Russian 5

The overall goal of this advanced Russian subject is to immerse students in texts mainly from the public sphere of discourse, so that they engage with sophisticated cultural and social topics through listening, reading, writing and speaking. The subject is based on topics and texts (literary and historical), into which the grammar and vocabulary are fully integrated. Instead of the traditional approach to language instruction that is structured around a sequence of grammatical topics, this subject relies on the texts themselves to provide the textual, informational and lexico-grammatical features that serve as the basis for developing students' language abilities. This subject covers more advanced grammatical features of Russian which are essential for understanding literary and media texts (e.g. gerunds and participles). The subject's emphasis on improving students' ability to read advanced texts, narrate, compare and contrast, express opinions and establish causal relationships in speaking and writing lays the groundwork for the independent research work in Contemporary Russia (capstone).