Proseminar (411-0-1)

Topic

Alternative Modernity

Instructors

Susan McReynolds Oddo
847/467-2754
1880 Campus Dr. (Kresge) Office 3361
Office Hours: Mondays 1-3pm and by appointment

Meeting Info

Kresge 3364 Slavic Seminar Rm: Thurs 3:30PM - 6:20PM

Overview of class

This course introduces students to the concept of alternative modernity or multiple modernities through readings of Russian artists and thinkers of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Readings will cover a variety of genres, including poetry, travel diaries, correspondence, short story, and novella. We will study how these Russian writers perceived the modernization of the West and what they thought Russia adopt, or reject, and why. We will put these Russian writers in dialogue with some significant Western European developments such as anti-colonialism and theories of Enlightenment. Readings can be done in Russian or English.

Secondary literature will include
--Marshall Berman, All That Is Solid Melts into Air: The Experience of Modernity.
--Ian Buruma and Avishai Margolit, Occidentalism: The West in the Eyes of Its Enemies
--Schmuel Eisenstadt, Multiple Modernities
--Dilip Gaonkar, ed. Alternative Modernities
--Steven G. Marks, How Russia Shaped the Modern World
--Edward W. Said, Orientalism
--Georgios Varouxakis, The West: The History of an Idea
--Larry Wolff, The Invention of Eastern Europe

Enrollment Requirements

Enrollment Requirements: Pre-registration is reserved for Slavic Majors or Minors only.