ling 211B: Topics in Advanced Phonology
Ling 240A-B: Field Methods. Language: Turkmen
Russian 202: Advanced Academic Russian
Slavic 210: Old Church Slavic
Slavic 220: Comparative Slavic
Slavic 222: Descriptive Grammar of Russian
Slavic 280: The Living Word Workshop [Co-taught with A. Muza]