Different approaches to Russia from the point of view of research: History, Culture and Literature, Sociology. Obligatory course for those who intend to make Russian Studies Programme.

The introduction course will address topics such as:

- An overview to the Russian history

- Periodisation of history in Russia and the Soviet Union

- Modernisation emphases of the state Mythmaking and propaganda in history

- Continuum in Soviet and Russian history

- Use of Past in the Soviet Union/Russia

- The legacy of the Soviet Union

- Key concepts of Russian cultural identity

- symbolic world of Russianness

- aspects of cultural history - cultural studies

- "New Man and Woman" - building a new Soviet man: kul'turnost'

- new Russian popular culture

- Russia's transition to a market economy, including the legacy of the Soviet economic system, the shadow economy and new forms of blat;

- Women in Russia, particularly their roles in business and the family

- Russia's transition to democracy, including presidential power, centralization and possibly state-media relations;

- How Russians have coped with the transition in daily life, for example facing changes in the workplace, economic insecurity and the growing gap between rich and poor (e.g. the "new Russians" versus the elderly poor).

Enrolment via NettiOpsu http://www.uta.fi/nettiopsu/

No previous knowledge of the Russian language is required. The course is set around studying prepared texts, through which the main areas of the grammar will be covered. Active participation and production are the main goals of the course. The teaching language will be English. Students of any discipline are welcome. Those who already have knowledge of Russian language can participate courses at the Slavonic philology.

This course is for those who have never studied Russian before but think it would be a fun at least to try. The aim is to learn the Russian alphabet, to acquire fundamental vocabulary of 500-800 lexical units, to achieve basic skills in pronunciation and grammar, to study everyday communicative situations. This means that after studying Russian for one semester you will be able not only to read simple texts (names of the streets, signs, ads, short newspaper articles, etc.), but also to understand some spoken language, and even to communicate in everyday life situations.

Of course you heard many times, that Russian is a very difficult language with an alphabet nobody can learn, with lots of grammar forms nobody can understand, and hundreds of rules with thousands of exceptions nobody can remember. You have a chance to see for yourself whether is it true or maybe a slight exaggeration...

Enrolment via NettiOpsu http://www.uta.fi/nettiopsu/

Objectives: To acquaint students with key events and concepts in Finnish-Russian relations and learn to detect dynamics of continuity and change in international relations between Finland and Russia.
Content: Finnish-Russian relations in a historical perspective (from 1809 to the present day): the autonomous Grand Duchy and Russia, the period of independent statehood, Finnish-Russian relations in the multilateral EU context.

This course has two main goals. It provides a basic overview of the Soviet Russian political-economical and sociocultural development 1917-1991 and seeks to illustrate certain aspects of this development: the interaction between official rhetorics and politics on the one hand and the realities of everyday life, and popular opinion on the other. To what extent did the official rhetoric and the popular discourses coincide or differ from each other?

During the course questions will be asked like ?Was the October Revolution of 1917 a coup or a revolution?' and ?Did Nikita Khrushchev succeed to de-Stalinize Russia?'. It will deal with topics like ?Stalinism in ideal and reality' and ?Did the late Soviet period mean stagnation or stability?' The course problematizes the development in the 1980s by asking questions like ?Did the pressure of Perestroika and Glasnost eventually topple Soviet social mechanism?' This is a course that also aims to view the Soviet Russian history from a gendered perspective by looking into officially proclaimed ideals of women's liberation and practices of gender politics in everyday life.

Preliminary programme:

1. Why revolution(s) in Russia? Explanations in economic, social, political and cultural terms

2. October 1917 - coup d'état or revolution?

3. Soviet Union - a state of nations

4. Marxism-Leninism: Sociel theories & power rhetoric

5. Stalinism - realities and ideals

6. The Kchrushchev era: Problems of de-Stalinization and Stalinist continuity

7. The Soviet economy - models and realities

8. The Brezhnev regime - stagnation or stabilization?

9. Class and gender in social relations in Soviet Russia

10. Soviet Union and the surrounding world - a geopolitical model of concentric circles

11. Russia today and the Soviet legacy - politics, economics and culture

12. Perestroika and glasnost - too much of both in order to keep the Soviet empire together?

Kurssi toteutetaan yhteistyössä valtakunnallisen Venäjän ja Itä-Euroopan tutkimuksen maisterikoulun kanssa.

Enrolment via NettiOpsu http://www.uta.fi/nettiopsu/

The main purpose of this course is to observe how the processes of censorship and self-censorship as alienable parts of the cultural process were developed. Most of the attention is to be paid to XX century and the present time taking into account that the last decades have given a rise to new forms of media involvement (including active promotion of television and Internet). The pivotal idea is to differentiate the peculiarities of censorship and self-censorship for Russian and Western realities so that the students could better understand the theoretical background of the definitions themselves. The course is designated for all who tend to understand the cultural and political evolution of modern Russia.

Enrolment via NettiOpsu http://www.uta.fi/nettiopsu/

The aim of the course is to provide students information about the current state and development of mass media in Russia. The course pays attention also to media in the Soviet Union, media as part of political process in Russia and journalistic culture in Russia. The course gives basic information about the role of the media in contemporary Russian society, including the presentation of different media institutions, audience choices of different media and changes in the media system.

Enrolment via NettiOpsu

Some previous knowledge of Russian language is required, i.e. a beginner's course or equivalent. The course is set around studying and discussing original texts (simple newspaper articles, popular songs or poems etc.) and prepared texts, where some areas of the grammar will be dealt with in more detail. The teaching language will be English. Students of any discipline are welcome.

The program is for the students who want to continue their study of Russian language and culture after the basic course, or for those who wish to refresh their basic knowledge of Russian and to activate their vocabulary after a break in their studies. The program is lingua-culturally oriented, it will help you to communicate with Russian native speakers on everyday topics, to read and comprehend short original texts.You will study the key points of Russian grammar, such as the case system, the general concept of verb aspect, verbs of motion, the structure of simple and complex sentences. Your vocabulary will cover 1000 - 1300 lexical units.

After the course

• You will be able to satisfy your basic communicative needs in social, cultural, and classroom environments;
• You learn to speak Russian correctly and to understand native speakers in basic communicative situations;
• You will be able to comprehend the oral speech of native Russian speakers on a variety of topics and to participate in discussions with native speakers on social, cultural and political issues;
• You will learn to express your own thoughts on various subjects;
• You will learn to read authentic and non-adapted short fiction and non-fiction texts.

Enrolment via NettiOpsu http://www.uta.fi/nettiopsu/

Visual culture makes up a significant part of a particular national culture or civilisation and encodes the main values and attitudes of the people and state. For understanding Russia with her dramatic history this is particularly significant. The course aims at providing the students with knowledge of the Russian visual arts and contemporary visual environment with its semiotics and encoded social values.

Content of the course

Starting from the Russian icon and the 19th century painting, the course concentrates on Russian avant-garde art, the Soviet poster and Soviet/Russian art-photography with special attention to the following topics:

• The Russian avant-garde: in literature and in visual arts;
• The history of the Soviet poster;
• Photography and propaganda;
• Gender in Russian painting poster and photography;
• Censorship in visual arts under Stalin;
• Famous Russian war photographs and photographers;
• Socialist realism in the visual arts (1950s-1980s);
• The re-emergence of fine-art photography in the 1970s;
• Outstanding contemporary Russian photographers.

The final part of the course deals with the Post-modernist ?visual quotation' and visual pop-culture in modern Russia (?what people see').

Kurssi toteutetaan yhteistyössä valtakunnallisen Venäjän ja Itä-Euroopan tutkimuksen maisterikoulun kanssa.

Enrolment via NettiOpsu http://www.uta.fi/nettiopsu/

The transition from socialism has involved widespread changes throughout societies in Central and Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union. For example, in Russia the "cradle to grave" role of the state in welfare provision has given way to increasing insecurity for certain segments of the population, alongside burgeoning wealth for elites. Today, Russia can be described as both a rich and poor country.

This course will address health and social welfare in Russia and other transition countries from various perspectives. First, key health and social developments in transition countries will be summarized. Second, broad trends in socioeconomic inequality and marginalization in Russia will be addressed: who are the most vulnerable in Russian society? Third, recent developments in social policy and programs in the Russian Federation will be discussed, including debates over the allocation of state oil revenues to the stabilization fund versus social welfare programs. Fourth, the Russian public health situation will be discussed: changes in health policy during the transition, health status and the health behaviour of the Russian population, client satisfaction in health services, health care payments and public perceptions of current health threats/problems in Russia.

Kurssi toteutetaan yhteistyössä valtakunnallisen Venäjän ja Itä-Euroopan tutkimuksen maisterikoulun kanssa.

Enrolment via NettiOpsu http://www.uta.fi/nettiopsu/ ENROLMENT IS COMPULSORY!

In the aftermath of the Russian-Georgian war in August 2008 EU-Russian relations have reached their lowest point since the end of the Cold War. The current disillusionment in Russia's 'Europeanization' and the retreat of ambitious visions of EU-Russian cooperation require a reassessment of the overall framework of analyzing EU-Russian relations. This course traces the emergence and unfolding of
EU-Russian conflicts in the current decade from the perspective of identity politics and the interplay of sovereignty and integration in foreign policy. The lectures will focus on the ongoing crisis in
EU-Russian relations in the aftermath of the Caucasian War and address the changing status of the 'idea of Europe' in Russian politics.

No previous knowledge of the Russian language is required. The course is set around studying prepared texts, through which the main areas of the grammar will be covered. Active participation and production are the main goals of the course. The teaching language will be English. Students of any discipline are welcome. Those who already have knowledge of Russian language can participate courses at the Slavonic philology.

This course is for those who have never studied Russian before but think it would be a fun at least to try. The aim is to learn the Russian alphabet, to acquire fundamental vocabulary of 500-800 lexical units, to achieve basic skills in pronunciation and grammar, to study everyday communicative situations. This means that after studying Russian for one semester you will be able not only to read simple texts (names of the streets, signs, ads, short newspaper articles, etc.), but also to understand some spoken language, and even to communicate in everyday life situations.

Of course you heard many times, that Russian is a very difficult language with an alphabet nobody can learn, with lots of grammar forms nobody can understand, and hundreds of rules with thousands of exceptions nobody can remember. You have a chance to see for yourself whether is it true or maybe a slight exaggeration...

Enrolment via NettiOpsu http://www.uta.fi/nettiopsu/

The course (20 h) focuses on environmental issues in the Russian context. It sheds light on different physical and societal aspects of environmental issues. The course covers the Soviet background of environmental problems and policies, the current state of the Russian environment, and the environment as a social and political question in today's Russia. In addition, Russia's environment is examined from different angles, varying from questions of energy policy and natural resource use to those concerning environmental planning and Russia's role in international environmental politics.

Enrolment via NettiOpsu http://www.uta.fi/nettiopsu/

The course examines the Second World War and its impact on Soviet and Russian cultures. We will focus on the effects, phenomena and myths of the War ("The Great Patriotic War") in culture, art and society. In addition to this we will pay attention to questions related to gender, the role of victory in the discourses of war and the renewal and reconstructing of the memory of the war. The lecture series will start with an introduction to the history of the Second World War and the place war had in the rhetoric of the pre-war Soviet Union. The course then proceeds to looking into more detailed questions related to the War, such as women and the home front, the effects of war on different art forms, war propaganda, war heroes, etc. The aim of this course is to provide information about the history and culture of Soviet Union during the Second World War and to encourage to critical thinking in connection with the renewal of the myths of war and the changing of the memory of the war.

Some previous knowledge of Russian language is required, i.e. a beginner's course or equivalent. The course is set around studying and discussing original texts (simple newspaper articles, popular songs or poems etc.) and prepared texts, where some areas of the grammar will be dealt with in more detail. The teaching language will be English. Students of any discipline are welcome.

The program is for the students who want to continue their study of Russian language and culture after the basic course, or for those who wish to refresh their basic knowledge of Russian and to activate their vocabulary after a break in their studies. The program is lingua-culturally oriented, it will help you to communicate with Russian native speakers on everyday topics, to read and comprehend short original texts.You will study the key points of Russian grammar, such as the case system, the general concept of verb aspect, verbs of motion, the structure of simple and complex sentences. Your vocabulary will cover 1000 - 1300 lexical units.

After the course

• You will be able to satisfy your basic communicative needs in social, cultural, and classroom environments;
• You learn to speak Russian correctly and to understand native speakers in basic communicative situations;
• You will be able to comprehend the oral speech of native Russian speakers on a variety of topics and to participate in discussions with native speakers on social, cultural and political issues;
• You will learn to express your own thoughts on various subjects;
• You will learn to read authentic and non-adapted short fiction and non-fiction texts.

Enrolment via NettiOpsu http://www.uta.fi/nettiopsu/

The course deals with the rise of consumerism in Russia in the 20th century. Consumerism is to be treated both as socioeconomic phenomenon and as part of mass consciousness. Different motives and patterns of consumerist behavior in Russia and the USSR will be examined from historical prospective. Political implications of society's frustrated consumerist expectations for the Soviet system, as well as some attempts by the Soviet authorities to meet consumerist challenge will be discussed. Political crisis of the late 1980s that led to the collapse of the Soviet Union will be explained as a sort of popular revolt against the system's inability to meet consumerist demands. Lectures will be supported by various pieces of evidence from Soviet Russian literature, folklore, periodicals, and the movies.

Kurssi toteutetaan yhteistyössä valtakunnallisen Venäjän ja Itä-Euroopan tutkimuksen maisterikoulun kanssa.

Enrolment via NettiOpsu http://www.uta.fi/nettiopsu/

Content: Crisis period is always a catalyst for social change. Russian society like many others faces crisis-related challenges. The effects of the crisis are already making an impact on its basic institutions, economic and social. The Russian society and the elites have to respond to key dilemmas of the day:
- How to define itself vis-à-vis the West or the East?
- Should the policy of openness be continued or should protectionism replace international cooperation?
- How should the social policies be defined - support for the poor or bolstering the rich?
- What should be the response to political challenges - more concentration of power or more democracy?
The response to these and many other challenges is going to shape the future of the Russian Federation and, in a way, the future of Europe and the world.

Compensations:

Sociology: 2 ECTS from SOSLA2.2 Vertaileva tutkimus or SOSLA2.4 Sosiaaliset instituutiot ja käytännöt

Social Policy: 2 ECTS from SPOLA3A2 Vertaileva hyvinvointivaltiotutkimus or SPOLA2.4 Globaali sosiaalinen kehitys

Bachelor of Social Sciences/ISSS: Sociology: 2 ECTS from SOSLA2.2 Comparative Research or SOSLA2.4 Social Institutions and Practices

Russian Studies: RSTA4

Other compensations to be confirmed.

Modes of Study: Lectures 12 h and learning diary 10 pages (1.5-row, 12-font). Lecture diary to be returned by March 31 in paper form to the ISSS-office (Linna room 6062)

More information from isss(at)uta.fi