History of Russian Literary Language and Culture

Catalog description

This course examines the linguistic, literary, and social history of the Russian language from the earliest written records to the modern day. Course topics include: the creation of the Slavic alphabets and the first literary language of the Slavs, Old Church Slavonic; the beginnings and development of writing and literacy in Medieval Rus (modern Belarus, Russia, and Ukraine); the evolution of the Russian literary language, its styles, and registers; grammatical categories of Russian; features of Russian lexicography; the social history and politics of language use; analysis of texts. Readings in Russian & English; advanced language proficiency required.