REEE 260 - A 20th Century Childhood: Growing Up in the Soviet Union

FC ARHU CD

4 credits
Childhood has long been associated with a kind of spontaneity, freedom, and play that we leave behind in the process of becoming adults. Russian and Soviet writers took up this theme in various ways: to refresh their perceptions of life; to propose models of education; to create and contest national mythologies; to escape censorship; and to express nostalgia for the past in times of radical change. We will trace the representation of childhood in Russian literature up to the end of the USSR and address the complex legacies of the Soviet Union. The class will be taught in English.