About

  

The Department of Slavic Languages in the Faculty   of Languages and Linguistics offers a broad range of   courses for undergraduate majors and minors, students from other schools, and for graduate students in the Center for Eurasian, Russian and East European Studies (CERES).
Students in language courses make use of audio and video materials both in and outside of the classroom, and they are encouraged to watch the numerous Russian television broadcasts available on campus by satellite transmission. In all language courses, the emphasis is on content and proficiency-based language instruction in a multi-media context. The third year sequence refines linguistic usage and utilizes a variety of authentic native-language texts, such as journal and newspaper articles, literary texts, and films.

Upper-level courses range from surveys of nineteenth and twentieth-century Russian literature to specialized courses on individual writers, themes, and genres. While most courses are conducted in Russian, in order to best serve the needs of various constituencies within the University community, some courses are conducted entirely in English, while others utilize both Russian and English. The Department's linguistics offerings include "Structure of Russian," "Russian Phonology," "History of the Russian Language," and "Comparative Slavic." A sequence of courses in Russian culture is also offered. The Department also invites senior majors with the requisite grade point average to write an honors thesis in the context of a fourth-year course of their choosing.

Georgetown University is one of the core schools for the Council on International Educational Exchange (CIEE), which offers study abroad in St. Petersburg, and is also a participant in ACTR's Moscow Program. The Department encourages its students to participate in summer, semester and/or academic-year programs in the Russian Federation.

Ukrainian and Polish
In response to dramatic changes and new opportunities in the Slavic world, the Department began offering Ukrainian in 1991 and Polish in 2002. Introduction to Ukrainian (UKRN 301 and 302, taught in tutorial format) and Beginning Polish (PLSH 001 and 002) cover all the fundamentals of grammar and introduce students to cultural and reading materials. Intermediate courses, UKRN 303 and 304 (tutorials) and PLSH 101 and 102, build on students' basic knowledge and further develop vocabulary and comprehension abilities in all skill areas. All courses are three credits each; the two-year sequence satisfies the Georgetown College foreign-language requirement. Tutorials on topics in Ukrainian or Polish literature are also possible