Publication: A Princeton Companion
Slavic Languages and Literatures. Russian language instruction at Princeton began during World War II, when a group of interested students asked to have John Turkevich of the Chemistry Department give them a course, and President Dodds granted their petition. Professor Turkevich's efforts were continued by Pierre Eristoff, Professor Turkevich's wife Ludmilla and eventually, by Valentine Bill, who continued until her retirement in 1974.
Russian offerings were later incorporated into the Department of Modern Languages, and, after it was divided, Russian became a part of Romance Languages, where it remained until an independent Program in Slavic Languages and Literatures was finally organized in 1961. Shortly thereafter a graduate program was initiated, and the faculty was expanded considerably, with additions primarily from Yale and Harvard. This period also saw the establishment of a Program in Russian Studies, in which students could work jointly, while taking courses in Slavic. In 1967 the Program in Slavic became a full-fledged Department of Slavic Languages and Literatures. In 1971, because of a budgetary crisis and the cessation of support from the government, the Graduate Program in Slavic was, unfortunately, suspended, but not until it had trained fifteen excellent people who now teach at Harvard, Yale, Columbia, and Pennsylvania, among other institutions. The Slavic Department now focuses on an excellent undergraduate program, but continues its efforts to have its Graduate Program restored.
The department concentrates much of its activity on a rigorous four-year language program in which all professors are involved. In addition, a wide variety of Russian and Soviet literature courses are offered, including such individual authors as Dostoevsky, Tolstoy, and Solzhenicyn. Advanced courses are often taught primarily or solely in Russian. Undergraduate majors in Slavic may emphasize literature, but they may also involve themselves more directly with the language and study the structure and history of Russian and Slavic. Though Russian itself is certainly the main language in the Princeton Slavic Department, a course in Czech is now offered, and Polish and Serbo-Croatian have also been available in the past.
The Slavic department maintains close cooperation not only with Russian Studies but also with the Departments of Comparative Literature and Linguistics, and its students frequently take courses in these departments.
Charles E. Townsend
From Alexander Leitch, A Princeton Companion, copyright Princeton University Press (1978).