Information Session: Undergraduate Russian Flagship Program
When: 4:00-5:00pm, Tuesday, October 2, 2012
Where: 1418 Van Hise Hall, 1220 Linden Drive
The UW-Madison Russian Flagship Program is an innovative undergraduate program to offer highly-motivated students in any major the opportunity to reach a professional level of competence (ACTFL Superior/ILR 3) in Russian. Scholarships are available to support overseas and intensive summer study. For more information: www.russianflagship.wisc.edu
Students who are interested in applying to the program, or would just like to learn about it, are invited to attend the information session, or to contact Karen Evans-Romaine, Russian Flagship director (evansromaine@wisc.edu) or Dianna Murphy, Russian Flagship associate director(diannamurphy@wisc.edu).
Upcoming application deadlines:
November 15, 2012 (Spring 2013 admission)
March 15, 2013 (Fall 2013 admission)
The UW-Madison Russian Flagship is a collaborative initiative of the UW-Madison Department of Slavic Languages and Literature and the Language Institute, with the Center for Russia, East Europe, and Central Asia, and the Doctoral Program in Second Language Acquisition. The programis funded by the Language Flagship, a public/private partnership sponsored by the National Security Education Program (NSEP), U.S. Department of Defense. The content of this website does not necessarily reflect the position of policy of the U.S. government. No official government endorsement should be inferred.
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Собачьесердце/Heart of a Dog (1988)
A Language Flagship Film Presentation
Date and Time: 5:00pm, Wednesday, October 3, 2012
Location: 250 Van Hise Hall
In Russian, with English subtitles
Не пропустите просмотр этой великолепной экранизации повести Михаила Булгакова "Собачье сердце", картинa Владимира Бортко о фантастическом превращении бродячего пса в типичного советского гражданина Шарикова. Благодаря невероятно талантливым актерaм, сыгравшим трех основных героев фильма, так и за счёт тонко продуманной режиссуры, переломная эпоха в судьбе страны предстала на экране в ёмкой, афористичной форме, которая не лишена яркой трагифарсовости.
This movie is one of the unsung masterpieces of world cinema. A very well-mannered, and yet at the same time absolutely savage denunciation of the Soviet regime and the type of person who flourished under it, the film is a faithful adaptation of the long-banned eponymous book by Mikhail Bulgakov. The sets are flawless, and the director made the brilliant decision to film in monochrome sepia, adding a feel of authenticity where a late-80s washed-out color incarnation would have all but ruined the film. The plot deserves to be discovered by the viewer himself, but the performances are true Oscar material. (IMDb)
The film will be shown with English subtitles and introductory remarks in Russian by Madina Djuraeva.
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POSTPONED
"'A Period of Darkness': Mongol literature between the Purging of the Intelligentsia and the Death of Stalin (1938-1953)"
Simon Wickham-Smith, Western Washington University
Date and Time: Thursday, October 4, 2012; 4:00 pm
Location: 206 Ingraham
About the Lecture: Following the Stalinist purges of intellectuals and monastics during the late 1930s, Mongol literature entered into a period characterized by censorship and war. The writing of this period, while frequently characterized as dull, as the lifeless work of Soviet stooges, in fact reveals how writers were able to express patriotic feeling in a new way, and how the traditional ideas of Mongol literature were adapted, both in the service of revolutionary politics, and/or in order to outwit the censors.
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Alexsei Guerman: The Complete Features
A Cinematheque Double Feature:
"Trial On the Road" & "The Seventh Companion"
Date and time: October 6 at 7:00 P.M.
Location: 4070 Vilas Hall, 821 University Ave., Madison, WI 53706
Sponsor: Cinematheque, CREECA
About the films:
TRIAL ON THE ROAD (PROVERKA NA DOROGAKH)
Soviet Union, 1971, 35mm, 97 min., Russian with English subtitles
Directed by Aleksei Guerman
With Vladimir Zamansky, Fyodor Odinokov, Anatoly Solonitskin
A searing anti-war film, Guerman’s first solo feature was banned for 15 years. Based on true events in WWII, the film follows Lazarev, a Russian sergeant who defected to the Nazis, only to later return to the Red Army. Suspicious of his loyalty, Lazarev’s co-combatants repeatedly make him prove his allegiance through a gauntlet of increasingly risky missions. “Bravura filmmaking at its best.” - Artforum (MK)
Saturday, October 6, 8:45 p.m., 4070 Vilas Hall
Guerman
THE SEVENTH COMPANION (SEDMOY SPUTNIK)
Soviet Union, 1967, 35mm, 89 min., Russian with English subtitles
Directed by Aleksei Guerman and Grigori Aronov
With Andrei Popov
Guerman’s first feature was co-directed with the more established (and conventional) Griogori Aronov, to whom he ceded more control. Nevertheless, Guerman’s oblique view of history and rough wartime humanism are on full display in this vision of the Russian civil war. Imprisoned by revolutionary forces, a bourgeois general is cleared of his crimes and released back into society, only to find his apartment has turned into a crowded commune. (MK)
For more about these films, check out Cinematheque's Web site at cinema.wisc.edu.
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The Holocaust and the Problem of Empathy: Polish Writers Look at the Ghetto
Rachel F. Brenner, Max and Frieda Weinstein-Bascom Professor of Jewish Studies; Professor of Modern Hebrew Literature, UW-Madison
Date and Time: Wednesday, October 10, 2012; 5:30 pm
Location: Conrad A. Elvehjem Building Room L140
Sponsors: Center for the Humanities
About the Speaker: Rachel Feldhay Brenner is Professor of Modern Hebrew Literature in the Department of Hebrew and Semitic Studies, and Max and Frieda Weinstein-Bascom Professor of Jewish Studies, both at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Her research focuses on Jewish Diaspora Literature, Israeli literature, and on representations of the Holocaust in literature and in autobiographical writings. She is the author of, most recently, Inextricably Bonded: Israeli Jewish and Arab Writers Re-Visioning Culture (2003), and The Freedom to Write: The Woman-Artist and the World in Ruth Almog's Fiction (2008).
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"Russian Politics: The Paradox of a Weak State"
Marie Mendras, Professor at the Paris School of International Affairs, Sciences Po University
Date and Time: Thursday, October 11, 2012; 4:00 pm
Location: 206 Ingraham
Sponsors: Center for Russia, East Europe, and Central Asia (CREECA), and the Dept. of Political Science, with generous financial support from the University Lectures Committee
About the Speaker: Marie Mendras is a professor at Sciences Po University and research fellow with the National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS) in Paris. She runs the Observatoire de la Russie at the Centre for International Study and Research (CERI) and is an Associate Fellow of the Russia and Eurasia Programme at Chatham House.
About the Lecture: What has become of the Russian state twenty years after the collapse of Communism? Why have the rulers and the ruled turned away from democratic institutions and the rule of law? What explains the Putin regime’s often uncooperative policies towards Europe and its difficult relations with the rest of the world? These are among the key issues discussed in this lecture, which will be drawn from Marie Mendras' new book Russian Politics: The Paradox of a Weak State (Columbia University Press, 2012).
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AATSEEL-Wisconsin Conference
Date and time: October 12-13
Location:Pyle Center 335
Sponsor: Department of Slavic Languages and Literature
About the conference:
Keynote Lecture October 12: Alexander Zholkovsky, "Poetics Today: Some Burning Issues"
For the program for October 13, click here.
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"Poetics Today: Some Burning Issues"
Alexander Zholkovsky, Professor, Slavic Languages and Literature and Comparative Literature, USC
Date and time: October 12 at 4:00 P.M.
Location: Room DE355, Pyle Center
Sponsor: Department of Slavic Languages and CREECA, with generous financial support from the University Lectures Committee
About the Speaker: Professor Alexander Zholkovsky researches Russian literary studies, with a focus on Soviet Aesopian "art of adaptation", the poetics of bad writing and intertextuality. He studies the power of grammar in Russian literature, authoring numerous publications that examine how modern Russian writers are engaged in reinterpretive dialogue with previous generations of Russian literary masters. He also studies Russian writers whose works span generations, including Karamzin, Pushkin, Gogol, Tolstoy, Chekhov, Babel and Akhmatova, among others.
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Alexsei Guerman: The Complete Features
A Cinematheque Film:
"Twenty Days without War"
Date and time: October 13 at 7:00 P.M.
Location: 4070 Vilas Hall, 821 University Ave., Madison, WI 53706
Sponsor: Cinematheque, CREECA
About the film:
Soviet Union, 1976, 35mm, 101 min., Russian with English subtitles
Directed by Aleksei Guerman
With Yuri Nikulin
In a characteristically perverse move, Guerman followed the banned Trial on the Road with a second critical WWII film that keeps the war almost entirely offscreen. On leave from the front, a soldier returns to his hometown, where he encounters a film crew producing a bombastic adaptation of his own war correspondence, and courts a seamstress in the costume department. (MK)
For more about this film, check out Cinematheque's Web site at cinema.wisc.edu.
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"Manya, a Living History of Marie Curie"
When: Sunday, October 14, 2012; at 2:00 pm and again at 4:00 pm
Where: Middleton Performing Arts Center, 2100 Bristol Street
Cost: Suggested donation of $4
Sponsor: Polish Heritage Club Wisconsin-Madison, developed with support from UW Go Big Read program
Synopsis: Performed by Susan Marie Frontczak, Storysmith. Program for school-age children and families. For 28 years her presentations have taken her to 21 of the United States, Scotland , and Canada for over 190 performances.
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"Eisenstein, Sexuality, and Decadence"
Evgenii Bershtein , Reed College
When: Monday, October 15, 2012; 4:00 pm
Where: 254 Van Hise
Sponsor: Dept. of Slavic Languages
Synopsis: Sergei Eisenstein (1898-1948), well known as one of the last century's most influential film directors and theorists, was also a prolific writer of aesthetic and sexual theory as well as the author of thousands of erotic drawings. This lecture is based on a study of Eisenstein's films as well his largely unpublished documents and drawings, and it examines the Soviet master's artistic and intellectual links to European Decadence.
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"Bieganski: The Brute Polak Stereotype in Polish-Jewish Relations and American Popular Culture"
Danusha Goska
Date and Time: Thursday, October 18, 2012; 4:00 pm
Location: Marquee Theater, Union South
Sponsors: Mosse-Weinstein Center for Jewish Studies, Folklore, LISAR, Department of Slavic Languages & Literature, CREECA, and Religious Studies
About the Lecture: Danusha Goska, PhD, will discuss the role of the Brute Polak stereotype in Polish-Jewish relations and American popular culture. She will also discuss how the Brute Polak stereotype is used to distort Holocaust history and the ethical demands presented by the Holocaust. Co-sponsored by the Religious Studies Program, the Lubar Institute for the Study of Abrahamic Religions, the Slavic Department, the Folklore Program, and the Center for Russia, East Europe, and Central Asia.
About the Speaker: Danusha Goska is a writer and teacher living in New Jersey. She has lived and worked in Africa, Asia, Europe, on both coasts, and in the heartland, of the United States. She holds an MA from UC Berkeley and a PhD from Indiana University Bloomington. She currently works at WPUNJ. Her writing has been praised by a variety of scholars, including John Mearsheimer, Father John Pawlikowski, Robert Ellsberg and Paul Loeb. She has won the New Jersey State Council on the Arts Grant, the Halecki Award, and the Eva Kagan Kans award.
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Sequoya Library Author Visit:
Jennifer Wilson , Author of "Running Away to Home: Our Family's Journey to Croatia in Search of Who We Are, Where We Came From and What Really Matters"
When: Friday, October 19, 2012; 7:00 pm
Where: Sequoya Branch Library at 4340 Tokay Blvd
Synopsis: Travel writer Jennifer Wilson took her family, including two small children, to spend a sabbatical in Mrkopalj, Croatia, the birthplace of Wilson’s great-grandparents. They arrived in the village speaking little Croatian but soon became part of the community. She relates how they learned the traditions of her family’s village and tracked down distant relatives. Jennifer Wilson is an award-winning writer who has chronicled her travels, both epic and around the corner, in National Geographic Traveler, Gourmet, Midwest Living, Better Homes & Gardens, Frommer’s Budget Travel, and Parents. Running Away to Home was awarded Best Nonfiction Book of 2011 by the American Society of Journalists and Authors.
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Alexsei Guerman: The Complete Features
A Cinematheque Film:
"My Friend Ivan Lapshin"
Date and time: October 20 at 7:00 P.M.
Location: 4070 Vilas Hall, 821 University Ave., Madison, WI 53706
Sponsor: Cinematheque, CREECA
About the film:
Soviet Union, 1984, 35mm, 101 min., Russian with English subtitles
Directed by Aleksei Guerman
With Andrei Boltnev, Nina Ruslanova, Andrey Mironov
Heralded as the greatest Soviet film of all time in a national poll of film critics, this legendary movie is itself an inquiry into the nature of legends. A beloved provincial policeman is remembered 50 years later for both his heroism and his involvement in a love triangle. Based on popular stories by Guerman’s father, Lapshin’s life unfolds in a fragmented narrative film scholar Ian Christie deemed “as elaborate as anything in Orson Welles.”
For more about this film, check out Cinematheque's Web site at cinema.wisc.edu.
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Language Over Lunch: 2012-13 Language Institute Brownbag Series
Superior Proficiency in Russian by Graduation: The Undergraduate Russian Flagship Program
Karen Evans-Romaine, Department of Slavic Languages and Literature
Dianna Murphy, Language Institute
Anna Tumarkin, Department of Slavic Languages and Literature
Date and Time: October 22, 2012, 12:00 pm
Location: 1418 Van Hise Hall
Sponsors: Language Institute, Russian Flagship
About the lecture: The UW-Madison Russian Flagship Program, established in 2010, is one of 26 Language Flagship Centers in the United States that receive funding from National Security Education Program in the U.S. Department of Defense to provide opportunities for undergraduate students in all majors to achieve a Superior level of proficiency in a “critical” language such as Arabic, Chinese, Hindi Urdu, Korean, Persian, Portuguese, Russian, Swahili or Turkish.
In this brownbag presentation, we will discuss some of the key components of the UW-Madison Russian Flagship Program’s design: an expanded upper-level curriculum, including a 2-semester sequence on Russian culture, and senior capstone course or research seminar; individual and small-group tutoring; Russian tutorials linked to courses in other subject areas; intensive summer study options in Madison and abroad; study abroad in Russia at least twice, for a minimum of a summer and full academic year; proficiency-based benchmarks and assessments; and extensive opportunities for practice in Russian outside of the classroom. The discussion will focus on those aspects of the Russian Flagship’s curricular design that may have the potential for application in languages without federal funding to support significant programmatic enhancements to the existing undergraduate program.
The UW-Madison Russian Flagship Program is an initiative of the Department of Slavic Languages and Literature and the Language Institute, with the Center for Russia, East Europe and Central Asia. The program is directed by Karen Evans-Romaine, with Dianna Murphy (Associate Director) and Anna Tumarkin (Assistant Director).
Language Over Lunch brownbag presentations and discussions are free and open to the public. Sponsored by the Language Institute.
For more information or accommodations: Kazeem Sanuth (608) 262-1473.
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"Contemporary Russian Literature, Politics, and Society"
CREECA Faculty Roundtable
Date and Time: October 25, 2012, 4:00 – 5:30 PM
Location: 206 Ingraham Hall, 1155 Observatory Drive
Sponsors: Center for Russia East Europe and Central Asia (CREECA)
Panelists:
Irina Shevelenko, associate professor of Slavic Languages and Literature, UW-Madison
Andrew Reynolds, associate professor of Slavic Languages and Literature, UW-Madison
Alexander Dolinin, professor of Slavic Languages and Literature, UW-Madison
Moderated by Yoshiko M. Herrera, associate professor of Political Science and CREECA director
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“The Illusion of Democratic Revolution: Why Orange Was Just Red and Yellow (But Not Blue).”
Mark R. Beissinger, Professor of Politics, Princeton University
Director, Princeton Institute for International and Regional Studies (PIIRS)
Date and Time: October 26, 2012, 12:00 pm
Location: Ogg Room, Department of Political Science, North Hall
Sponsors: Co-sponsored by the Comparative Politics Colloquium (CPC) and Center for Russia East Europe and Central Asia (CREECA)
About the lecture: This paper uses a highly unusual survey taken in the aftermath of the 2004 Orange Revolution in Ukraine to examine who participates in liberalizing revolutions and how revolution participants differ from those who support revolution but do not participate, who mobilize in support of the incumbent regime, who oppose revolution but do not mobilize, and who remain apathetic in the midst of revolution. The findings show that most Orange Revolution participants had a weak commitment to democratic values and mobilized primarily against the incumbent regime rather than for a common set of goals, values, or policies. This negative coalitional quality to the revolution was largely a product of the need to generate the large numbers necessary for successfully challenging the incumbent regime. The survey also shows that shared symbolic capital and weak network ties were more important in structuring participation than selective incentives or strong network ties. These patterns reflect what might be called the “illusion of ‘democratic’ revolution”: whereas elite-articulated master narratives and mobilizing demands revolve around attaining civil and political freedoms and free-and-fair elections, the vast majority participants are propelled not by a desire for democracy but by their extreme dislike of the incumbent regime, often for reasons that have little to do with democratic change. As a result, a significant degree of post-revolutionary instability seems built into liberalizing revolution and the processes that underpin its success: its reliance on a rapidly convened negative coalition of hundreds of thousands, distinguished in particular by fractured elites, lack of consensus over fundamental policy issues, and weak commitment to democratic ends.
About the speaker: Mark Beissinger is Professor in the Department of Politics at Princeton and Director of the Princeton Institute for International and Regional Studies.. He previously served on the faculties of University of Wisconsin-Madison and Harvard University. His main fields of interest are social movements, revolutions, nationalism, state-building, and imperialism, with special reference to the Soviet Union and the post-Soviet states. In addition to numerous articles and book chapters, Beissinger is author or editor of four books: Scientific Management, Socialist Discipline, and Soviet Power (1988); The Nationalities Factor in Soviet Politics and Society (1988); Beyond State Crisis? Post-Colonial Africa and Post-Soviet Eurasia Compared (2002); and Nationalist Mobilization and the Collapse of the Soviet State (2002).
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Alexsei Guerman: The Complete Features
A Cinematheque Film:
"Khrustalyov, My Car!"
Date and time: October 27 at 7:00 P.M.
Location: 4070 Vilas Hall, 821 University Ave., Madison, WI 53706
Sponsor: Cinematheque, CREECA
About the film:
Russia, 1998, 35mm, 137 min., Russian with English subtitles
Directed by Aleksei Guerman
With Yuriy Tsurilo, Nina Ruslanova
“One of the few indisputable masterpieces of world cinema of the past 40 years” (Film Comment), this phantasmagorical odyssey into the dark heart of Soviet Russia is mad, bewildering, and unlike anything you’ve seen. The delirious scenario follows a Red Army general/brain surgeon during the mayhem of Stalin’s final days. “An orchestrated cataclysm, a narrative inferno that demands to be inhabited rather than decoded… Russian cinema’s answer to Finnegan’s Wake.” – Sight and Sound. (MK)
For more about this film, check out Cinematheque's Web site at cinema.wisc.edu.
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