How are Cossacks depicted in literary and visual works? Were they the agents of a repressive Russian government, the hirelings of Polish kings, the tormentors of Eastern European Jews, the protectors of Europe from the Ottomans, or the liberators of the Ukrainian nation? We read works from the Jewish, Polish, Russian and Ukrainian cultural traditions. Examining the cultural, linguistic, confessional, and social diversity of the Caucasus, this interdisciplinary course provides foundations for engaging with the region’s cultural history, the evolving self-conception of its peoples, and the historical place of the Caucasus in the imagination of European and Asian outsiders. We will study a broad variety of documentary and fictional sources including folklore, political and religious thought, literary fiction, autobiography, film, painting, architecture. Taught in English, all readings in English, no preparation is required.
How are Cossacks depicted in literary and visual works? Were they the agents of a repressive Russian government, the hirelings of Polish kings, the tormentors of Eastern European Jews, the protectors of Europe from the Ottomans, or the liberators of the Ukrainian nation? We read works from the Jewish, Polish, Russian and Ukrainian cultural traditions. Examining the cultural, linguistic, confessional, and social diversity of the Caucasus, this interdisciplinary course provides foundations for engaging with the region’s cultural history, the evolving self-conception of its peoples, and the historical place of the Caucasus in the imagination of European and Asian outsiders. We will study a broad variety of documentary and fictional sources including folklore, political and religious thought, literary fiction, autobiography, film, painting, architecture. Taught in English, all readings in English, no preparation is required.
