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V.V. Andreev’s Velikorusskii Orchestra: National Identity and Music in Late Imperial Russia
Anya Shatilova writes about Vasily Andreev, “a self-taught balalaika player” who in 1888 organized the Society of Balalaika Devotees in order to “manifest the ‘Russian national idea’ in musical form.
"Black Snow [Khara Khaar]": Sakhawood’s Latest Thriller is a Punishing, Yet Gripping Watch
No more than five minutes into Stepan Burnashnev's Black Snow, it becomes clear that Gosha is headed for big trouble. The winter landscape in the Sakha Republic is notoriously unforgiving,...
Excerpt From Colleen Lucey's "Love for Sale: Representing Prostitution in Imperial Russia," Part I
The Great Reforms, initiated by Tsar Alexander II in the aftermath of Russia’s crushing defeat in the Crimean War (1853–56), brought significant changes to the country’s social and legal institutions...
Rewriting Russian History Through Cinematic Representations of Revolutionary Terrorism
Russian revolutionary terrorism is a perennial subject for state-sanctioned historical reconstruction, receiving a wide variety of treatments in cinema from the early Soviet period to the present day.
Open Letter on the Termination of Russian Studies Faculty at Ohio University
Like you, we are wholeheartedly invested in the survival and recovery of higher education in the United States amid the COVID-19 pandemic. That recovery depends on the will of universities...
When Piety Goes Wrong: Russia, Athos, and the imiaslavie Controversy
The imiaslavie, or “Name-Glorifiers,” controversy emerged from ambiguities in Church teachings and believers’ growing desire to pursue piety and personal salvation.
Cold Snap (Part II): Russian Film after Leviathan
An auteurist orientation, therefore, is neither good nor bad, but it is certainly mismatched to an industry—especially during periods of robust growth—in which so-called “spectators’ cinema” [zritel'skoe kino] is in...
Excerpt From Colleen Lucey's "Love for Sale: Representing Prostitution in Imperial Russia," Part II
Hoodwinked by the establishment’s malicious and conniving madam, Aleksandra Pakhomovna, Luiza agrees to join the brothel.
Russia by the Numbers: symposium on the humanities + mathematics
The Jordan Center hosted a symposium on Friday March 7th, Russia by the Numbers, to discuss the relationship between mathematics and Russian-focused humanities, as well as the emergence of the...
Higher Powers, Lower Motives (Turkish Gambit 4)
Fandorin is Spencer Tracy, while Varya is Katherine Hepburn, but without the talent.
Admitted as a Tourist, Tried as a Spy
Then I was asked[...] to name the former US secret service workers that he believed were teaching at NYU, and to recount the anti-Russian information that they believed was being...
An interview with Donna Orwin on her new book, "Simply Tolstoy"
We heard that Donna Orwin had just published a new book called "Simply Tolstoy" and had to find out all about it.
Russian Christmas Comes But Once a Year
In the United States, the Christmas season is winding down — or concluded depending on whom you speak to. The “most wonderful time of the year” typically ends after the...
Lady's Choice (Turkish Gambit 6)
Fandorin sounds less like Akunin and more like Yuliya Latynina
Go and See (Turkish Gambit 7-8)
What, exactly, were we hoping to see and why?
“Vulgar Spectacle:” The 1967 Festival of Fashions in Moscow
The failure of Soviet design at the Festival of Fashions in Moscow was not the result of insufficient designer talent, nor did it proceed from the low quality of Soviet...
A Tribute to “Sovok of the Week" (Russia's Alien Nations)
For a brief, glorious time in the 2000s, a website established by three post-Soviet emigres devoted itself exclusively to the topic of sovok.
On Not Talking about Gender in Nineteenth-Century Russian Literature
As a graduate student in Russian literature, I wrote a dissertation and eventually a book about the body and the grotesque in nineteenth-century realism. As I look back, I can’t...
Interrogating the Declining Significance of Pushkin’s Blackness: Henry James, Ivan Turgenev, and Literary Nationalism (with Korey Garibaldi and Emily Wang)
On October 14th, Professors Korey Garibaldi and Emily Wang, both of Notre Dame, joined the Jordan Center to speak about their collaborative work on race and literature in talk entitled...
Making an Anti-imperialist Empire: Revolutionary Russia and the Muslim World
On February 16, Jordan Center for Advanced Study of Russia hosted Professor Norihiro Naganawa, who spoke about his ongoing book project on early Soviet Russia’s engagement with Central Asia, Iran,...