Course syllabus
Welcome to study "Russian Folklore: Faith, Magic and Fears Through the Ages", 10 credits, at Dalarna University!
Upon completing the course, you will be able to:
- explain and analyse the difference between folklore and popular and mass culture, and present the content and history of folklore
- describe central genres and figures in Russian folklore
- analyse rituals and their development over time
- describe and discuss the relationship between traditional Slavic beliefs and Christianity
- explain and analyse the scholarly tradition in terms of Slavic folklore and the connection between folk memory and other cultural traditions.
We have no physical meetings in Falun, the course is completely web-based with obligatory online seminars in real time.
The rollcall takes place via Zoom on Thursday, September 4th, at 16:30. The link to the Zoom-meeting will be made available below two weeks before the course start.
For more information on Zoom, please, see Zoom for students.
For participation in the seminars, you will need a headset with a microphone and a web-camera. It is compulsory to use webcam during online seminars. Please, check if your microphone and headset work in good time before the seminar. If you have any problems, contact Supportcafé in Zoom.
The seminars will take place on Thursdays at 16:30 – 18:00. The detailed timetable will be published in August.
The attendance is obligatory, and for the seminars to fulfill their purpose, everyone is expected to participate in the discussion. A natural pre-requisite for that is that all of you have read the assigned texts before each seminar and prepared responses to the questions, as indicated in the homework files.
Teacher and course supervisor: Nikita Mikhaylov, PhD, nmi@du.se
Course literature:
- Ivanits, L. J. (1992). Russian folk belief (1 ed.). Armonk, N.Y: M. E. Sharpe. ISBN: 0-87332-889-2
- Kononenko, N. O. (2007). Slavic folklore: a handbook (1 ed.). Westport, Conn: Greenwood Press. ISBN: 978-0-313-33610-2
- Digital material for seven seminars, comprising approximately 250 p.
Please, note that English is used as the working language at the seminars.