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IMPERIAL RUSSIA,THE SOVIET UNION AND AFTER David Brandenberger This course considers the history of the Russian empire, the USSR and Russia and the post-Soviet successor states from the outset of the Napoleonic Wars through the end of the 20th century. Although this course’s units are arranged in chronological order, they are intentionally diverse and varied. Diplomatic and dynastic history is flanked by social and cultural concerns. Empire, nationalism, class, gender and ideology also play major thematic roles in this course. Underlying structures and trends are likewise elucidated. Monday and Wednesday meetings typically consist of lectures with time allocated for specific questions and brief discussion. Fridays are devoted to in-depth work on the primary sources and documents that accompany each unit, run in a discussion format. Participation in the discussions accounts for a quarter of the final grade. Six 500-word essays are due before the end of classes, to be based on questions drawn from the fifteen weekly study guides distributed during the term. Essays should be written for the current week’s reading and only one essay per week should be submitted. Otherwise, the timing of the six essay submissions is a matter of personal choice. Essays should be deposited in the instructor’s box on Thursday before 2pm to allow for grading before Friday’s discussion. These essays account for a quarter of the final grade. There will be an in-class midterm and final. The midterm covers all of the preceding lectures, as well as assigned readings. The final covers the material presented after midterm. Each exam counts for a fourth of the course’s grade. Missed exams can only be made up with a note from the appropriate authorities. Unexcused absences during the term may only be made-up via the submission of an extra essay per absence. Students are encouraged to come to office hours or make appointments with the instructor in order to get together outside of class. Email communication is also strongly encouraged as a means of clarifying basic issues associated with the course or its readings and assignments. Unless otherwise specified, however, all written work is to be handed-in in paper form; email submissions are acceptable only when an agreement has been reached with the instructor in advance.   SCHEDULE OF READINGS (e) indicates e-reserves * indicates optional WEEK 1: THE LONG 19TH CENTURY Monday, Aug. 25: Introduction to the Course Wednesday, Aug. 27: Reform, Revolution and Reaction, 1815-1825 Friday discussion, Aug. 29 “N. M. Karamzin Defends the Established Order, 1811,” in Major Problems in the History of Imperial Russia, edited by James Cracraft, 283-291 (e) J. N. Westwood, Endurance and Endeavour: Russian History 1812-2001, 1-31 *David Christian, Imperial and Soviet Russia, 39-70 *Edward C. Thaden, Russia Since 1801, 78-99 WEEK 2: A WELL-ORDERED POLICE-STATE Monday, Sept. 1: “Orthodoxy, Autocracy and Nationality” vs. the Societal Elite Wednesday, Sept. 3: the “Gendarme of Europe” and the Crimean Cataclysm Friday discussion, Sept. 5 film: Onegin (M. Fiennes, 1999) Thaden, “Intellectual Russia versus Imperial St. Petersburg,” in Russia Since 1801, 128-147 (e) A. Walicki, “The Slavophiles,” in A History of Russian Thought, 92-114 (e) Westwood, Endurance and Endeavour, 32-64 WEEK 3: THE ORIGINS OF CIVIL SOCIETY AND THE LIMITS OF AUTOCRACY Monday, Sept. 8: the Great Reforms Wednesday, Sept. 10: Radicalism and Reaction Friday discussion, Sept 12 I. Turgenev, Fathers and Sons, entire Westwood, Endurance and Endeavour, 65-128 *David Christian, Imperial and Soviet Russia, 71-99 *Thaden, Russia Since 1801, 167-191, 219-51, 282-312 WEEK 4: INTRACTABLE PROBLEMS? THE LATE 19TH CENTURY Monday, Sept. 15: the Peasantry, the Nascent Working Class and the Educated Elite Wednesday, Sept. 17: the Empire at the Turn-of-the-Century Friday discussion, Sept. 19 I. Turgenev, “Khor and Kalinych,” in Sketches from a Hunter’s Album, 15-28 (e) Olga Tian-Shanskaia, “Infanticide, Emotion, Sexual Disorder and Food,” in Village Life in Late Tsarist Russia, 95-115 (e) Maxim Gorky, “On the Russian Peasantry,” Journal of Peasant Studies 4:1 (1976): 12-27 (e) “S. I. Kanatchnikov Recounts his Adventures as a Peasant-Worker-Activist,” in Major Problems in the History of Imperial Russia, 528-549 (e) Westwood, Endurance and Endeavour, 129-141 *David Christian, Imperial and Soviet Russia, 100-127 *Thaden, Russia Since 1801, 315-339 WEEK 5: LOSS OF IMPERIAL LEGITIMACY, 1881-1913 Monday, Sept. 22: Parties and Politics Wednesday, Sept. 24: the Revolution of 1905 and the End of Autocracy Friday discussion, Sept 26 D. Lieven, “Autocratic Government” in Nicholas II: Emperor of all the Russias, 102-131 (e) Konstantin Pobedonostsev, “The Great Falsehood of our Time,” in Reflections of a Russian Statesman, 32-58 (e) Westwood, Endurance and Endeavour, 142-169 *David Christian, Imperial and Soviet Russia, 128-152 *Thaden, Russia Since 1801, 340-358, 374-404 WEEK 6: THE COLLAPSE OF THE OLD REGIME Monday, Sept. 29: World War I and the Crisis of Empire Wednesday, Oct. 1: February, October and the Bolshevik Consolidation of Power Friday discussion, Oct. 3 A. I. Guchkov, “The General Political Situation and the Octoberist Party (1913),” Russian Review (London) 3:1 (1914): 141-158 (e) film clips from October (Eisenstein, 1927) Time of Troubles: the Diary of Iurii Vladimirovich Got’e, selections (e) Westwood, Endurance and Endeavour, 170-245 *David Christian, Imperial and Soviet Russia, 153-206 *Ronald Grigor Suny, The Soviet Experiment: Russia, the USSR, and the Successor States, 56-95 *Thaden, Russia Since 1801, 407-433 WEEK 7: THE LAUNCH OF THE SOVIET “EXPERIMENT” Monday, Oct. 6: midterm Wednesday, Oct 8: War Communism, Civil War and the New Economic Policy Friday discussion, Oct 10 M. Bulgakov, Heart of a Dog, entire Westwood, Endurance and Endeavour, 246-303 *David Christian, Imperial and Soviet Russia, 207-264 *Suny, The Soviet Experiment, 207-264 WEEK 8: THE GREAT BREAK, 1928-1932 Monday, Oct. 13 : fall break Wednesday, Oct. 15: Industrialization, Collectivization and Cultural Revolution Friday discussion, Oct. 17 J. Scott, Behind the Urals: An American Worker in Russia’s City of Steel, 164-165, 169-170, 173-187 (e) G. Andreev-Khomiakov, Bitter Waters: Life and Work in Stalin’s Russia (a memoir), 1-81, 127-88 G. Alexopoulos, “Portrait of a Con Artist as a Soviet Man,” Slavic Review 57:4 (1998): 774-90 (e) Westwood, Endurance and Endeavour, 303-324 *David Christian, Imperial and Soviet Russia, 265-292 *Suny, The Soviet Experiment, 217-251 WEEK 9: PARANOIA AND PRAGMATISM Monday, Oct. 20: the Great Terror Wednesday, Oct. 22: the Great Retreat Friday discussion, Oct. 24 L. Chukovskaya, Sofia Petrovna, entire film clips from Eisenstein’s Aleksandr Nevskii (1938) and Aleksandrov’s The Radiant Path (1940) N. Timasheff, “The Family, the School, the Church: the Pillars of Society Shaken and Reinforced,” in The Great Retreat, 303-318 (e) David Brandenberger, “Proletarian Internationalism, ‘Soviet Patriotism’ and the Rise of Russocentric Etatism in the Stalinist 1930s,” Left History 6:2 (2000): 83-103 (e) Westwood, Endurance and Endeavour, 324-348 *David Christian, Imperial and Soviet Russia, 293-323 WEEK 10: ARMAGEDDON Monday, Oct. 27: The Great Patriotic War Wednesday, Oct 29: The Origins of the Cold War Friday discussion, Oct. 31 A. Tolstoi, “The Russian Character,” K. Simonov, “The Third Adjutant,” in Russkii kharakter: rasskazy sovetskikh pisatelei, 152-169, 134-151 (e) Suny, “The Big Chill: the Cold War Begins,” in The Soviet Experiment, 337-362 (e) John L. Gaddis, “Cold War Empires: Asia,” in We Now Know: Rethinking Cold War History, 54-84 (e) Westwood, Endurance and Endeavour, 349-374 *David Christian, Imperial and Soviet Russia, 324-350 *Suny, The Soviet Experiment, 309-336 WEEK 11: HIGH STALINISM AND THE “THAW” Monday, Nov. 3: in the Wake of War Wednesday, Nov. 5: Khrushchev and “de-Stalinization” Friday discussion, Nov. 7 E. Zubkova, “Russia After the War: Hopes, Illusions and Disappointments,” in Stalinism: the Essential Readings, ed. David L. Hoffmann, 280-301 (e) Juliane Fuerst, “Prisoners of the Soviet Self? Political Youth Opposition in Late Stalinism,” Europe-Asisa Studies 54:3 (2002): 353-375 (e) Hiroaki Kuromiya, “’Political Youth Opposition in Late Stalinism’: Evidence and Conjecture,” Europe-Asia Studies 55:4 (2003): 631-638 (e) N. Khrushchev, “Secret Speech,” in The Anti-Stalin Campaign and International Communism, 1-89 (e) Westwood, Endurance and Endeavour, 375-429 *David Christian, Imperial and Soviet Russia, 351-376 *Suny, The Soviet Experiment, 363-420 WEEK 12: STAGNATION Monday, Nov. 10: State and Society under Brezhnev Wednesday, Nov. 12: Gerontocracy Friday discussion, Nov. 14 Hedrick Smith, “Private Life,” in The Russians, 102-123 (e) N. Baranskaya, A Week Like Any Other: Novellas and Stories, 1-62 (e) “Liza,” in Moscow Women: Thirteen Interviews, edited by Carla Hansson and Karin Liden, 3-29 (e) David K. Willis, “Women: the Statusless Sex,” in Klass: How Russians Really Live, 155-182 (e) film: Taxi blues (P. Lugin, 1990) Westwood, Endurance and Endeavour, 430-478 *David Christian, Imperial and Soviet Russia, 377-401 *Suny, The Soviet Experiment, 421-68 WEEK 13: GLASNOST AND PERESTROIKA Monday, Nov. 17: the Gorbachev Phenomenon Wednesday discussion, Nov. 19 Friday, Nov. 21: no class Hedrick Smith, “Stalinism: the Open Wound,” in The New Russians, 121-147 (e) Westwood, Endurance and Endeavour, 479-494 *David Christian, Imperial and Soviet Russia, 402-430 WEEK 14: COLLAPSE Monday, Nov. 24: the Soviet disUnion, 1989-1991 Westwood, Endurance and Endeavour, 494-521 *David Christian, Imperial and Soviet Russia, 431-435 WEEK 15: THE END OF HISTORY Monday, Dec. 1: the Reemergence of Russia and the Yeltsin Years Wednesday, Dec. 3: Vladimir Putin and the Revenge of the Past Friday discussion, December 5 V. Pelevin, Omon Ra, entire Westwood, Endurance and Endeavour, 522-553 *Suny, The Soviet Experiment, 469-506