Department of Slavic Languages and Literatures

SLA408H1, Fall Semester, The Ukrainian Short Story, 2009 - 2010 (Taught as a language course)

Class meets on Thursdays from 1:00 to 3:00 PM in Alumni Hall, Rm. 204

This year, SLA408H, The Ukrainian Short Story, is being conducted as a language course. The course will be conducted as a practical exercise for advanced language students. We will indeed read short stories—concentrating on contemporary writing in Ukraine—but we will read only one or a few short stories every week and we will read them with the specific intent of improving students' language skills.

The course will meet once a week. In each class we will actually read a short story (or part of a short story), we will discuss it, and examine unusual vocabulary and peculiarities of language in it. Every week, students will be given a writing assignment relating to the short stories. These assignments will be in Ukrainian and will allow students to develop their writing skills while they also show their abilities to analyze a literary work. Assignments will be graded on the correctness of their language, their demonstration of an ability to express ideas, and on their understanding and interpretation of the stories.

Writing assignments are due every week. You will be assigned a topic on the previous Thursday. For the final grade, only the 10 best scores will be counted. Each assignment will be judged on language skills as well as ideas, so it is not beneficial for students to limit their writing to the simplest level of language.

Attendance at each class is mandatory. You will receive a grade for your oral participation in each class. Every week after the first, students will be assigned the role of discussion leader. Discussion leaders make a very brief (5 minute maximum) presentation about the story under discussion and ask other students questions to stimulate a discussion. The presentation and the questions should focus both on language (new vocabulary, unfamiliar or unusual expressions, grammatical anomalies) and on the content of the stories. For the final grade, only the 10 best grades will be counted.

Textbooks: All the readings for this course will be made available to students either in xerox copies or in downloadable files on the internet. However, students are STRONGLY advised to acquire a good Ukrainian dictionary. Students should also make use of the information provided by the "Slovnyky Ukrainy" on-line dictionary of Ukrainian which provides grammatical information (paradigms) and the Slovnyk.net dictionary, which provides the meaning of words.