Slavic Languages and Societies Commons^™

Review: Faces Of Contemporary Russia: Advanced Russian Language And Culture, Snezhana Zheltoukhova

Russian Language Journal

Cultural literacy is of the utmost importance for advanced language students. Olga M. Mesropova’s Faces of Contemporary Russia is thus a welcome addition to the selection of upper-level textbooks for Russian learners. Unlike existing advanced materials, it offers an interdisciplinary approach to contemporary Russian culture, media studies, history, politics, anthropology, and sociology, making it well-suited for a content based language course with discussions and independent research as its primary focus. The book successfully presents input at the academic essay level with intricate syntax and target output of paragraph-length oral and written discourse on abstract general topics relevant to both Russia …

Review: Between Rhyme And Reason: Vladimir Nabokov, Translation, And Dialogue, Brendan Nieubuurt

Russian Language Journal

An ambitious study, Between Rhyme and Reason endeavors to synthesize two lines of inquiry concerning Nabokov’s long and prodigious career as translator. First, how can we best characterize Nabokov’s method of translation, especially since most of his translations do not follow the same “literalist” approach with which the author and his notorious Eugene Onegin (1964) are so closely associated? Second, how did the act of translating other writers contribute to Nabokov’s own creative work? Stanislav Shvabrin locates the nexus of these concerns in Bakhtin’s concept of dialogism. Against the performative author’s posturing as an absolutely independent creative consciousness free of …

Вторичные Имперфективы В Системе Русского Глагола В Свете Классификации Глагольных Предикатов По Вендлеру, Валентина C. Соболева

Russian Language Journal

В данной статье представлена попытка проанализировать семантические особенности вторичных имперфективов и их видо- вых коррелятов на основе классификации глагольных предикатов по Вендлеру.1 Следует отметить, что наличие в аспектологической литературе необозримого количества исследований по самым разным вопросам, касающимся функционирования категории глагольного вида в русском языке, говорит о том, что в данной области многие кардинальные проблемы остаются нерешёнными, включая как видовую парность глаголов при наличии видовых троек и одновидовых глаголов, так и семантическое содержание каждого вида.2 И, наверное, в связи с нерешённостью этих кардинальных вопросов, глаголам вторичной имперфективации не уделяется достаточного внимания, хотя некоторые исследователи отмечали «загадочное» поведение вторичных имперфективов (О. Swan, …

Cultural Differences In Russian And American Magazine Advertising: A Pragmatic Approach, Emily Furner

Russian Language Journal

Though some may think that TRANSLATION and LOCALIZATION are two words that represent the same function, many scholars make a distinction between the two terms, and some even add a third term, GLOBALIZATION, into the mix. Translator and localization specialist Bert Esselink (1998) perhaps best defined the distinctions in these terms: Globalization […] is typically used in a sales and marketing context, i.e., it is the process by which a company breaks free of the home markets to pursue business opportunities wherever their customers may be located. Translation is the process of converting written or displayed text or spoken words …

Cherchez La Femme! Cherchez Laura A. Janda!, Michal Korenar

Russian Language Journal

In The Mohicans of Paris (1871), Dumas’s detective concludes at some point that a woman was necessarily involved in an investigated crime, leading him to famously exclaim: “Cherchez la femme!”, which is translated to English as “Look for the woman!” (Horn, 1991). One does not need to be an actual detective to reveal the purpose of the reviewed book Each Venture a New Beginning: Studies in Honor of Laura A. Janda. Needless to say, I do not want to imply in any way that Janda has committed a crime. Still, I find the expression rather apposite because the reader can …

Review: A Convenient Territory: Russian Literature At The Edge Of Modernity, Joe Peschio

Russian Language Journal

The Festschrift is an odd, performative genre, and it tends to comprise loose collections of gestures—gestures of gratitude, gestures of respect, gestures of celebration. Not so with this Festschrift. With only a few exceptions, the works here are very form- and literature-centric, something as rare these days as it is welcome. This is as good a reflection as any of the honoree’s place in our field. As the astonishing bibliography of Barry Scherr’s works at the end of the book attests, he has been a strong force in formal analysis, poetics, exact methods, and, in general, empirically minded literary scholarship …

Review: Studies In Phonological Theory And Historical Linguistics, James Joshua Pennington

Russian Language Journal

This volume represents a definitive collection of Bill Darden’s research over his career of more than forty years as a linguist. The book is divided along his main areas of expertise into two parts: (1) “Historical Linguistics,” consisting of 17 chapters that cover a variety of problematic issues in Indo-European, Balto-Slavic, and Slavic historical phonology, morphology, and syntax; and (2) “Phonological Theory,” comprising 10 articles, which illustrate Darden’s approach to tackling difficult issues in phonological theory through examples from Russian and Greenlandic.

Review: Russian Science Fiction Literature And Cinema: A Critical Reader, Alla A. Smyslova, Alexandra Portice

Russian Language Journal

Anindita Banerjee’s critical reader provides excellent insight into the development of science fiction literature and cinema in Russia from the early nineteenth century all the way to the mid-2000s. The book features four sections, each of them comprising four articles by different authors, and an introduction from the editor. The latter provides a brief but brilliant overview of Russian nauchnaia fantastika, or “scientific fantasy,” positioning it within the context of literary, social, and scientific life in the USSR, as well as outlining the existing scholarship on the topic. From the very beginning, when the genre first emerged at the turn …

Full Issue

Russian Language Journal

No abstract provided.

Defining The Accessibility Of A Literary Text: Contemporary Russian Literature In A Cefr B2 Russian As A Foreign Language Classroom, Sofya Yunusova

Russian Language Journal

In the last three and a half decades, a considerable number of publications in foreign-language methodology have addressed the use of literary texts (LTs) in foreign-language classrooms. While at the beginning of the twentieth century learning a foreign language still meant a close study of canonical LTs for linguistic and humanistic purposes following the grammar-translation method (Kramsch and Kramsch 2000; Iatsenko 2017b), by the middle of the century, literature was replaced by more functional models of learning (Carter 2007). The 1980s opened new perspectives on the didactic role of L2 literary reading, which are commonly associated with the confluence of …

Introduction

Russian Language Journal

The editorial team of Russian Language Journal is pleased to present volume 68. This issue sees five articles received through our regular blind review process, one review article, and five book reviews.

In our first section on Pedagogy and Practice, Yunusova provides a theoretical framework for assessing the appropriateness of literary texts for use in foreign language classrooms. Caffee and Lucey describe an innovative peer-to-peer experiential learning project based around foodways. Both of these articles should provide concrete and innovative ideas for Russian language classrooms.

Our second section on Linguistics, contains three articles. Soboleva tackles the thorny question of aspect, …

Borscht, Bliny, And Burritos: The Benefits Of Peer-To-Peer Experiential Learning Through Food, Naomi Caffee, Colleen Lucey

Russian Language Journal

Like other disciplines in the humanities, Russian Studies faces an ongoing crisis of recruiting and retaining majors and minors for the longevity of undergraduate programs (Looney and Lusin 2018). Shrinking budgets and limited resources compound the problem as language and culture departments across the United States are asked to do more with fewer resources (Gerber 2015). In the context of an increasingly corporatized academy where language and cultural studies are marginalized, faculty in Russian Studies have a powerful means at their disposal to attract new students and build cross-campus alliances: the common language of food. Courses on foodways can reinvigorate …

Загадки “Слинкса” (Slynx) Татьяны Толстой. Дешифровка Мифологии Романа “Кысь” В Переводах На Французский И Английский Языки, Филипп Фризон, Елена Гаврилова

Russian Language Journal

“Кысь” (фр. Le Slynx, англ. The Slynx) - первый роман Т.Н. Толстой, увидевший свет в 2000 г. Его появление не осталось незамеченным: в следующем году книга стала победителем конкурса “Лучшие издания XIV Московской международной книжной выставки- ярмарки” (г. Москва) в номинации “Проза-2001” и удостоена литературной премии “Триумф”. На французском языке “Кысь” вышла в 2002 г. в переводе с комментариями Кристофа Глоговски, на английском - в 2003 г. в переводе Джейми Гэмбрелл, без комментариев, но с перечнем цитат в приложении. Предметом рассмотрения настоящей статьи стали именно иронические и фольклорные моменты повествования и подход французского и английского переводчиков в их стремлении передать …

Review: Limits To Interpretation: The Meanings Of Anna Karenina; Russian Science Fiction Literature And Cinema: A Critical Reader, Serenity Stanton Orengo, Alla A. Smyslova

Russian Language Journal

Limits to Interpretation is a staple of Tolstoy scholarship. Newly reprinted in paperback, it is worth revisiting, even for those already familiar with this work. Alexandrov’s aim in the book, outlined on the first page, is to “propose a text-specific reading methodology, one that is tailored as much as possible to a particular work, and that is thus designed to minimize the circularity of interpretation, or the process of mediation, inherent in any act of reading” (3). Alexandrov seeks to demonstrate how a work of literature can prompt a fixed range of contradictory and divergent interpretations simultaneously. He wants to …

Teaching A Russian Media Course Based On The Theory Of Multiliteracies Pedagogy, Andrea Liebschner

Russian Language Journal

This paper is intended to provide a pedagogical framework for specific choices that instructors can make about tasks and their relationship to course goals for teaching a Russian media course to non-native speakers of Russian. The course materials involve work with literary texts, television, and the Internet. This paper first considers the New London Group’s (1996) theory of multiliteracies to build a fitting pedagogical framework for working with different types of media and communication channels in a Russian media course outside of Russia. The paper then provides an overview of existing courses about Russian media. Finally, it analyzes in detail …

The Development Of Syntactic Complexity In The Writing Of Russian Language Learners: A Longitudinal Corpus Study, Olesya V. Kisselev, Anna A. Alsufieva

Russian Language Journal

To make inferences about how second language (L2) learners develop over time, most Second Language Acquisition (SLA) research has traditionally relied on cross-sectional one-time sampling design, in which data collected from different groups of learners at different levels of language proficiency are compared against a preestablished set of measures. Rarer are longitudinal studies, in which researchers track a small number of participants over a relatively long period of time. Recent developments in technology and the rise of the language corpora have made it possible to combine the benefits of these two approaches; longitudinal LEARNER LANGUAGE CORPORA, large databases collected continuously …

Review: Mezhdu Nami, Jim Sweigert

Russian Language Journal

Между нами marks a new and quite remarkable approach to the teaching and learning of Russian. In place of the typical print textbook series is an online text that also incorporates some aspects of more traditional Russian language textbooks. Indeed, this is perhaps the first time that a Russian language textbook for the North American market has provided students with an entry point that is nearly entirely in an online format. As the authors state, “Между нами is a free, web-based textbook that provides a comprehensive introduction to Russian language and culture. It is organized around the experiences of four …

Introduction

Russian Language Journal

No abstract provided.

What Makes Russian Advertisements Russian? Contemporary Russian Advertising As A Sociocultural Phenomenon, Valentina Iepuri

Russian Language Journal

It is common knowledge that advertisements reflect society. They play an important role in the formation of stereotypes and impose a certain way of life and a certain system of values. By analyzing both the foreground and the background of advertisements as texts, it is possible to reveal not only their primary sales messages but also the embedded social and cultural ones (Frith 1997, 3).

Sociocultural, anthropological, and psychological aspects of Russian advertising and various forms of its impact on public consciousness, morality, and public taste require special attention and research, especially now that advertising has become an integral part …

Review: Panorama: Intermediate Russian Language And Culture, Jim Sweigert, Irina Six

Russian Language Journal

Every time a new Russian textbook is released, it raises similar expectations among both experienced and new teachers: Would this textbook make my teaching life easier? The hope is even more anxious when the textbook is designed to help students move from intermediate to advanced proficiency, a challenging task that needs more published teaching materials. Panorama is a textbook meant to respond to this market need.

Full Issue

Russian Language Journal

No abstract provided.

Literary Texts In The Undergraduate Russian Curriculum: Leveraging Language Learning And Literary Discussion Through Scaffolding, William J. Comer

Russian Language Journal

In this article, I want to summarize the broader discussion about literary texts in the undergraduate curriculum for the more commonly taught languages, consider the nature of Russian undergraduate programs in light of that discussion, and then suggest a way that upper-division Russian classes can work with literary texts through the effective deployment of scaffolding in classroom tasks.

Using Blogs In A Heritage Russian Classroom, Julia Titus

Russian Language Journal

Over the recent years blogging has become an increasingly frequent component in an academic setting, making appearances anywhere from English writing courses to foreign language classes. Research assessing the usefulness of blogs as a learning tool (Warschauer 2010; Murray, Hourigan, and Jeanneau 2007; Lee 2011; Bloch 2007) confirms that the blog format may offer many unique advantages, such as giving the learner a central role in the learning process; allowing the learner to practice writing on topics important to the him or her and fostering self-expression; creating meaningful and authentic context; extending learning beyond the classroom; developing self-reflection; viewing writing …

Давайте Познакомимся: Обучающий И Образовательный Потенциал Игрового Учебного Пособия «Квартет: Лица России», Mapa Сухолуцкая

Russian Language Journal

Под языковой картиной мира традиционно понимают «зафиксированную в языке специфичную для данного коллектива схему восприятия действительности» (Яковлева 1994:9). Впитанные «с молоком матери» представления о мире «закрепляются воспитанием, социализацией, естественно происходящим через язык приобщением к образованности, знанию труду, культуре...» (Костомаров 2015:17). Как справедливо отмечают в своей статье Е.Л. Кудрявцева и И.В. Корин, «люди, говорящие на разных языках, видят мир по-разному... Человек видит окружающий мир через призму той картины мира, которая существует в его сознании» (Кудрявцева, Корин 2013:15). По мнению С.Г. Тер-Минасовой, «каждое иностранное слово отражает иностранный мир и иностранную культуру: за каждым словом стоит обусловленное национальным сознанием ...представление о мире» (Тер-Минасова …

On The Expressive Function Of Russian Quantitative Aktionsarten In Speech, Elena Nikolaenko

Russian Language Journal

The goal of this article is to examine the expressive function of Russian quantitative Aktionsarten in oral and written speech from the perspective of functional grammar and cognitive linguistics, the theoretical principles of which are outlined below. The focus will be on occasionally used Aktionsarten, which name an action quantity as “greater than the norm”; the term is used by native Russian speakers to express personal appreciation/depreciation of the action.

Лексические Средства Номинации Эмоционального Концепта «Қорқыныш/Fear» В Казахской И Английской Лингвокультурах, Айнагуль Исмагулова, Динара Рыспаева, Алма Жукенова, Кайрат Гульсауле

Russian Language Journal

Перспективы исследования состоят в дальнейшем изучении структуры и семантики концепта «страх»(«қорқыныш/fear»), в более углубленном изучении комплексных исследований вербали-зации концепта в языковом сознании.

Концепт«страх» в разных лингвокульутрах привлекает внимание многих исследователей, причиной тому является тот факт, что страх – это одна из базисных эмоций человека. Страх основывается на одном из самых мощных инстинктов – инстинкте самосохранения, который побуждает человека защищаться и спасаться. Страх – это эмоция, а эмоции присущи каждому человеку независимо от этнической, религизной и социальной принадлежности.

Review: How Russian Came To Be The Way It Is. A Student Guide To The History Of The Russian Language; Studies In Accentology And Slavic Linguistics In Honor Of Ronald F. Feldstein, Ljiljana Durašković

Russian Language Journal

Tore Nesset is professor of Russian Linguistics at Arctic University of Norway. As many other professors, he has frequently found himself in situations where the simple conjugation of a verb like писать ‘write’ (1) triggered many questions from his Russian class. It is in practice impossible “to travel through time/centuries” every time a new exceptional form is introduced or mentioned in the setting of a language class. How Russian Came to Be the Way It Is is designed to make Russian more accessible to students by shedding light on Russian linguistic changes over its history.

Review: Studies In Accentology And Slavic Linguistics In Honor Of Ronald F. Feldstein; Exploring The Us Language Flagship Program: Professional Competence In A Second Language By Graduations, Ljiljana Durašković, Grant H. Lundberg

Russian Language Journal

As the title states, this volume was compiled in honor of the work and influence of Ronald F. Feldstein on the fields of accentology and Slavic linguistics. Though Professor Feldstein did some work in most of the areas covered in the volume, the book is unified by the ideas of the Prague Linguistic Circle and Jakobsonian structuralism, of which Feldstein was an important representative for many Slavic linguists working today.

Review: Siblings In Tolstoy And Dostoevsky: The Path To Universal Brotherhood, Naya Lekht, William Nickell

Russian Language Journal

This is a fine book that makes a strong contribution to the study of Tolstoy and Dostoevsky, while also demonstrating a framework that could be usefully applied to other literature of the period. It convincingly shows that sibling relations in the works of these two authors have been woefully underexamined, and it demonstrates that time and again, key scenes and ideas in their novels are structured around sisters and brothers. Reading from this perspective repeatedly brings new clarity not only to the scenes in question, but also to entire novels, and indeed, to the oeuvres to which they belong. The …

Full Issue

Russian Language Journal

No abstract provided.