Dickinson Russian department students staged two performances of Anton Chekhov's 'The Bear' in the last week of the semester. Level 200 students acted in an abridged version, and level 232 students put on the full 20-minute version. It was an entertaining experience both for the performers and the students watching, and memorizing the lines helped everyone master new vocabulary and grammar. The following photographs and students' comments give an idea of how it went.

 Mackenzie King `15:
I haven't participated in any sort of play since middle school, so I was a bit nervous in the beginning. However, playing in "Medved" ended up being a wonderful experience and was so much fun. It also helped improve my Russian pronunciation.

 Alexandra Shapiro `15:
I had a really fun time learning and performing the play. It was easy for all of us to get into our roles and have fun, and I also improved my language and reading skills. This was a great experience! 

‪For Mackenzie, "going to the undergraduate research symposium was a great experience. Presenting my work in that setting was initially nerve-wracking, but useful. The whole experience gave me more confidence in my public speaking ability and made me more comfortable with presenting my own work. I was impressed by the many topics covered by the presenters and the huge distance many of them had to travel to be there."

 The Russian Club and Russian Department held their annual Russian dinner on Monday, April 8. Students, faculty, and guests enjoyed Russian dishes (borsht, bliny, and beef stroganoff) and participated in traditional dances and songs led by the folk ensemble Barynya from New York City.

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World-renowned artist Vitaly Komar, founder of the Sots-art movement together with Alexander Melamid, came to Dickinson during the first week in April 2013. His presentation was called "My Experiences as an Artist in Russia and the West," which he delivered to a lively, packed auditorium. Komar emigrated to New York City in the late 1970s in the face of censorship from Soviet authorities. The term Sots-art is a blend of the Russian word for socialism and the "art" in pop art, and has aesthetic and conceptual roots in both traditions. During his presentation at Dickinson, he entertained and engaged students and faculty with a visual and theoretical retrospective of his work from the 1970s to the present, including collaborations with Andy Warhol, musicians, and even two elephants. The morning following his talk, Komar had breakfast with several Dickinson students from a variety of departments (e.g. Russian, Art & Art History, and International Relations), where they discussed his art, creativity under totalitarianism, and practical advice for succeeding in a future career: "If you don't love it, it's no use," he said.  

Students in the Russian Department have been preparing for Komar's visit in their Soviet literature and culture class, where they have been studying Socialist Realist literature and architecture.  Russian major Caroline Elkin '15 found the lecture "fantastic and engaging," but "having the chance to talk with Komar over breakfast was even better (how many non-art students get to meet and have a conversation with a world-famous artist?). I think it helped connect something that seems bizarre and distant--art and culture in the Soviet Union--to my experiences growing up in the United States--for example, being surrounded by commercials and experiencing pop art as a response to American consumerism."

A print of Komar's 2005 work, Air Superiority, is currently on display in the Trout Gallery through April.  

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 Five Dickinson Russian major alumna returned to campus last week to speak about their professional experiences since graduation. Invited speakers included Amity Fox '04, who is currently Assistant Director of the Career Center at Dickinson; Nicholas Stebinger '05, a lawyer for Chadbourne in NYC who was recently offered a judicial clerkship in Florida; Charles Blanchard '06, lead Natural Gas Analyst at Bloomberg New Energy Finance in NYC; and Leah McNamara '13, who will join Wells Fargo in Philadelphia as a country officer and bank liaison after graduation. Also, joining the group via Skype was Matthew Winter '02, a financier and restaurant owner in Lianyuungang, China.
Current students were able to hear several generations of Russian majors discuss their experiences--from the Peace Corps to their time as Fulbright Fellows--and learn how a degree in Russian helped them succeed in a variety of fields, even those not specifically connected to the Russian language.

Career Fair: Russian Majors after Graduation

Sasha Shapiro '15, Russian and Philosophy double major, prepares to connect with her Russian conversation partner

Sometimeslearning a language can seem like a theoretical game far removed from reality – but not at Dickinson. Students in the Russian department chat on Skype once every two weeks with undergraduate students at the Russian State University for the Humanities. All levels get to reinforce what's been learned in the classroom in lively communicative situations.  Intermediate students get a chance to practice new material from class, whether by listening to native speech or by trying out new constructions and vocabulary with their conversation partners. This makes the material on the page of the course-book come to life and brings their Russian language skills out of the classroom and into the real world. Advanced students get the opportunity to discuss politics, literature or culture with students their own age, thus expanding their linguistic and cultural skills at the same time. These sessions lay the groundwork for study abroad in Moscow. For those who have just returned from Moscow, it is a chance to keep their conversation skills up to par.

For Mackenzie King ’15, a Russian major who will spend the 2013-2014 academic year in Moscow, “Skyping with Russian college students is always interesting. Last time, I was able to speak to a student about Russian and American politics. She studies American politics, while I study Russia, so we were able to exchange our different impressions of each other's system of governance. Being able to speak with people our age who are also studying ensures we always have something to converse about.”

Leah McNamara ’13 will graduate this year with a Russian minor: “Skype exchanges may take you a bit out of your comfort zone, but it really instigates interesting conversations and practical and applicable Russian skills.”

A new exhibit, titled "A Family Story: The Troussoff Collection," will premiere on Sunday, April 21, at 1:30 in the Friends of the Library reading area in the Lower level of the library. Light refreshments will be provided.

The exhibit was curated by Caitlin Moriarty '13, double major in Russian and Political Science. "A Family Story: The Troussoff Collection" tells the story of Basil Troussoff (a painter and scene designer), his wife Elena, Basil's sister Eugenia, her husband (marine biologist Dr. Paul Galtsoff), and their immigration to the U.S. during the Russian Revolution. The collection was donated by Gail Troussoff Marks '73, Basil's granddaughter, whose daughters are members of the class of 2009 and 2014. Especially featured in the exhibit is Basil's collection of postcards and exhibit catalogs of Russian art from the early twentieth century, as well as his work in theatre and Paul's work as a marine biologist.

The exhibit will continue through the summer. 

 
Muscovites (and Dickinson students!) storming the ice castle during Maslenitsa
 
After roughly 30-45 min, the assailants finally managed to climb into the castle. Our own Chase Philpot '14 was the second one to manage to enter the castle. Lady Maslenitsa was finally captured. Upon being captured, she was taken to the center of the site and burnt. Her ashes covered in snow, to fertilize the ground. Then, since the Sunday of Maslenitsa is a day of forgiveness, everybody asks their friends and family for forgiveness for anything they might have done wrong during the past year.

Actors at a Maslenitsa festival burn a straw effigy to celebrate the coming of Spring
 
I could say the usual "touristy" thing about Maslenitsa--about how it was very culturally interesting and how I learned a lot about the Russian people (which I did). But the best way to summarize Maslenitsa came to me from an old lady: "We really like Maslenitsa because it is one of the last holidays where the government does not bother us; it is a holiday where we all come together and have fun whether we are religious or not." I will admit that it sounded very corny, but I think I mostly agree with her.

- Paul Bouvet 14

On Thursday, March 7, Drew Chapman of the University of Pittsburgh gave a guest lecture to students, entitled "Why is Солgате Toothpaste the Product Choice of Russian Soldiers? Conflicting Russo-Soviet Modernities and the Globalizing World."  

His talk addressed the (often humorous) interplay between Western products and Soviet culture during the final decades of the USSR, including everyday practices (standing in line, procuring goods), cartoons, and advertisements from the Stagnation period (1970s) to the present day, showing how globalization is an incomplete process, where past tradition and local spheres of knowledge collide with present day ideologies.

For Kevin Doye'16, the talk "was really fascinating. Especially the fact that so many cultural innovations and anecdotes came out of something like standing in line. I thought the flash-mobs of lines was one of the weirdest things I've ever heard of, but in a sense logical because of how essential queuing was to Soviet culture."

On Thursday, April 4 at 7 PM, world-renowned artist Vitaly Komar will give a presentation entitled "My Experience as an Artist in Russia and the West" in Althouse 106. The lecture is free and open to all.

 During the late 60s and early 70s in Moscow, Vitaly Komar & Alexander Melamid founded the Sots Art movement, a unique version of Soviet Pop and Conceptual Art, which combines the principles of Dadaism and Socialist Realism. In 1973, they were expelled from the Soviet Artist Union and in 1974 they were arrested during a performance and their works destroyed by Soviet authorities. By 1978, Komar & Melamid were living in New York. They continued developing Sots Art through the 1980s, being the first Russian artists to receive funding from the National Endowment for the Arts. They devoted their projects in the 1990s to iconoclasm, democracy, elitism, and ecology. Komar's work with Melamid has appeared at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the MOMA, the Walker Art Center, Brooklyn Museum, and the Louvre, among other places. On their collaboration: "Even if only one of us creates some of the projects and works, we usually sign them together. We are not just an artist, we are a movement"  (from artist's statement). Since 2003, Komar has been working independently on New Symbolism, an art movement that "works toward restoring a sundered connection between art and certain historical and timeless myths."

 A print of Komar's, Air Superiority (pictured), is currently on display in the Trout Gallery:

Vitaly Komar

Air Superiority, 2005

Serigraph on paper

 Students from several departments came together on a cold day in early March to learn how to make borscht--a traditional Russian beet soup.

 
Enjoying the results

Over winter break, juniors Chase Philpot and Peter Sisson left Moscow, where they had been studying on the Dickinson-in-Moscow program for the fall semester, and headed towards Lake Baikal-the world's largest freshwater lake, in the heart of Siberia.

Of their trip, Chase writes:

"I decided to trek eastward on the Siberian Railroad with my buddy Peter, going three days by train to our first destination Irkutsk, a small city not far from the Mongolian border famous for its prime location near Lake Baikal.  After a week of exploration in negative 40 Celsius weather, getting lost in Siberian forests, and riding on a dog sleigh (those last two are unconnected), we travelled further to Vladivostok, Russia's largest eastern port. After snowboarding and walking out onto the frozen Pacific Ocean, Peter and I split up and I took my time returning to Moscow by train stopping in Blagoveshensk, Khabarovsk, Irkutsk, and Novosibirsk.  I recommend the Siberian Railroad experience to all! It is not as scary as it sounds! My trip was made most memorable because I used the "couchsurfing" website. Instead of staying in hostels, I found complete strangers in each city willing to take me in for a few days.  Each experience was unique and now I have good friends all over Russia."

Peter added that "on our trip, I came to realize that Russians are good, kind-hearted, and open people. They are willing to share their opinions and experiences with you and will listen to you share yours. The stereotype of the Russian people could not be further from the truth. My best memories from my semester abroad came from this trip." 

Peter returned to Dickinson for the spring semester; Chase will spend the rest of the 2012-2013 academic year in Moscow.

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Poet Vera Pavlova and her translator Steven Seymour, who also happens to be her husband, read a selection of poetry in Russian and English translation in the Biblio Café on Valentine's Day 2013. 

Seniors Alex North, Caitlin Moriarty, and Maria Smirnova also read translations of Pavlova's newest, unpublished poems. They had prepared these translations together with Pavlova and Seymour earlier in the week as part of their senior seminar in translation.  

Mackenzie Stricklin '16, a second-semester Russian student, attended the reading: "It was great to hear the poems in their original form and I loved how they sounded, even if I couldn't understand every word. Vera Pavlova was so animated while she was reciting her poems. She moved her arms around, made eye contact, and used interesting intonation, which made the poems fun to listen to. Plus the poetry was beautifully written and translated."

Barrett Ziegler, a first-year Russian student and a poet himself, thought that "hearing her recite was beautiful. Even being unable to grasp everything she said, the rhythm was something that crossed all linguistic boundaries."

World-renowned Russian poet Vera Pavlova, the author of 18 collections of poetry translated into 22 languages, visited Dickinson this week. She was joined by her translator and partner Steven Seymour, former translator and interpreter for the US Department of State. Both are longtime friends of the Dickinson Russian Department, having visited back in 2004 as part of the annual poetry festival Semana Poetica. During their most recent visit to Carlisle, Vera and Steven worked with advanced Russian students Caitlin Moriarty, Alex North, and Maria Smirnova on the translation of a new cycle of Vera's poetry. The workshop was part of the students' senior seminar, "Workshop in Translation," led by Prof. Alyssa DeBlasio. During the session with Vera and Steven, students discussed and worked through many of the difficulties of translating poems from Russian into English. Later this week, Vera will read a selection of her poetry to the Dickinson community at a public reading in the Biblio Café and the students, Caitlin, Alex, and Maria, will read their English translations in accompaniment.  

For Maria Smirnova, a student from the Russian State University for the Humanities (Moscow), it was her first time translating from her native Russian into English. "Before the workshop I was very afraid and thought I would never be able to do it. Now I have changed my mind, as I understood that the most important fact for the translator of poetry is to make the translated poems sound natural, sound like they were originally written in English. It was a great experience." 

For more information on Vera and Steven's first visit to Dickinson in 2004, see:

http://www.dickinson.edu/academics/programs/russian/content/Vera-Pavlova/

Edwards taking lava temperatures at Tolbachik

Since November 2012, the Plossky Tolbachik volcano on Russia’s Kamchatka Peninsula has been erupting. But almost all the scientific information about the eruption is in Russian, leaving non-Russian speaking volcanologists and seismologists in the dark about recent developments in Russia’s far east. Professor Ben Edwards of Dickinson's Earth Sciences Department took a trip to the eruption site in January 2013, where he measured temperatures at the lava flow and studied the lava-snow interaction. After his return, three advanced Russian language students joined the project by translating updates about the eruption from Russian into English. Their translations were completed as part of their senior seminar, “Workshop in Translation,” where they have been trying their hands at translation of texts in a variety of styles, from poetry to journalism.

The students’ translations can be found on the official website of the Kliuchi Vulcanology Observatory: 

http://www.volkstat.ru/news.php  

Next week, the students in the seminar will be working with renowned Russian poet Vera Pavlova and her translator, Steven Seymour, for a special workshop on challenges in translating poetry from Russia to English.

Alex North (L), Maria Smirnova (C) and Caitlin Moriarty (R)

an established journalist, translator, and Jewish advocate

 Dickinson Professor Crispin Sartwell’s research interests in anarchist political philosophy brought him to the work of Russian revolutionaries Mikhail Bakunin and Petr Kropotkin. But Prof. Sartwell has a personal connection to Russian culture. His great-father, Herman Bernstein (1876-1935), was born in Vladislavov--now present-day Lithuania, but then located on the Russian-German border. In 1893, Herman emigrated from the Russian Empire to the United States, where he wrote for The New York Evening Post and The Nation, and was an editor of The New London Day and The Jewish Tribune. In 1917, he returned to Russia to cover the Russian revolution for the New York Herald. In 1918, Herman made headlines by publishing a secret correspondence between Tsar Nicholas II and Kaiser Wilhelm II, which he called "The Willy-Nicky Telegrams." On top of his journalistic career, Herman was a prolific translator, translating works by Leo Tolstoy, Maxim Gorky, and Leonid Andreev from Russian into English. A collection of his interviews with Tolstoy, Kropotkin, Leon Trotsky, and others was published in 1913 as Interviews by Herman Bernstein and Celebrities of Our Times.

  Crispin Sartwell

 (Prof. of Art & Art History and Philosophy). 

Do you see a resemblance? 

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For David Cochrane'14, participation in the Dickinson-in-Moscow program is not only about studying the Russian language: it is about living Russian culture by immersing himself in the realities of everyday life. For David, this happens through music. Nearly every night he is rehearses and sings with three prestigious choirs: The Great Academic Choir of RSUH, the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception Choir, and the cathedral’s small early music chamber ensemble where he also co-directs and conducts.

''The week on Thanksgiving night I sang a concert with the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception choir," David said. "It was an honor to sing in this beautiful Cathedral, which in my opinion has some of the best acoustics in the world. It is by far the most amazing space that I have ever sung in. The director, Sister Valentina, is an amazing women and musician, and it was a pleasure to ask to be a soloist on her concert and to continue to sing with her every week at mass and in future concerts. As the Advent season has quickly rolled in we have been learning very challenging music very fast, which pushes me out of my comfort zone and is making me a better musician every night!”

Last week in the Great Hall of the Moscow Conservatory, David took part in the final grand-concert of the Musical Festival series. He preformed with the Great Academic Choir of RSUH, where he sang the choir part of the opera “Cavalleria Rusticana.”

“It was a blessing to get to sing this opera with these musicians,” David said, “To be able to say I sang with Vladislav Piavko, who is a very famous in Russia and for many years was a lead performer in the Bolshoi Theater, is amazing. I learned so much from this even from just watching every little aspect of how Sergey Kondrashev, the conductor of the Moscow City Philharmonic, ran rehearsals.”

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Students from a variety of universities come together to discuss big issues in the world today. 

 Dickinson students in Moscow were able to uphold the annual American tradition of coming together and remembering to be thankful while becoming accustomed to a regular way of life in a foreign land. They invited some Russian friends and other students studying Russian at RSUH, and in a tiny Moscow kitchen they cooked turkey and other traditional Thanksgiving food.

 Kirsten Brents’14 “I find it funny, yet impressive how we successfully cooked a thanksgiving dinner at the last minute. Then threw it in bags and ate the next day on the train to Volgograd, because the day we traveled was the actual Thanksgiving Day. The small table in our compartment was full of food, and Russians seeing all these food probably couldn’t believe that we could eat so much… ”

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Dickinson-in-Moscow students in front of the Motherland Statue.

 The Motherland Statue in Volgograd.

This past weekend Dickinson-in-Moscow students (and two students from Holy Cross College) traveled to Volgograd, formerly named Stalingrad. As they learned the history of Volgograd from the 16th century to modern days, they paid particularly attention to the history behind the Battle of Stalingrad.
As Peter Sisson’14 recounts, “We went to the Panorama and Museum of the Battle of Stalingrad. Our tour guide Alexandra was very enthusiastic and very knowledgeable. On the top floor of the museum there was a huge panorama depicting all of the various stages of the battle, from the initial German attack to the Soviet counters attack and victory. The panorama highlighted the acts of heroism by the soviet army soldiers, such as how one soldier crawled through the fire and connected a telegraph line with his teeth.”
The best part of the trip for Kirsten Brents’14 was going to Mamaev Hill and seeing the statue of the Motherland. “It was absolutely breathtaking,” she says, “When you are walking up there you realize how big the statue is and how much the victory of Stalingrad means to the Russian people. I also found it interesting to watch the Honor Guard do its regular drill and ceremony. Guarding the memorials at Mamaev Hill is very serious and honorable job for these young Russian soldiers.” 

Chase Philpot '14 lays under a tank during a day out in Volgograd.

 Peter Sisson '14 poses as Lenin. 

Did you know…

You can have your written work read by language tutors before you turn your final draft? Stop by the Multilingual Writing Center (located in the basement of the Library next to the archives) to make an appointment. Bring a hard copy of your written work with you to your appointment and receive feedback from advanced speakers.

 
Language Tutor Vadim Ivanishchev, from Moscow, Russia, reviews a student composition.

 Here he describes his experiences playing on a local Moscow lacrosse team--one of only two in the Russian Federation:

For many Muscovites, this past weekend was nothing out of the ordinary. For a few, however, Saturday marked the third annual Russian Lacrosse National Championship. Aptly named "The Capitals Cup," last Saturday’s encounter was between Russia’s two fiercest rivals: Moscow and Saint Petersburg. These rivals are, in fact, the only two teams in all of Russia. Founded almost simultaneously three years ago by expatriates, American students, and their intrigued, sports-savvy Russian colleagues, the Moscow Rebels and Saint Petersburg White Knights have since met bi-annually.
Last years match resulted in a win for the Knights, so the Trophy Cup exchanged hands last weekend as the Rebels secured a 12-7 victory. At least that’s what we think the score was. Last weekend’s game occurred on a waterlogged, smaller-than-regulation sized field and was refereed by expatriates with a limited understanding of the game. In fact, only one of the two referees was actually provided a whistle. Due to these setbacks, there were times when I doubted we were actually playing lacrosse; at points, the game resembled American Football with a Slip ‘n Slide twist thrown in. From time to time, however, both teams managed to overcome the circumstances and played with incredible knowledge of the game, skill, and finesse.
Last Saturday’s game was truly a sight to behold. Our Muscovite Rebels outnumbered expat teammates by nearly three to one. Our ranks have been filling quickly as Russians can’t seem to get enough of this dynamic sport. Due to the fact that most of our newcomers had never seen a real game played, an American majority squad started the match to gain an early lead and exemplify lacrosse in a real game setting. Within minutes of the first whistle, however, a Russian from the Moscow team put the first point on the board, setting the tempo for the rest of the game. The Rebels gained an early comfortable lead of 7 points by half time.
At the start of the second half, our American goalie suffered a chin injury, requiring a trip to the hospital. Kirill, our very inexperienced Muscovite substitute, was brought in and more than stepped up to the challenge. In fact, half way through the third quarter, many of our Russian newcomers stepped up to fill our tired ranks and were flying up and down the field, making game-changing plays. Finally, the friendly match ended in favor of the home team. The White Knights handed over the cup to the victorious Moscow Rebels, and fans and players alike took photos to mark the occasion. This was the last game for David, our coach, main organizer, and founder of the team. As he is moving to Kiev, Ukraine for work, he hopes to find a similar community there and help lacrosse spread across Eastern Europe.
I discovered the Moscow Rebels one day as I jokingly asked myself whether there was a lacrosse team in Russia. Walking to my apartment one day early September, I googled “Russian Lacrosse” and, much to my surprise, I found the Rebels. Here it is crucial to note to fellow Dickinsonians, especially those endeavoring to study abroad, NEVER underestimate the power and unlimited possibilities of simply introducing yourself to complete strangers! I have so many new friends and possibilities to practice my Russian because I wrote the team on Vkontakte (Russia’s social networking system), out of the blue, and they were more than welcoming. Don’t be bashful; Russian is a particularly difficult language and this can often inhibit making friends early on in your abroad experience. Just put yourself out there and you will be glad you did!
Playing lacrosse in Moscow has improved my Russian immensely. Leading drills in practice has helped me solidify my understanding of verbs of motion and commands. Water breaks have helped me pick up on the day-to-day slang and, naturally, spending so much time with Russian teenagers, I have managed to pick up some of the worst swear words one could never learn in the classroom. Finally, playing lacrosse in Moscow has improved my confidence while speaking and given me a deep appreciation for what a rich language Russian truly is.

Chase Philpot
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While walking around St. Petersburg, Kirsten Brents '14 ran into people peacefully protesting the expansion of apartments around the St. Petersburg area

 Chase Philpot '14 and Peter Sisson '14 by the Neva River

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Advanced Russian (RUSS 200), Spring 2012 

 
Advanced Russian students during a conversation hour on the lawn

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"Before attending Professor Henry's lecture, I knew next to nothing about Russia's past and current attitude towards environmental protection. As fascinating as the topic of forestry in Russia was, what I found most informative was the broader implications of Russian suspicious attitudes toward international NGOs and Russia's lack of their own NGOs. Given the current political climate in Russia, I am left wondering if the recent protests will be able to breathe life into Russian grass-roots organizations." -Mackenzie King '15

“Professor Henry's lecture allowed me to better understand the various roles both Russian and international non-profits play in modern-day Russian environmental activism. She also spoke at length about the differences between environmental issues facing people living in small and large cities. It was also very interesting to hear about her personal research in the Far East.” -Andrei Vernon ‘12

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Thursday, February 16, 2012 - 4:30 PM
Location: Bosler 208

Sponsored by the Dept. of Russian, Environmental Studies, the Center for Sustainability Education and the Student Senate.

On December 10th, 2011, I braved the cold and hordes of police to attend the massive protest in Moscow against the falsification of the Duma elections: "The Meeting for Honest Elections" (Митинг за Честные Выборы). The number of people who poured into Bolotnaya Square has been debated. The Kremlin modestly estimates a crowd of 30,000 while protesters claim the turnout was twice that number. Even according to the most conservative numbers, the Meeting still takes its place in Russian history as the country's largest public demonstration since the fall of the Soviet Union.

I was initially incredibly nervous to attend. Spontaneous protests over the election fraud had broken out across Moscow in prior weeks and ended with police violence. I even received an e-mail from the U.S. Consulate warning Americans abroad to steer clear of any protests. Indeed, as I approached the Meeting that Saturday afternoon immediately noticeable were the long lines of stern-looking policemen and armored trucks. Though upon joining the massive crowd and being handed a white ribbon denouncing United Russia as a "Party of Crooks and Thieves," my fears were eased. The energy of the protesters was not at all one of mob violence, rather of rightful and well-articulated anger. And despite the ominous police presence, not a single police altercation was reported. Interactions on the square itself were aimiable. Many signs and banners being waved employed satire and puns, and everyone joined together to sing Viktor Tsoi's "Перемен" ("Change") and to chant "Россия без Путина!" ("Russia without Putin!").

As a foreign onlooker, I was incredibly moved and impressed. The election fraud was so openly and shamelessly corrupt, a kind of apex of the political corruption that has plagued Russia in the last two decades. But for the first time under Putin, public outrage overpowered the Kremlin's rigid control over public discourse. Russia is not my country and this is not my fight, but chanting in the cold alongside tens of thousands of protesters I felt some of that revolutionary spirit still memorialized all over the streets of Moscow. 

 
A pun: “Putin, enough Churov-ing!” The verb these protesters use, churovat’, sounds like shurovat’ (to poke at, incite, stir). Churov is the head of the Central Election Commission, and one of the demands of protesters is that he be fired. 

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Image courtesy of Discovery Communications

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Video is available here.

 
Russian 116 student Eli Blumenthal '14 (left) listens as Kirill Medvedev reads 

 
Dickinson students with Prof. Rubin.

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Andrei at Peterhof Palace (St. Petersburg, Russia) 

On May, 22 the students who are participating in Dickinson-in-Moscow program presented their projects. Andrey Vernon '12 «The separation of trash and recycling in Moscow». Olivia Stevens '12 - «The role of NGOs in Human Rights protection in Russian Federation».

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Tatiana graduated from Moscow State University and during the Soviet period five collections of her poetry, as well as a novel, appeared in samizdat.  In 1989 she represented alternative (“second”) literature at the Poetry International of Rotterdam, and in that same year her poems began to see publication in the official Soviet press.  Between 1992 and 1997 Tatiana lived in Paris, where she continued to write poetry and prose, translated poems from French into Russian, and worked for Radio Liberty. Her original work has been widely translated and included in many of the premiere volumes of contemporary Russian poetry. In 1997 she returned to Moscow and in 2001 she became the deputy editor of the journal Vestnik Evropy (European Messenger) in 2001.  

While at Dickinson, Tatiana met with beginning and advanced Russian language students who had been working on translating several of her poems as part of their language study. 

 This event was organized to provide support and friendship for the international students arriving at the University. There were also Russian students invited who offered them any help they might require. It was a great opportunity to make new friends as well as to explore the University. 

   Флоренс: I enjoyed the Skype session. It was good to be able to practice my Russian with a native speaker. I definitely realized how much I still have to learn, that is for sure.   

    Уилл: Speaking with the Russian students really helped me work on my accent. 

    Таня: Speaking with native speakers on Skype is a wonderful opportunity to improve one’s speaking abilities. 

    Андрей: Skyping with a native speaking Russian, who barely speaks English, got me out my comfort zone. This helped because it forced me to have a conversation in Russian only. This is a great way to learn Russian!   

    Билли: Мне понравилось говорить по-русски с Людой из России потому что я люблю понимать русскую культуру. 

    Дэвид: Skyping was really cool. I learned a lot. I got to talk to a really nice guy who was very interesting.  

    Саша: I really enjoyed speaking Russian with a native – the opportunity had me thinking in Russian in a way I had not before. I had to be on my toes, trying to communicate what I wanted to say. 

    Тревис: Мне понравилось, что моя собеседница сказала, что у меня хорошее русское произношение. Но она говорила по-английски лучше, чем я по-русски.  

    Лия: Мне понравилось говорить по скайпу, потому что я люблю говорить о России с людьми, которые говорят по-русски. 

    Катя: Когда я говорила по-русски с русским человеком, я научилась многому о русском языке. 

    Лорен: Мне было весело говорить по-русски с носителем языка. Я познакомилась с интересным человеком. 

Russian students and faculty got together to enjoy warm Russian conversation and 'hot' Russian food! See more photos here .

From folk to rock: students of all Russian language levels present their original musical compositions. READ MORE 

A renowned Russian conceptualist poet Lev Rubinstein presented his works at Dickinson’s International Poetry Festival Semana Poetica VIII. READ MORE 

The Department of Russian sponsored the talk Global Crisis and Russian Society by Boris Kagarlitsky, the Director of the Institute of Globalization and Social Movement in Moscow.

A successful staging of Anton Chekhov's play "The Proposal" marked the end of the spring semester. READ MORE 

RUSSIAN (200's) students learn Russian culture not only through the language.

For the third time, Vera Pavlova visited Dickinson College as a guest of Semana Poetica VII. READ MORE

Alexei Tsvetkov, a Russian poet living in NYC, came to Dickinson College not only to present his poetry, but also to visit his former place of work. READ MORE