Courses
Each quarter, numerous courses on campus deal primarily with Russia, East Europe, and/or Eurasia across a variety of disciplines. Those at the 200 level or above (300 for HISTORY) are open to REEES MA students. Please visit Explore Courses for information on instructors, scheduling, and units. Detailed profiles of REES courses may be found here.
Other courses that may count toward the REEES MA degree, pending approval, may be found here.
REEES-RelatedCourses2014-2015.pdf
Fall 2014
- ARTHIST 205 Cairo and Istanbul: Urban Space, Memory, Protest
- COMPLIT 114A Istanbul the Muse: The City in Literature and Film
- COMPLIT 248A Reading Turkish I
- HISTORY 103F Introduction to Military History
- HISTORY 201C; INTNLREL 140C The U.S., U.N. Peacekeeping, and Humanitarian War
- HISTORY 204G/304G War and Society
- HISTORY 266C; INTNLREL 154 The Cold War: An International History
- HISTORY 282F/382F History of Modern Turkey
- HISTORY 284F/384F Empires, Markets and Networks: Early Modern Islamic World and Beyond, 1500-1800
- IPS 210 The Politics of International Humanitarian Action
- IPS 230; INTNLREL 114D; POLISCI 114D/314D Democracy, Development, and the Rule of Law
- MS&E 193/293 Technology and National Security
- MUSIC 187 Music and Culture from the Land of Fire: Introduction to Azerbaijani Mugham
- REES 100/200 Current Issues in Russian, East European, and Eurasian Studies
- REES 301B History and Politics in Russian and Eastern European Cinema
- REES 320 State and Nation Building in Central Asia
- SLAVIC 77Q Russia's Weird Classic: Nikolai Gogol
- SLAVIC 129/329 Russian Versification: History and Theory
- SLAVIC 145/345 Survey of Russian Literature: The Age of Experiment
- SLAVIC 372 Osip Mandelstam In Context and the Russian Experience: 1891-1991
- SLAVLANG 60M Songs and Poems of Comrades, Cossacks, Gypsies, and Peasants
- SLAVLANG 60T Teaching Slavic Conversation
- SOC 113; POLISCI 143S Comparative Corruption
Winter 2015
- ARTHIST 1A Introduction to the Visual Arts: Prehistoric through Medieval
- ARTHIST 207C Phenomenology and Aesthetics in Medieval Art
- COMPLIT 157/357 Contemporary Turkish Cinema and Society
- COMPLIT 248B Reading Turkish II
- FEMGEN 5C/105C; HISTORY 5C; HUMBIO 178T Human Trafficking: Historical, Legal, and Medical Perspectives
- HISTORY 4N; JEWISHST 4N A World History of Genocide
- HISTORY 20A/120A The Russian Empire, 1450-1800
- HISTORY 38A/138A Germany and the World Wars
- HISTORY 87/187 The Islamic Republics: Politics and Society in Iran, Afghanistan and Pakistan
- HISTORY 137/337; JEWISHST 183/383 The Holocaust
- HISTORY 202/306E; POLISCI 216E/316 International History and International Relations Theory
- HISTORY 221B; FEMGEN 221B The ‘Woman Question’ in Modern Russia
- HISTORY 224C/324C Genocide and Humanitarian Intervention
- HISTORY 226E/326E Famine in the Modern World
- HISTORY 321A State, Society and Nation in Modern Russian Historiography
- JEWISHST 385B; HISTORY 385B Core in Jewish History, 20th Century
- ME 421 European Entrepreneurship and Innovation Thought Leader Seminar
- POLISCI 114S; HISTORY 104D; IPS 241 International Security in a Changing World
- REES 100/200 Current Issues in Russian, East European, and Eurasian Studies
- REES 220A/320A Literature and Cultural Politics in the Former Yugoslavia
- REES 224A; HISTORY 424A The Soviet Civilization
- REES 231 Russia, the West and the Rest
- REES 250A; ANTHRO 150; FEMGEN 150A Minaret and Mahallah: Women and Islam in Central Asia
- SLAVIC 187/387 History of the 18th and 19th Century Russian Poetry
- SLAVIC 226 Bakhtin and His Legacy
- SLAVIC 236 The Russian Long Take
- SLAVIC 311 Introduction to Old Church Slavic
- SLAVIC 327 Boris Pasternak and 20th Century Russian Modernist Poetry
- SLAVLANG 60H Culture and Politics of Russian Athleticism through the lens of Sochi 2014
- SLAVLANG 70 Reading in Russian
- THINK 21 Folklore and Literature in Russia and Beyond
Spring 2015
- ANTHRO 225A; REES 335A Animism and Alter-Native Modernities
- ARCHLGY 240; REES 240 Post-Socialist Heritages: Memorialisation, past mastering and nostalgia in Eurasia
- ARTHIST 105B; DLCL 123 Medieval Journeys: Introduction through the Art and Architecture
- ARTHIST 409 Iconoclasm
- COMPLIT 245 Introductory Ottoman Turkish
- COMPLIT 248C Advanced Turkish-English Translation
- HISTORY 25 St. Petersburg: A Cultural Biography
- HISTORY 82C Making of the Islamic World, 600-1500
- HISTORY 102; INTNLREL 102 History of the International System
- HISTORY 103E; POLISCI 116 The International History of Nuclear Weapons
- HISTORY 201A/301A The Global Drug Wars
- HISTORY 202G/302G Peoples, Armies and Governments of the Second World War
- HISTORY 204E/307E Totalitarianism
- HISTORY 208B/308B; FEMGEN 208B Women Activists’ Response to War
- HISTORY 222 Crime and Punishment in Early Modern Europe and Russia
- HISTORY 228/328; JEWISHST 282/382 Circles of Hell: Poland in World War II
- HISTORY 230F/330F Surveillance in Modern Europe
- HISTORY 252B; INTNLREL 174 Diplomacy on the Ground: Case Studies in the Challenges of Representing Your Country
- HISTORY 424B The Soviet Civilization, Part 2
- REES 84/184 Zionism
- REES 100/200 Current Issues in Russian, East European, and Eurasian Studies
- REES 227/327; HISTORY 227D/327D All Quiet on the Eastern Front? East Europe and Russia in the First World War
- REES 240 Post-Socialist Heritages: memorialisation, past mastering and nostalgia in Eurasia
- REES 313 Transformation of Socialist Societies
- SLAVIC 147/347 Modern Russian Literature and Culture: The Age of War and Revolution
- SLAVIC 325 Readings in Russian Realism
- SPECLANG 186 Introduction to Serbo-Croatian
- THINK 13 Century of Violence
Language Courses
In addition to Russian, CREEES supports Special Language Program (SLP) courses in the following languages:
- Albanian
- Czech
- Hungarian
- Kazakh
- Polish
- Romanian
- Serbo-Croatian
- Ukrainian
- Uzbek
- Yiddish
Please visit Explore Courses for information about specific courses.
For languages not listed above, please contact SLP director Eva Prionas (eprionas@stanford.edu) to learn about on-demand offerings each academic quarter.
Profiles of 2014-15 REES courses
Rees 54A Central asia through films
Through films this course explores major issues of contemporary peoples of Central Asia while learning fundamental concepts in cultural anthropology. In this seminar we will consider a wide range of examples, including first of all the new feature films, which will be used as a window into the modern reality and therefore could be served in a certain sense as anthropological fieldwork data. Films are prearranged by the instructor according to certain thematic subjects for in-class discussions.
REES 84/184 Zionism
Hotly contested still, this course will open up the movement's ideas, practices, achievements and crises in such a way as to allow students to hear the fullest range of voices - Jewish, Arab, religious, secular, etc. It will track the movement from its appearance in the late nineteenth century until the establishment of State of Israel in 1948, and beyond. Same as: HISTORY 84/184; JEWISHST 84/184
REES 100/200 Current Issues in Russian, East European & Eurasian Studies
Scholars present analyses of methodologies, challenges, and current issues in the study of Russia, E. Europe, and Eurasia. Enrollment limited to REEES MA students. Offered Autumn, Winter, and Spring quarters.
rees 224 The Soviet civilization
Socialist visions and practices of the organization of society and messianic politics; the Soviet understanding of mass violence, political and ethnic; and living space. Primary and secondary sources. Research paper or historiographical essay. Same as: HISTORY 224A/424A
REEES 227/327 ALL QUIET ON THE EASTERN FRONT? EAST EUROPE AND RUSSIAN IN THE FIRST WORLD WAR
Until recently history has been comparatively quiet about the experience of World War I in the east. Far from being a peripheral theater of war, however, the experiences of war on the Eastern Front were central to shaping the 20th century. Not only was the first shot of the war fired in the east, it was also the site of the most dramatic political revolution. Using scholarly texts, literature and film, this course combines political, military, cultural and social approaches to introduce the causes, conduct and consequences of World War I with a focus on the experiences of soldiers and civilians on the Eastern Front. Topics include: the war of movement, occupation, extreme violence against civilians, the Armenian genocide, population exchanges, the Russian Revolution and civil war, and the disintegration of empires and rise of nation-states.
rees 231 RUSSIA, THE WEST AND THE REST
Focus on understanding the diversity of political, social, and economic outcomes in Russia since the collapse of the Soviet Union. Exploration of questions, including: Is Russia still a global power? Where does it have influence internationally, how much, and why? Developmentally, what is the relevant comparison set of countries? Is Russia's economic growth over the last decade truly similar to Brazil, China, and India or is it more comparable to Kazakhstan, Nigeria, and Kenya? How has Russia's domestic political trajectory from liberalizing country to increasingly autocratic affected its foreign policy toward Ukraine, Georgia, and other formerly Soviet states? Finally, is Russia's reemergence as an important global actor more apparent than real? Same as: IPS 231
REES 240 Post-Socialist Heritages: memorialisation, past mastering and nostalgia in Eurasia
The post-Soviet story is far from resolved! While national identities and geopolitical alliances are being (re)negotiated across Eurasia, unresolved atrocities continue to reopen old wounds. Within this process the past is skillfully embraced to support and sustain conflicting political discourses. Drawing on a variety of highly topical case studies this course will explore the main dynamics and historically entrenched structures that define how the past plays out in the present since the disintegration of the Soviet Empire. Same as: ARCHLGY 140/240
REES 301B History and politics in russian and eastern european cinema
From 1945 to the mid-80s, emphasizing Polish, Hungarian, Czech, Slovak, and Yugoslav contexts. The relationship between art and politics; postwar establishment of film industries; and emergence of national film movements such as the Polish school, Czech new wave, and new Yugoslav film. Thematic and aesthetic preoccupations of filmmakers such as Wajda, Jancso, Forman, and Kusturica. Same as: FILMSTUD 245B/445B
rees 313 Transformation of Socialist Societies
A quarter-century from the fall of the Berlin Wall, we have gained broad perspective on the challenges of wholesale transformations away from socialism. This course explores the process and social consequences of opening the economies of Eastern Europe, Eurasia, and China to market forces. We will answer questions about how individuals and social systems respond to the particular challenges of rapid economic and political openings, including demographic challenges, corruption, nationalism, and growing inequality. We will compare the Eastern European and Post-Soviet experiences of these issues with the Chinese experience, and highlight the similarities and distinctions between transformations in these societies. Same as: SOC 313A
rees 320 State and nation building in central asia
Issues of identity, development, and security following the dissolution of the Soviet Union and the emergence of independent states in Central Asia and the Southern Caucasus. Topics include the impact of 9/11, the spread of radical Islamist movements in the region, its growing role as a transit route for drugs, weapons, and possibly nuclear materials, the impact of the Soviet legacy, the nature of political and economic transformations, relations with neighboring countries, security challenges, and options facing U.S. policy makers.