Russian

Engaged Russian/Russian and East European Studies

Engaged Russian/Russian and East European Studies takes what you’re learning in your courses and puts it into practice through internships, research, study away, winter term, career exploration, and beyond.

Here’s a sampling of recent projects, field experiences, and post-graduate destinations for Russian and REES majors.

RISE at Oberlin
Research. Internships. Study Away. Experiential Learning.

Ways Russian and REES Majors Rise

Research

  • “A Dream Deferred”: Olga Berggolts and Disillusionment in the USSR, 1945-1954
  • The Vagrant: Where the Soviet Love of Bollywood Began
  • The Underground Soviet: Shaping Soviet Culture in the Leningrad Metro
  • Night Thoughts: Existentialism and Russian Romantic Poetry

Internships

  • The Great Baikal Trail Project, Siberia
  • The Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg
  • Presidential Physics and Mathematics Lyceum 239, St. Petersburg
  • The Jewish Museum, Riga, Latvia
  • Pheasant’s Tears Winery, Sighnaghi, Georgia

Study Away

  • Bard/Smolny College of Liberal Arts & Sciences in St. Petersburg
  • Middlebury School in Russia: Irkutsk, Moscow, Yaroslavl

Experiential Learning

  • Live or spend time in the immersive environment of Russian House, a small, coed residence hall that is the hub of Russian-related activities (lectures, films, poetry readings, teas, cooking sessions) at Oberlin.
  • Teach Russian through our student-driven Winter Term Elementary Russian Intensive.
  • Practice literary translation and present your work at Oberlin’s annual Translation Symposium.
  • Spend a summer or semester working in-country for nonprofits through OCREECAS (Oberlin Center for Russian, East European and Central Asian Studies) Internships.

First Destinations of Recent Russian and REES Majors

  • Fulbright Fellows:

    In the past decade, 10 majors have spent a year teaching in Russia and Azerbaijan as Fulbright fellows; last year one of our majors won a Princeton-in-Asia Fellowship.

  • Positions:
    • Journalist for The Moscow Times
    • Assistant to the provost at European University at St. Petersburg
    • Sommelier at Pheasant’s Tears Winery in the Republic of Georgia
    • Scout for the N.Y. Yankees
    • Business development associate for Hornblower Cruises in Calif.
    • Risk consultant for Morgan Stanley
    • Student coordinator of international and English language programs in Washington
    • English language teacher at Language Link in Moscow
    • Peace Corps in Kyrgyzstan
  • Graduate Schools:

    Our students have entered top graduate programs in literature, history, and politics at Columbia, Brown, Yale, Oxford, Wisconsin, NYU, Georgetown, Berkeley, Middlebury, University of Chicago and elsewhere.