Are you interested in the kinds of advanced research that students do in the Russian, Central, and Eastern European Concentration? Please join us this Friday, May 10, 12:00pm-1:00pm, in JRC 209, for a presentation of four Mentored Advanced Projects:

Wild West and Model Socialist City: Wrocław and Warszawa in Post-World War II Poland,

1945-1956 ~ Doug Dobrzynski ‘13

State and Regime in post-Soviet Central Asia: Economic Decisions and Regime

Classification ~ Adam Lauretig ‘13

Czech Young Adult Literature: the Roma Problem ~ Furugh Nahib ‘13,

 The Devil in Moscow: Illustrations in The Master and Margarita ~ Christopher Squier ‘13

Sponsored by the RCEES Concentration and the Department of Russian

A light lunch will be provided!

We are pleased to announce an evening of Russian food and music, featuring our annual Slavic Coffeehouse, with a wide variety of delicious Slavic foods prepared by Russian Department faculty and students available for a nominal cost, and a special concert of Russian folk music performed by the renowned Russian folk music group Zolotoi Plyos (Alexander Solovov, Elena Sadina, and Sergei Gratchev). The group’s repertoire includes songs from many different regions of Russia, and the trio performs in authentic folk costumes and plays numerous traditional Russian instruments, including the treshchetka, balalaika, garmoshka and lozhki. Founded in 1994, the group has performed in Russia, Belgium, Holland, Luxembourg, Germany, Portugal and the US.

Saturday, April 13th

Slavic Coffeehouse, Bucksbaum Rotunda, 5:30-6:30 pm

Concert, Sebring-Lewis Hall, 7:00 pm

Sunday, April 14th

Workshop, JRC 101, 11:00 am

We hope you will join us in Faulconer Gallery on Tuesday, March 12th, at 4:15, for a talk presented by Professor Ed Cohn of the department of history. Ed’s talk is inspired by the pictures of Chernobyl, which are part of the current exhibit of Robert Polidori’s art in the gallery. http://www.grinnell.edu/faulconergallery/exhibitions/polidori

View of Chernobyl taken from Pripyat (from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:View_of_Chernobyl_taken_from_Pripyat.JPG)

Русский дом! Live in Russian House next year!

Are you interested in living off-campus next year? Would you like to live in a Russian-language environment, and participate in Russian activities? Join fellow Russian enthusiasts in Russian House, which is located at 1217 Park Street. There are singles and doubles available, as well as a full kitchen (кухня), a lounge area with television (телевизор), and various activities (мероприятия), including the now famous Russian Tea Party (Чаепитие) and Maslenitsa (Масленица) celebration.

Interested? Please contact the Russian House Coordinator at [russia] or [squierch] and/or Todd Armstrong at [armstron].

Just include your name, year, involvement in Russian (major or intended major? native speaker? taking classes?) and any extra information that may be important (going abroad for a semester, for example).

Grinnellians will be interested in reading about the adventures of one of last year’s graduates, Jared Dye ’12, who is spending the year in Russia, where he is teaching English in Tyumen, a city in Siberia. Jared, along with Kristen Moreland ’12, received a prestigious Fulbright award. Jared’s blog can be found here: http://jaredsfulbrightinsiberia.blogspot.ru.

Elvira Fattakhova was recently asked by the on-line journal oncampus.ru to contribute an essay describing her experiences so far in the US and at Grinnell College as a Fulbright Russian Language Assistant. Students of Russian and our alumni, as well as past assistants, will find this article of interest:

http://oncampus.ru/lichnyy-opyt/lichniy-opyt-5-stazhirovka-v-ssha-po-programme-fulbrayta

Elvira with the Russian Department at the annual Russian Department Picnic, Fall, 2012

On Wednesday, January 30th, residents of the Grinnell College Russian House hosted the first Чаепитие (Tea Time) of the Spring 2013 semester. The event, which traditionally has been held later in the evening, has undergone a transition this semester–instead of evening tea and Russian treats, Russian Tea Time at Grinnell has become a dinner event, now occurring weekly on Wednesdays at 18:00.

The first Tea Time was a success, despite the frigidity of Iowa’s January weather. The main course: Russian-style Borscht (Борщ), prepared by Russian major Anthony Wenndt ’15. Complete with Russian music and pleasant conversation, the first dinnertime Чаепитие at Grinnell certainly set the stage for a semester of fun and food at the Russkii Dom.

Left to Right: Anthony Wenndt ’15, Sydney Devine ’13, Christopher Squier ’13.

2012-2013 Russian Language Assistant Elvira Fattakhova

Welcome back, one and all! We hope you enjoyed a pleasant winter break, both productive and restful, and we also hope you are ready for Spring 2013 (though it hardly seems like spring at the moment: ХОЛОДНО В ГРИННЕЛЛЕ!)! We look forward to seeing those on campus at our weekly Русский стол on Fridays at noon in the dining hall, and Русский дом invites you to come to its weekly Чаепитие (Tea Party), which this semester will be held on Wednesday evenings at 6 p.m. in Русский дом (see below).

Чаепитие!

The first Чаепитие will be held this evening, January 30th; Борщ, made by Антон/Anthony will be featured! 

We also have a number of other events planned for the semester, including our annual Maslennitsa/Масленница celebration in March, Slavic Coffeehouse/Славянское кафе in April, and a screening of the Russian film Стиляги (Hipsters). Watch for future posts on Novosti for more information!

Guests in Grinnell for Spring 2013

We’d also like to welcome to campus an old friend of the department, RCEES concentration, and College, Mr. Konstanty (Kostek) Gebert, who is the 2012-13 John R. Heath Professor.  Having just completed a stint as head of the Warsaw office of the European Council on Foreign Relations, Kostek is an “international reporter and columnist at “Gazeta Wyborcza”, Poland’s biggest daily. He was a democratic opposition activist in the Seventies, when he was also an organizer of the Jewish Flying University, and an underground journalist in the Eighties under martial law. He is the founder of the Polish Jewish intellectual monthly Midrasz, and a board member of the Taube Centre for the Renewal of Jewish Life in Poland and of the Einstein Forum in Potsdam, Germany. He has taught in Poland, Israel and the US. He wrote ten books, e.g. on the Polish democratic transformation and on French policy toward Poland, the Yugoslav wars and the wars of Israel, Torah commentary and post-war Polish Jewry.  His essays have appeared in two dozen collective works in Poland and abroad, and his articles in newspapers around the world” (from: http://ecfr.eu/content/profile/C126). Kostek is teaching two courses this semester in the RCEES concentration (“Comparing Genocides” and “Polish-Jewish Relations in the Twentieth-Century”). He will also be giving a public lecture this semester; please watch for more news on this event. Welcome back, Kostek!

Students in Russia

Good luck to our students studying in Russia this semester! Arthur Richardson ’14 is studying on a Middlebury program in Irkutsk, Russia, and Stephanie Porter ’14 is studying in Saint Petersburg, in the Bard-Smolny program.  We look forward to hearing from them as they experience Russia for the first time!

Funding Opportunities

Finally, watch for future posts regarding funding for summer and post-graduate study. For now, students should check out the Russian Department website for information on two important opportunities, the Anne K. Hanson Award, and the John Mohan Russian Study Award.  Please contact Todd Armstrong if you have questions about these awards.

Русская кафедра желает всем нашим студентaм и друзьям счастливого и безопасного пути домой! The Russian Department wishes all our students a pleasant and safe journey home! We hope you enjoy the winter break, and we look forward to working with you in 2013. We have lots of interesting events and guests in the coming semester; watch for future postings for more information.