In summer 2007 the Davis School of Russian will be hosting writer-in-residence Dina Rubina, Israel-based author of numerous novels and short stories, including the most recent collection of stories "A Cold Spring in Provence" and novel "On the Sunny Side of the Street". In addition, we will be hosting actor Veniamin Smekhov, clarinetist Julian Milkis, and pianist Nina Kogan in an evening of poetry and music, as well as concert performances by the folk ensemble Zolotoi Plyos from Saratov, Russia and Mechelen, Belgium, who will conduct our student choir. Among our guest lecturers this year will be Alexander Domrin, lawyer, law professor, Fulbright Scholar, and former member of the Supreme Soviet speaking on "Russian Politics and Law under Putin", and University of Pennsylvania Russian literature professor (and several-time School of Russian faculty member) Ilya Vinitsky speaking on "Capital Punishment and Terrorism in Russia" (1860-1910). These lectures will be connected with graduate courses on Russian Nationalism in Film (taught by Associate Director Galina Aksenova), Terrorism and Reaction in the Modern World, and Early Twentieth-Century Russian History: Russian Revolutions (both taught by Russian State University for the Humanities Professor and Dean of the Faculty of History, Political Science, and Law Alexander Logunov), and Contemporary Literature (taught by Russian literature scholar Oleg Proskurin).
As always, the School of Russian will have a rich film program including classic and the most recent contemporary films, as well as a silent film with live piano accompaniment by pianist, composer, and Berklee College of Music (Boston) Yakov Gubanov.
This year during the second week of the session the School of Russian will host four of the nation's leading experts on Russian language pedagogy leading a pedagogy workshop for School of Russian faculty and 14 guests invited in a highly selective national application process. Guests will attend workshop sessions on a wide variety of topics, watch contemporary films, and see the magic of Middlebury's Davis School of Russian up close. That workshop will be followed by a course on Russian language pedagogy taught to graduate students by School of Russian faculty member and University of Pennsylvania Russian language program coordinator Maria Shardakova.
Details on other activities will appear in this space as they become available.