Reading and composition course based on works of Russian and other Slavic writers, either written in English or translated into English. As students develop strategies of writing and interpretation, they will become acquainted with a particular theme in Russian and/or Slavic literatures and their major voices. R5A satisfies the first half of the Reading and Composition requirement, and R5B satisfies the second half.

Anna Karenina begins “All happy families are alike, each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.” While we will not read Lev Tolstoy’s modern epic of family life, this course will be premised upon the idea that families have taken different forms throughout history, and that literature can tell us something about our closest relations. We will examine love, sex, gender, and the family as socially contingent categories that have both shaped and been shaped by external political and economic forces. Through thoughtful engagement with art, literature, and cinema, we will attempt to understand what constitutes the normative family at several moments in history, and question the value of such norms today. While the nuclear family–traditionally consisting of married parents and their children–has long been a dominant social unit, we will examine it as one familial form in a constellation of possible alternatives. We will consider how kinship bonds form, whether by birth, marriage, adoption, or other means; and ponder both the narrowing and expansion of family structures. We will ask just who gets to call themselves part of a family, as well as which rights and obligations come with these labels. We will question institutions like the monogamous marriage and the heteronormative family in an attempt to learn who these ideas serve. This course will be premised on Aleksandra Kollontai’s claim that different political-economic systems like feudalism, capitalism, and socialism produce different kinds of families. By reading works of literature from Ancient Greece, Early Modern Europe, and modern British, American and Russian/Soviet authors, we will explore evolving representations and structures of family relations over time. We will discuss the love lives of characters to get at the heart of these relations. Aside from literary and cultural representations of the family, we will bolster our understanding with readings from queer and feminist theory, Marxist philosophy, and sociological analysis. This course fulfills the second half of the UC Berkeley Reading & Composition requirement. The primary goal of this class is to develop college-level writing and research skills. In addition to learning how to make clear, persuasive arguments, students will learn to work with secondary sources, evaluate outside scholarship, contextualize research amongst other scholarly perspectives, develop academic arguments, and author quality research. No prior knowledge of East European, Russian or Eurasian languages, literatures or cultures is required.

Requisites

• Previously passed an R_A course with a letter grade of C- or better. Previously passed an articulated R_A course with a letter grade of C- or better. Score a 4 on the Advanced Placement Exam in English Literature. Score a 4 or 5 on the Advanced Placement Exam in English Language and Composition. Score of 5, 6, or 7 on the International Baccalaureate Higher Level Examination in English.

Repeat Rules

Course is not repeatable for credit.

Requirements class fulfills