This course will explore the history of Russia from the 17th century to the 20th century.  It will begin with general issues such as Russian geography, politics, and culture, and then go on to explore in detail the Romanovs, the Russian Revolution, the Cold War, the collapse of communism, and other events. 

Part I: These sessions will introduce the overall scope of this course including Russian geography and geopolitics. It will also explain how the history of Russia has shaped the modern world. Also, it will cover Peter's life and his reforms (the Great Revolution) and the age of Empresses including reign of Catherine the Great (her life, reforms, the Pugachev uprising, and the critique of autocratic despotism in Russia). 

Part II: These sessions will cover the reign of Paul I, Alexander I, and Nicholas I. Also it will look at causes and consequences of remarkable events such as Napoleon's invasion of Russia, the Decembrist Revolution, and the birth of the intelligentsia in the 19th century. 

Part III: The sessions will deal with the reign of Alexander III and Nicholas II, the last Tsar. It will also examine the Russian experience before (Marxism, Lenin, the Revolution of 1905, peasant life and culture, the religious renaissance) and in World War I and the coming revolution and the civil war. Furthermore, this session looks at Russian political, social, and cultural life in the 1920s and 1930s. 

Part IV: This final sessions will examine Stalin's life, Stalin's paths to socialism, the Soviet experience in World War II (the Great Patriotic War) and the Soviet Union (Russia) after Stalin's death in 1953 until its collapse in 1991 (Khrushchev, Brezhnev, Andropov, Chernenko, Gorbachev, dissidence)

Questions for Considerations:

How did the Russian tsars traditionally think about their power?
What ideas inspired Peter the Great and Catherina the Great?
Why were Russian intellectuals so passionate about philosophical ideas?
How did Lenin value liberal democratic goals?
Did the Russian state become a  constitutional monarchy after October 1905?
Were the Bolsheviks destroyers of freedom?
What was Stalin's political outlook?
What was the the Great Patriotic War?
Was Gorbachev's vision of a reformed and humanistic socialism unrealizable?