The Center for Language Studies offers Russian classes designed for professionals who want to continue working while strengthening their fluency in a language. Students earn one Beloit unit for each course, which covers the full curriculum of a college semester and includes five language skills: listening, speaking, reading, writing, and cultural awareness. Classes meet online in three one-hour sessions each week and the homework helps students prepare for each class. In the advanced class, thought-provoking discussions are conducted primarily in Russian.

Professional Language Training courses

RUSS 100E. Introduction to Russian Language and Culture (1). This course introduces students to the essentials of Russian language and culture through a variety of communicative practices aimed at developing the four skills of speaking, listening, reading, and writing. Students also begin to develop intercultural competency through engagement with contemporary and classic Russian texts and cultural idioms. Graded credit/no credit.

RUSS 315E. Advanced Russian: Understanding Russia in Everyday Contexts (1). This course is designed to advance students’ understanding of the culture of everyday life in Russia and thus promote the intercultural competency necessary for deep comprehension of Russian texts and for meaningful interactions with Russians in a variety of contexts. Through a close analysis of Viktoria Tokareva’s Pervaya Popytka, students learn to decode messages embedded in the novella’s many textual allusions to Russian culture, history, and behavior. Graded credit/no credit.

RUSS 360E. Advanced Russian: Selected Topics in Russian Literature (1). A course involving intensive textual analysis in Russian of selected works of 19th- and 20th-century Russian literature. Topics may focus on a single author or novel, or on a particular theme, such as women in Russian literature, literature and revolution, Russian romanticism, or the Russian short story.