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The article is devoted to the paper of Dagestan Arabic manuscripts and epistolary documents of the 19th — early 20th centuries, as an important aspect of source study. This work allows you to get an idea of the history of Russia’s cultural and economic ties with Dagestan and the countries of the East. In the course of the study, a comparative historical method was used. The authors analyzed the works of domestic and foreign experts on this issue, highlighted the main identification features of the paper of these written documents. The relevance of the ongoing research is due to the need for a comprehensive study of the writing material of the Arabographic monuments of Dagestan origin. The novelty of the work lies in the fact that the paper of these historical sources for the first time became the object of study in domestic source studies. It has been established that in the Dagestan manuscripts and epistolary documents of the 19th — early 20th centuries, the marked paper of Russian manufactories and factories is mainly represented. The article notes that for a full-fledged study of Dagestan Arabographic sources, it is necessary to use advanced digital technology and modern natural scientific developments. The study of historical sources paper is of great importance in the preservation and restoration of monuments of the written culture of the Dagestan peoples.

The composition of the novel by the modern English writer P. Ackroyd “The Plato Papers” in connection with the problems of the work is considered. The review of the last researches devoted to creativity of this author is given. Attention is paid to how the work reveals the problem of interpretation of history, its ambiguity, the concept of the movement of time, progress, the relationship of the past, present and future. The author shows that when shifting the time of the novel in the future, Ackroyd uses the documentary imitation technique, changes narrators and types of narration. The composition of the work consisting of separate small parts connected in a key way by the speaker Plato is analyzed. Such properties of the composition of the analyzed novel as fragmentation and nonlinearity are noted. It is shown how the novel realizes postmodern idea about the relativity of the interpretations of the events of the past. The position of the main character endowed with the gift of insight, able to penetrate into the past, to look from an unusual point of view at the present, to doubt and seek the truth is revealed.

The article exposes the cross-cultural incongruence in academic paper titles organization in Russian and in English. The research is based on extensive linguistic corpus data that cover 10 000 paper titles authored by native Russian and English speakers. Its main purpose is to demonstrate that word-for-word translation of paper titles from Russian into English often fails to map standard stylistic patterns characteristic to academic English. It is shown that there is a number of reasons why scientific papers (books, theses, conference reports, etc.) in Russian and in English are titled in different ways. The most important is the difference in the academic style proper in the two languages. While the Russian academic style generates rather extended titles with (multiple) abstract nouns, genitive constructions, etc., incorporated into a single noun group, the English academic style prefers a two-parts title pattern. The latter, in its turn, prefers the and -conjunction, a column, non-finite forms of the verb, prepositions, interrogative constructions, etc. The communicative asymmetry in academic paper titles’ verbalization principles in Russian and in English is no doubt a topical issue for Russian academic community in its way towards effective international cooperation.

The author of the article assumes that the interstate relations between Russia and Great Britain in the late 18th — early 19th centuries largely determined the area of private contacts between Russians and the British. English-Russian marriages have a special place in the history of English-Russian relations. Attention is paid to one of such unions — the marriage of the outstanding statesman M. M. Speransky with an Englishwoman Elizabeth Stephens. It is claimed that a significant role in Speransky’s fate was played by A. A. Samborsky, also married to an Englishwoman, in whose house Speransky’s fateful meeting with his future wife took place. It is reported that the Speransky Fund of the Russian national library preserved letters of Elizabeth Stephens to Speransky, previously not widely attracted by researchers, but not all of these letters actually belong to Elizabeth, some of them belong to her sister — Marianne. This study provides the first translation of these letters for the analysis of Speransky’s private life. The author concludes that the preserved correspondence meets the standards and methods of expression of feelings in the era of “sentimentalism.” The problem of how much Speransky was immersed in the cultural context of British reality due to this marriage is also considered. Despite the fact that the marriage was quite short, Speransky’s relations with the Stephens family were quite strong.

The work is devoted to the publication of archival materials related to the poet and literary critic Georgy Adamovich (1892–1972) and not included in his Collected Works, the publication of which has begun not long ago. The published selection, which makes a certain contribution to the study of the poet’s heritage and literature of the Russian Diaspora, is called upon to present different aspects of Adamovich’s activity. The first block is devoted to his Masonic activity and includes one of the reports read by Adamovich at a meeting of Russian Masonic lodges in Paris, “The Secret of Pushkin”. The second part of the selection, demonstrating the diversity of Adamovich’s correspondence, is presented by a letter from the poet Alla Golovina concerning the last days of her brother Anatoly Shteiger, also the poet, probably the most prominent representative of the so-called “Paris note”. The letter is addressed to Adamovich as an ideologist of the indicated literary direction. As an example of materials for an unpublished volume of Adamovich’s Collected Works, his speech at the evening dedicated to Teffi (Nadezhda Aleksandrovna Lokhvitskaya-Buchinskaya, 1872 −1952) is selected. Materials are accompanied by an introductory note and publisher’s comments.

The article discusses the role of the poet, writer, journalist and translator Rinaldo Küfferle (1903–1955) in the distribution of Ivan Bunin’s works in Italy in the 1920s and 1930s. Küfferle’s critical essays about Bunin in Italian literary journals, his translations of Bunin’s poems and short stories, different stages of promotion of the writer's works in Milan publishing houses (a novel “The Life of Arsenyev” and a collection of short stories) are identified and analyzed. The article also provides a number of archival materials on Küfferle’s personal relations with Bunin.

The study analyzes the doctrinal content of Vyacheslav Ivanov’s paper “The Meaning of the Word ‘Earth’ in the Gospels”, as well as the network of contexts (textual, ideological, biographical) in which it was created. It is noted that Ivanov’s paper is not in the strict sense a philological or theological study of the meaning of the lexeme “earth” in the Gospels, and Ivanov’s thesis concerning the centrality of the “question of earth” for Christianity find no support in Christian dogmatics. Presuppositions from which Ivanov’s reasoning starts are discussed: he postulates the existence of different degrees of initiation into mystical mysteries and recognizes esoteric revelations unknown to the “outer” church. It is demonstrated how the concepts of Merezhkovsky and his mysticism of sex are combined in Ivanov’s paper with the interpretation of the Gospel of John. It is shown that among the sources of Ivanov’s exegetical schemes there are occult mythologems and interpretations of the Gospel of John, borrowed from R. Steiner. The contrast between the doctrinally heterogeneous content of the paper and the deliberately traditional form of its presentation is pointed out. It is demonstrated that certain mythologems created by Ivanov are plot invariants externalized in different forms in his other texts. To clarify the concepts underlying Ivanov’s exegetical reasoning, the topics discussed are analyzed in the context of his other writings, drawing on evidence from correspondence, memoirs, records of oral conversations.

The article analyzes actual methodical research areas in Russian as a foreign language. The author bases on Doctor and Candidate dissertation papers defended at the chair of the Russian language and methods of its teaching over the past 10 years.

The author considers three periods in creating Russian textbooks for foreign students: a classic paper, an electronic and a smart textbook. The author describes their specific features. The author presents his own concept of smart Russian textbooks for foreign students and their place and functions in education.

This paper continues the series of publications on the morphology of the dialect of Staroshvedskoye (Sw. Gammalsvenskby), which is the only surviving Scandinavian dialect in the territory of the former Soviet Union. The village of Staroshvedskoye is located in the Kherson region, Ukraine. Its Swedish dialect historically belongs to the group of Swedish dialects of Estonia and goes back to the dialect of the island of Dagö (Hiiumaa). The dialect of Gammalsvenskby is of interest to slavists as an example of a language island in the Slavonic environment. From around the 1950s, the main spoken language of all village residents, including dialect speakers, has been surzhik. Due to the complete lack of studies of the present-day dialect and because of the severe endangerment in which the dialect is currently situated, the most urgent task is to collect, classify, and publish the factual material. This paper introduces comprehensive material on nouns in the conservative variety of the present-day dialect. It lists all masculine nouns of types 1b, c, d, and e together with their cognates from Estonian Swedish dialects; comments on the history of the forms are given as well. The sources for the material presented here are interviews with speakers of the conservative variety of the dialect recorded by the author during fieldwork in the village from 2004 to 2013. We plan to publish nouns of other types in later articles.

Dėl nepatikimos informacijos Daivos Šveikauskienės straipsnyje „Lietuvių kalbos gramatikos informacinė sistema: I morfologija“, publikuotame elektroniniame žurnale Lietuvių kalba 2016 m. nr. 10.

The article is devoted to two well-known historians of the Ural State University: Mikhail Yakovlevich Syusyumov (1893-1982), the outstanding byzantinist of the 20th century, and Ivan Nikanorovich Chempalov (1913-2008), the founder of the Ural school of historians of international relations. The aim of the article is to study one of the most important aspects of the unique process - the formation of the scientific school of historians of international relations at the Ural University. Special attention is paid to an important stage in the scientific biography of its founder I. N. Chempalov - preparation of the doctoral thesis. The documents are used which had not previously been published, in particular, the materials of personal correspondence of M. Ya. Syusyumov with other historians - V. T. Sirotenko and K. D. Petryaev. The authors believe that the Ural school of historians of international relations was formed not without the influence of the theory of continuity (historical succession) proposed by M. Ya. Syusyumov. There is a high prognostic potential of historical thinking of this authoritative medievalist, who gave a number of assessments of the modern historical process, as subsequent events confirmed his rightness. The authors of the article made an attempt to reveal the essence of “the phenomenon of I. N. Chempalov.” The process of scientific continuity and influence of the senior colleague on formation of I. N. Chempalov as a historian of international relations is covered.

The relevance of the study is in the need to find effective forms of work with lexical units in teaching foreign languages under the conditions of the changing educational environment. The system of teaching vocabulary in the educational-methodical complex “New Souvenir 1” oriented at adult learners (level A1-A2) is characterized. The specificity of this complex consists in the variability of presenting teaching material: paper version (textbook, workbook, guidebook) and online version for distance lessons. The aim of the study is to describe the methodology of working with vocabulary in Russian as a foreign language classes, which is equally effective for face-to-face and online lessons in groups of adult Tanzanian learners. The methods of analysis, systematization, description, generalization, and experiment were applied. The materials of the study were paper versions of the Russian Souvenir series and its revised, updated and improved analog of 2024, called New Souvenir 1 . The described system was tested in groups of adult English-speaking learners during intensive Russian language courses in Tanzania (2023, 4 groups of 10 people). The experiment revealed that classes with the use of the “New Souvenir 1” teaching method can be effective both in distance and face-toface learning; learning new words in class helps learners to memorize new vocabulary and facilitates in homework, high repetition of the learned vocabulary and its minimization contributes to the assimilation of the learned lexical material. At the end of the course, the students successfully completed the final test, which checked not only the learned vocabulary, but also its use in speech activity (speaking, writing, reading, listening). The authors proved that the system of work with lexical material in the educational-methodical complex “New Souvenir 1” contributes to the effective learning of vocabulary in the course of Russian as a foreign language in groups of English-speaking (Tanzanian) students.

The paper views a literary debate of the early 19th century that has not yet received the due attention of specialists. The 1800s see emerging interest in original anecdotes that show the virtue and wit of Russians. The journal Drug Prosveshcheniia, which represents one of the influential literary factions of the time, the politically and stylistically conservative “Archaists” led by Alexander Shishkov, makes “Russian anecdote” a permanent section since its first issue. In 1805, the Russian anecdote becomes the object of a literary controversy. The discussion is initiated by a publication in the May issue of Drug Prosveshcheniia. It is followed by polemical replies of Severnyi Vestnik in June, Zhurnal dlia Pol’zy i Udovol’stviia in July, and Zhurnal Rossiiskoi Slovesnosti in September. The present paper traces the course of this discussion, deciphers the sub-texts, and analyses the participants’ positions. The research shows that the subject of the dispute is the nature of the anecdote as a genre. The discussion helps to outline the range of issues of its understanding: this includes the subject matter, volume, and style. During the polemics, the paradigm of genre variants is determined. In addition, this dispute acts as part of the polemic about language between the supporters of A.S. Shishkov and N.M. Karamzin, which intensifies in the summer of 1805. The article clarifies the positions of the parties on the material of this genre, demonstrating the diversity of opinions that cannot be reduced to two polar viewpoints.

The paper develops applied and theoretical results obtained by the author in a long-term, corpus-based research on the cross-linguistic scientific communication and on its most distinctive problem — translating modern scientific texts mainly on digital information processing from English into Russian (and vice versa). These texts are characterized primarily by the growing number of multi-word language-specific new terms. In this respect special attention is paid in the paper to modern authentic «digital» neologisms-clusters in English: to their cross-linguistic idiomatic character, their language-specific types and patterns, to their systematization as well as to their communicative and cognitive distinctions. The paper introduces their equivalent terminological counterparts in Russian and the way they are to be translated into Russian. Some important generalizations and proposals are also introduced concerning new trends in the formation of language-specific «digital» terminological clusters in English and the way they can be rendered into Russian. The paper concludes with outlining some further perspectives in studying cross-linguistic scientific communication, its new terminology and developing its cross-linguistic translation, particularly by digital resources.

The paper examines crucial topics of reflection on the nature of art in L. N. Tolstoy’s works (1890–1900) in the light of their interpretations by V. B. Shklovsky. The principal part of these reflections is the search for a new mode of writing, “beyond any form,” which Shklovsky inherits and analyzes in his fragmentary aphoristic prose. The fragmentary forms in the late period of Tolstoy’s works and Shklovsky’s writing stem from the era of dramatic, rapid, and irreversible changes at the turn of the 19th–20th centuries. The paper pays particular attention to aspects of Shklovsky’s interpretation of Tolstoy’s technique of defamiliarization (ostranenie) and examination of the contexts of Tolstoy’s thought, which combine the themes of freedom, memory, and imagination in the existential, ethical, and aesthetic registers. Shklovsky translates Tolstoy’s existential thought into an aesthetic register, considering it as a result of a long process of emerging new forms in art.

This paper is dedicated to one of the heroes of Fyodor Dostoevsky’s novel Crime and Punishment, Dmitry Razumikhin, who is usually regarded as a minor, accessory character and often considered an ordinary, average, even mediocre personality in contrast to higher figures. The paper suggests that Razumikhin’s “minority” is a deceptive evaluation that overlooks the real value of the character. His importance is shown by the author through Razumikhin’s extraordinary deeds and through many complimentary remarks about him, which are very unusual for Dostoevsky’s poetics. In the novel, the opposition between the two poor students who have come to the capital from Russian provinces, have left the university as they could not pay for it, and must face their fate alone, is determined by their choices of social behavior. Raskolnikov breaks through the circumstances, trying to get everything at once by committing a terrible crime. Razumikhin is resolved to overcome his poverty by way of petty earnings, complete his university education, become a professional and a financially independent person. Choosing the way of a crime, Raskolnikov rejects the ways of Razumikhin. Of special importance is Razumikhin’s love story. He loves as a noble knight, ready to serve his lady selflessly. For Razumikhin, his love for Raskolnikov’s sister entails an all-embracing care not only for his sweetheart but for all her relatives as well, whatever might happen to them. Razumikhin’s love is a transforming and creative feeling. Dostoevsky, who knew very well the saving mission of work, saw to it that Rodion Romanovich, after his prison term, had someone to come to for advice and support. Sonya Marmeladova promised Raskolnikov her devoted love, but only the Razumikhins, Dunya and Dmitry, could help him recover and find his way in new circumstances.

Russian unprefixed verbs of motion (UVoMs) have been commonly recognized as one of the most challenging topics in Russian second language (L2) instruction. The traditional way of conceptualizing and teaching UVoMs, based on the rather ambiguous category "directionality" (cf. Isačenko, 1960), has recently been challenged by some linguists and Russian L2 educators proposing alternative approaches (cf. Bernitskaїa, 2017; 2019; Six, 2019; Bondarenko, 2023). From an epistemological perspective, the paper clarifies the linguistic principles underlying the traditional directionality-based approach to evaluate its potential efficiency in L2 classrooms. The paper demonstrates that the traditional approach is deeply rooted in the tenets of European structural linguistics, which a priori considers any grammatical category as a privative opposition. Searching for universal semantic invariants associated with specific morphemes, structuralist linguistics abstracts from contextual factors and fails to provide an easily applicable guide to choosing the correct UVoM. In contrast, the alternative approaches, such as Semantic Labeling (Bondarenko, 2023), are situation based, item-focused, and experience-driven. Converging with the principles of cognitive linguistics, they seem to be able to make up for the shortcomings of the traditional approach and offer a more intuitive methodology for teaching UVoMs.

The paper deals with the history of academic commentary in the Soviet era, particularly the formation of standards for a description of the sources of the text, its creative history, and clarification of the encountered realities incomprehensible to the reader. A separate part of the paper is devoted to the critical editions of Russian “classics” designed for high school institutions, among them, e. g., the five-volume collection of works by A.S. Pushkin, issued by Lev I. Polivanov. The main specificity of these comments is that they precede the literary text and answer questions that students may have in advance. The next object of our analysis is N.L. Brodsky’s commentary on Pushkin’s novel “Eugene Onegin,” intended for secondary school teachers. It became a subject of sharp criticism by V.V. Nabokov, like a commentary on the same novel released by Yu.M. Lotman. A new stage in the genre of commentary has become the Russian version of Nabokov’s “A Novel in Verse by Alexandr Pushkin,” growing into an autobiography and a self-discovery tool for the editor (Nabokov). We are also considering the question of how fair was Nabokov’s criticism of the commentaries of Brodsky and Chizhevsky. Another type of commentary should be that of Odessa researcher S.Z. Lushchik, published as an appendix to Kataev’s novel “Werther has already been written” (1980) and entitled “A real commentary on the novel.” This type of commentary grows into a full-fledged study that discovers unknown and carefully hidden details of the famous Soviet writer’s biography.

The present paper provides scholars with a critical assessment of research into Russian diachronic linguistics and Russian philology carried out by Italian Slavicists over the last thirty years. This article first examines how Italian scholars have understood and engaged with fundamental issues in the history of the Russian language, which have been at the centre of discussion on an international level. It then explores the advances made in Italian research on historical grammar and emphasises the peculiarity of the approach to textual criticism developed by Italian scholars and its relevance to Russian philology. Finally, the paper discusses major Italian contributions regarding specific issues in Russian diachronic linguistics and philology, which reveal innovative solutions to long-standing problems. While further exploration is necessary in several areas, in qualitative terms, the hitherto accomplished research cannot but be positively assessed.

This paper is an attempt at tracing the origins of the Slavic names of the days of the week. Although these names have a clear etymology from a purely linguistic point of view, it is unknown whether they are of Christian or pagan origin, and if they were created by an individual – presumably Saint Cyril or Methodius – or arose more naturally. The paper examines the Slavic day-names in relation to other European languages and attempts to recreate the development process of the Slavic week from its supposedly pre-Christian beginnings to its final form that we know from written Slavic languages. The evidence shows that the Slavic names of the days of the week developed over a longer period, starting in pre-Christian times and introducing Christian elements through contact with neighboring cultures along the way. It also excludes the possibility of their creation by an individual, while leaving room to speculate about the original form of the Slavic week.

This paper analyzes twelve poems by Federico García Lorca that Marina Cvetaeva received from the Russian Hispanist F. Kel’in and translated in 1941. Out of them, five poems were translated into Russian, five into French (these texts were identified and republished only in 2020), and two poems remained untranslated. In this paper, we analyse Cvetaeva’s translation process as a reception of texts and compare poetic images from García Lorca’s original poems with Marina Cvetaeva’s images in translations and her work. It is a well-known fact that Cvetaeva wrote to Kel’in saying she liked Lorca and that the poems were well chosen for her. This statement became the starting point of the work. We demonstrate the typological proximity and similarities of imagery between García Lorca’s poems and Cvetaeva’s work and trace possible echoes of Cvetaeva’s poetry in translations from the Spanish poet. In searching for translation solutions, Cvetaeva activates her vocabulary, as well as metrical, rhetorical, and compositional techniques, and introduces allusions to the works of other Russian authors into the texts.

The paper presents the first results of the field research carried out in June 2023 in the Khorol and Chernigov districts of Primorsky Krai of Russia among the descendants of immigrants from Ukrainian and Belarusian lands. The purpose of the expedition survey was to record the speech of dialect speakers of the Ukrainian and Belarusian languages, to study the functioning of dialects in contact with closely related Russian language, to identify the preservation of traditional folk culture. The main problem during field research was related to the difficulties of informants when trying to record spontaneous dialect speech. Relics of Belarusian dialects were not found in this expedition. The utterances in Ukrainian were recorded in cases of quoting speech of older relatives, in memories about childhood and in folklore. The paper presents some transcribed texts, reveals phonetic and morphological features, analyzes individual lexical units. Narratives on the following topics are presented: the linguistic situation among migrants at the micro and macro levels, metalanguage observations, stories about local place names and ethnic nicknames. In addition to audio recordings, a written source is analyzed, the history of the formation of the Khorol village, written in Russian with Ukrainian dialect items. This text reveals all the linguistic features noted in the oral speech of the informants. Moreover, it contains valuable information about the daily activities of the first settlers, about their holidays, customs, contacts with neighbors of different ethnicity. In the future, it is planned to work on transcribing the entire corpus of recorded texts for their publication and analysis, as well as to publish a written history of the village of Khorol.

The paper deals with the post-war period of I.A. Bunin’s life. These were years of difficult financial situation and serious health problems for the writer, which also involved additional expenses. The author examines how the Nobel Laureate tried to publish translations of his book “The Liberation of Tolstoy.” The translations significantly expanded the market and brought writers more income than publications in publishing houses of the Russian abroad. With the help of his former secretary Andrey Sedykh, Bunin wanted to undertake an English edition of the book, but he didn’t succeed. The paper reveals some previously unknown details of the complicated relationship between Bunin and Sedykh (along with the Nobel Prize period), including mutual sympathies periods (at least on the part of the author of “The Life of Arsenyev”) as well as periods of disappointment. The article introduces archival materials, including previously unpublished sources, in particular a postcard sent by Bunin to Sedykh.

What is the correct approach when translating a literary work that dates back two hundred years? Should the translator try to bring the writer closer to the reader, i. e. simplify the text, omitting difficult-to-understand historical realities? Or should they, on the contrary, try to bring the reader closer to the writer by preserving historical realities and trying to explain them in footnotes as much as possible? Each of these options has its followers, and each has a right to exist. Moreover, sometimes both these points of view coexist in one translator’s personality: the linguist in them wants to make the text understandable without explanation, while the historian insists on preserving proper names and realities that are unclear to the modern reader. This paper attempts to resolve this conflict using the examples of old and new translations of two works by Balzac. The first one is “The Physiology of Marriage” (1829), first translated (with omissions) by V.L. Rantsov in 1900, and then by V.A. Milchina (her translation was published for the first time in 1995, and then, with corrections, in 2017). The second work, which Balzac conceived as a continuation of the one mentioned, is “The Minor Troubles of Married Life” (1846). It was first translated by E.G. Beketova in 1899, and then by V.A. Milchina in the same edition in 2017. The translations of Rantsov and Beketova were made according to the rules of their time, when the omission, for example, of proper names, which for some reason were difficult for the translator (the owner of the shadow theater Seraphin or the dancer Fanny Elsler), was considered a completely legal thing and not in the least reprehensible. Indeed, without these names, the text becomes smoother and easier to understand. This temptation is not unknown to modern translators either, but the author of this paper is convinced that it must be fought, especially when translating Balzac. However, this rule also has exceptions, and these are mentioned in the paper.

The paper analyses the phenomenon of being a reader compared with the phenomenon of being an author in Dostoevsky’s novel The Possessed, which has got the reputation of the most literary novel of the writer. For Dostoevsky, who was an intense and all-consuming reader from early youth, the purpose of reading was to draw from the books he read the art of creation, to take lessons in the craft of writing from fellow writers. In The Possessed the characters, engulfed by the powerful passion of literary creation with all its risks and adversities, form a kind of “authors’ union.” However, it is also a “readers’ union,” and the selfless experience of being a reader, devoid of egoism and ambition, proves to be constructive and transforming. Various and multifaceted books are involved in the lives of the characters of The Possessed. They turn to books for advice, consolation, or as a warning of danger. Of special importance are “well-thumbed books”: quite often, they tell us about their readers more than words and actions. The book that the author set on a character’s writing desk sometimes contains both the riddle of the character and the solution to it. The paper shows how, as the events in the novel become more and more macabre, leading to the disaster, the tone and the contents of literary reflections change radically. After many calamities in the universe of the novel remains the only Book around which the characters try to gather: the Apocalypse. The Apocalypse in The Possessed is indeed a Book in the book, and we can see how the novel’s characters strive to understand its message and accept it.

In this paper, we present the design of a textbook that, from both a linguistic and a didactic point of view, introduces activities and authentic texts for two fundamentally different language levels of Slovenian learners in primary schools. Linguistic heterogeneity is not only everyday school life with traditionally established methods, but it also puts many challenges to teachers, especially if they independently prepare individualized learning materials on a daily basis and implement internal differentiation in lessons. In the first part of the paper, we present the existing teaching material for bilingual lessons in the subject of Slovene. In the second part of the paper, we propose a model of internal differentiation in the classroom and present the design of the textbook, which mediates communicative activities and with a text-based method enables progress at (at least) two different language levels, such as beginners in learning Slovenian and students at the language level B2.

The paper describes a project conducted at Ruhr-University Bochum that aims to increase the motivation of Russian language learners by helping them to actively integrate Russian into their everyday life. Based on Slavkov & Séror (2019) and in collaboration with trainee and in-service teachers of Russian we developed a Passport of Linguistic Challenges for Russian, which can be used in both university and school contexts. The passport identifies 83 authentic challenging situations in which learners can use Russian outside the classroom, such as posting a comment in Russian on a social network or composing an email to their instructor in Russian. Learners can mark each linguistic action performed with a check mark and rate its difficulty. The motivation to use Russian as frequently as possible in everyday life also promotes students’ autonomy. In addition, learners who have mastered a certain number of risky situations with the help of the passport can be additionally motivated by rewards, e.g. at the end of the semester or term. The paper ends with concrete scenarios for the use of the instrument in different teaching contexts.

Dictation is quite common in Croatian methodological literature, especially when it comes to elementary school teaching. Teachers use it to check and – at the same time –monitor and evaluate studentʼs knowledge –grammar, orthography, pronunciation and vocabulary. Knowledge can be checked by different types of dictation: controlling, explained, studied, creative, optional, dictation with error prevention, self-dictation and dictation with explanation (Visinko, 2015, 2016). Dictation in foreign language teaching, including Croatian as a foreign language, can also be implemented at higher education institutions (e.g. Jukić, 2018). This paper will present ways in which creative dictation by image, being a subtype of creative dictation, can be included in teaching Croatian as a second language at different levels of learning. The aim of this paper is to show the value of creative dictation by image and to provide examples of texts for the beginner, intermediate and advanced level of learning Croatian as a second language. It is argued that dictation is valuable in teaching because it contributes to the development of the studentʼs auditory memory, reaction and accuracy, while creative dictation by image is also an opportunity to introduce indirect reality into teaching.

The paper addresses one question: What makes the Cross-Border Studies (CBS) MA a multilingual study program? The first part presents the CBS MA curriculum, developed on the basis of current research literature on multilingualism and transcultural learning. The multilingual essence of the trans-and interdisciplinary CBS MA program is visible among others in the German-and English-language tracks. Besides these languages of instruction, the MA program encompasses at least two target languages, one of which is mandatorily Slavic (BCMS, Russian or Slovene). The intended objective of the CBS MA is to educate future experts who will actively operate between languages and cultures. Therefore, the program’s focus is not on acquiring language skills only, but also skills in the intercultural, i.e., interpersonal, sociolinguistic, and social areas. These are covered in the inter-and transdisciplinary compulsory and guided electives (Gebundene Wahlfächer). In the second part of the paper, the CBS MA is discussed in the context of multilingual and multicultural universities. We argue that it is possible to introduce English as a language of instruction and keep a multilingual setting, which includes preserving the local languages. Numerous strategies used within the program both in and outside the classroom to reinforce multilingualism and language diversity are presented.

The aim of this paper is to show the circumstances, problems, and perspectives of the CLIL teachingin Serbia in Russian as a vehicular language at the high school level based on the conducted empirical research. The research included the following: visits to schools, analysis of documents, anonymous surveys filled out by 12 teachers and 95 students involved in bilingual teaching, as well as the results of students’ testing of the final grades in Aleksinac High School. The main aim was to determine the impact of CLIL teaching on the development of students’ competences in the Russian language. According to the results of the research, key problems related to CLIL teaching in the Russian language are indicated in the paper. Guidelines for improvement are proposed.

Given that the models of education in minority languages and scripts in the Republic of Croatia are aimed primarily at students belonging to minorities, the authors focus on reaffirmation of minority language education also for the children of the majority population. Teaching them together could not only contribute to the sustainability of specific minority language education models, but also the development of bilingualism in both language groups. That would also be a direct indicator of interculturalism, the goal that the educational-political discourse in Croatia has been striving declaratively for more than two decades. Therefore, the paper focuses on the most visible implementation problems of existing models but also on the possibilities of enrollment of the majority students. By interviewing 18 former participants of the model B of secondary education in Czech as a minority language, the paper examined whether the existing models achieve the goals of preserving the minority language and identity, what the implemen-tation of bilingual classes looks like in practice and whether it contributes to the continuation of education and the professional achievement of students. Based on the analysis of the obtained results, what was highlighted was the need for redesigning the curriculum and the introduction of new methods and content, which, in addition to the basic requirement for quality increase, would simultaneously enable the inclusion of the majority students.

This paper shows the role of motivation in teaching and studying Slovene at the Departments of Slavic and Translation Studies at the University of Graz and at the Department of Slavic Studies in Cologne. It presents the theoretical framework that guides the authors in fostering motivation for studying Slovene when planning units and designing teaching materials, and further lists several technical tools which help nurture motivation and creativity during online classes. The paper also describes the motivation for studying Slovene under current, i.e. pandemic conditions with exclusively online classes. The findings are based on a self-assessment questionnaire from spring 2021, administered to students in various Slovene language courses and lectures at said departments. Based on the analysis of the received responses, the paper attempts to illustrate students’ current willingness to study Slovene and puts forward a few suggestions or rather practical examples which proved effective in maintaining motivation for studying Slovene at different levels of proficiency during class.

This paper describes the use of theasynchronous, structured, and online-based learning platform “Trans-Siberian Language Journey” (German: Transsibirische Sprachreise) during the COVID-19 pandemic with a heterogeneous group of Russian foreign language learners in Berlin. The platform is based on a WordPress website with anH5P plugin. Additionally, synchronous online meetings via Zoom as well as an online chat accompanied the course. The following paper presents the structure of the course as well as the didactic considerations regarding the development of the materials. Moreover, the technical side of the platform, further technical alternatives and the feedback of the participants will be reflected on. Finally, future development possibilities of online-based asynchronous learning settings in adult education as well as in the school context will be discussed.

The paper aims to review the history of dialectology at Vilnius University since the establishment of the Department of the Lithuanian Language in 1940. To achieve this, we have set the following objectives: 1) to present the teaching of dialectology, 2) to review the dialect material collection, and 3) to examine existing research. Descriptive, analytical, and evaluative methods are applied in the study. The beginning of dialectological research is associated with the name of Antanas Salys. The works of Aleksas Girdenis and Zigmas Zinkevičius are also discussed in the paper, as well as the teaching of the dialectology subject, methods of collecting dialectological material and directions of dialectological research. The paper distinguishes the paradigms of traditional, structural, and new dialectology dialectology, and examines their methodological similarities and differences. The most important conclusions and summaries of the paper are fundamentally related to dialectological paradigms: in more than eighty years since the first dialectology subject taught at Vilnius University, the understanding of dialectology has changed. The stage of traditional dialectology at the University was extremely important, as it produced the most fundamental works that are still used today. The structural dialectology paradigm and Prof. Girdenis Dialectology School that trained a large group of productively working Lithuanian dialectologists has flourished over the years. Currently, the new paradigm of dialectology is making its way, offering new theoretical and methodological approaches to the study of dialects.

The paper concerns a question of great importance for history as a science, namely the problem of the limits of factual veracity and connected to them the phenomenon of alternate history — a phenomenon that does exist despite the repeated assertion that history does not tolerate the subjunctive mood. The author of the paper is convinced that intellectual and artistic reflection about the past, both personal and social, is indispensable for people, countries, and the whole world. Fyodor Dostoevsky, in his Pushkin speech (1880), successfully exercised the right to think in terms of alternate history. According to Dostoevsky, had Pushkin lived longer, he could have solved the problems which not only had not been solved by the end of Dostoevsky’s life, but had been aggravated to the extreme. The paper analyses the animated series created by Kaspersky Lab under the general title “History Could Have Gone Differently.” The series has five parts: “Raskolnikov,” “Pushkin,” “Chapayev,” “Charles Darwin (Evolution),” “Jack the Ripper.” It is worth mentioning that the image of Raskolnikov has been taken by the creators of the series as such a well-known character that he came to be treated as a real historical person. The animated cartoon “Raskolnikov” sheds light on important features of alternate history: in most cases, it does not provide universally valid solutions and functions selectively, fragmentarily, paving the so called “other way” not for all and not always. We cannot invent any technical devices for saving people preventively from destructive theories and criminal designs: in order to make Raskolnikov’s story go another way other means are needed.

This paper is devoted to the renaming of Ljubljanska street in the city of Vršac (Serbia) to commemorate Nikita Tolstoy on May 22, 2005. The paper’s author, who was then working as a Humanities Program assistant at the Russian Center of Science and Culture in Belgrade under the Russian Federation’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, relays a memoir that references relevant media articles and describes the events which preceded this commemorative event. The memory of this outstanding philologist has become at once part of the historical and cultural legacy of his native city and the everyday context of its inhabitants thanks to the involvement of key individuals who are commemorated here. As pro-Europeanism led to the change of many Serbian naming conventions, the hodonym Ulica Nikite Tolstoja was adopted thanks to the efforts of Serbs, the residents of Vrsac, Russian employees of the Russian Center of Science and Culture in Belgrade, and the descendants of the Russian refugees who emigrated to the Kingdom of Yugoslavia between the two world wars. The renaming unites several types of historical convention, i.e. (1) to commemorate an outstanding person biographically associated with a place, in this case, the city of Vrsac, (2) the great Russian writer's attitude towards Serbs regarding their descent from and recognition of the global significance of Russian culture; (3) commemoration of a strong Russian figure also spiritually close to the Serbs; (4) commemoration of a humanist who was engaged in the history of the Serbian language and the study of the spiritual culture of the Slavs; (5) attitude to historical events related to the liberation of Serbia and this city from Nazi occupation during World War II; (6) attitude to the heritage of Russian emigration which fostered the revival of Kingdom of Yugoslavia after the First World War; (7) commemoration of a figure who unites within himself two parts of Russian society torn apart by the Civil War. Each of these semantic layers is determined by the peculiarities of the outstanding personality and biography of Academician Nikita Tolstoy. The initiators of this commemorative toponym hoped that its multiple semantic layers would allow it to be preserved in the geocultural space of Vrsac regardless of future political change. Neither narrower Serbian-Russian relations nor other factors should diminish the legitimate breadth of the consideration behind it.

The chronicle is devoted to the conference “XXXIX All-Russian Dialectological Meeting «Lexical Atlas of the Russian Folk Dialects – 2023»” which annually takes place in Saint Petersburg and this time was held on January 30–31, 2023. The questions of the Russian dialect lexicology, lexicography and linguistic geography were mainly discussed. These disciplines are concerned with “Lexical Atlas of the Russian Folk Dialects” compiling which has been done by the Institute of Slavic Studies RAS, the Institute of Linguistic Studies RAS and leading universities of Russian Federation. Concrete dialect lexical characteristics as well as features of the Russian dialects in general were considered. Moreover, general problems of linguistic geography and dialect lexicography were analyzed, including the studies on “Lexical Atlas of the Russian Folk Dialects” material. Also some papers dealt with toponymy, antroponymy, etymology, onomastics, grammar, linguistic folklore studies and ethnolinguistics. Some presentations were devoted to the study of the Russian dialect lexicon against the Slavic background. Some linguistic geography and dialect lexicography aspects were shown on the material of non-Slavic languages, in particular, Komi-Permyak. A great number of scientists, including young researchers, from more than twenty Russian cities took part in the conference. Presented papers will be published in the annual volume “Lexical Atlas of the Russian Folk Dialects. Materials and Studies” by the Institute of Linguistic Studies RAS, edited by S.A. Myznikov. As a result of the conference there was made a decision to support and encourage the Atlas authors and to intensify their work on maps and research.

This article examines the functioning of the traditional genre of Russian folklore, specifically the religious legend, through the example of retelling the legend of the city of Kitezh on YouTube. The paper highlights the specifics of video content on YouTube, which can be defined as multimodal texts. The legend is presented in two main types: variants of texts recorded earlier and texts conveying personal verbalized mystical experience of communication with the city of Kitezh (folklore legend). The paper identifies three main types of retelling the previously recorded variants of the legend: brief retellings, expanded retellings with reference to “The Kitezh Chronicler,” and expanded retellings with the addition of other historical, quasi-historical, and mythological elements. The article establishes that these multimodal texts can be distributed into three groups depending on the number of resources used: weak multimodality — using only two resources; medium multimodality — using three or more resources; strong multimodality — using more than 4—5 resources. The article shows that the told / retold legend is a fragment of a more complex multimodal text or cycle of texts.

A Case of the Non-Directionality of Language Change: The Strength of Auxiliaries and Pronouns in South and West Slavic This paper discusses the directionality of language change on the basis of Slavic data. Specifically, it addresses the question of whether there exist predefined patterns and diachronic trends that affect words in terms of their prosodic and morphosyntactic strength. The paper investigates two classes of functional elements, auxiliary verbs and pronominal clitics, showing that they have undergone diachronic changes in opposite directions: while auxiliaries have weakened, pronominal forms have become strengthened in some Slavic languages. Bezkierunkowość zmian językowych. Siła czasowników posiłkowych i zaimków osobowych w językach południowo- i zachodniosłowiańskich Artykuł omawia zagadnienie kierunkowości zmian językowych, opierając się na danych z języków słowiańskich. W szczególności artykuł podejmuje kwestię istnienia uniwersalnych trendów i wzorców zmian diachronicznych w języku, takich jak jednorodne osłabienie słów pod względem prozodycznym i morfoskładniowym. Badane są dwa typy wyrazów funkcyjnych: czasowniki posiłkowe i zaimki osobowe. Jak wykazano, formy te podległy zmianom diachronicznym, które nastąpiły w przeciwnych kierunkach: podczas gdy czasowniki posiłkowe uległy prozodycznemu i morfoskładniowemu osłabieniu, w niektórych językach słowiańskich zaimki osobowe uległy wzmocnieniu.

Polish Translations of “The Life of Adam and Eve” as a Research Problem: An Analysis of Translation Strategies This paper presents the results of translatological research into Teresa Dąbek-Wirgowa and Agata Kawecka’s translations of the Old Church Slavonic apocrypha “The Life of Adam and Eve” into modern Polish. The two texts were examined independently of each other, since they do not form a translation series. The translations were compared with the Bulgarian and Old Church Slavonic sources, which made it possible to follow closely how the translators applied the fundamental techniques of translation. Using selected examples, the article discusses the types of translation transformations used, and characterises the dominant elements presented in the translations. Some errors are also pointed out, especially those that change the meaning of the translated text. The final part of the paper contains general conclusions about the translators’ work and indicates possible directions of future research, including further research into anthologies of ancient literature as translations and into the skills exhibited by translators of such literature. Przekłady Słowa o Adamie i Ewie na język polski jako problem badawczy. Analiza strategii tłumaczenia Artykuł prezentuje wyniki badań translatologicznych nad przekładami staro-cerkiewno-słowiańskiego apokryfu Słowo o Adamie i Ewie na współczesny język polski, których autorkami są Teresa Dąbek-Wirgowa i Agata Kawecka. Oba teksty zostały zbadane niezależnie od siebie, ponieważ nie tworzą serii przekładowej. Przekłady zestawiono ze źródłami (bułgarskim oraz staro-cerkiewno-słowiańskim), co umożliwiło dokładne prześledzenie sposobu pracy tłumaczek z podstawami tłumaczenia. W artykule na wybranych przykładach zostały omówione typy transformacji przekładowych wykorzystane przez tłumaczki, a ponadto przedstawiono charakterystykę dominant obecnych w przekładach. Wskazano także nieliczne błędy, w tym przede wszystkim te, które zmieniają sens tłumaczonego tekstu. W podsumowaniu przedstawiono ogólne wnioski dotyczące pracy tłumaczek oraz perspektywy badawcze obejmujące dalsze badania nad antologiami literatury dawnej jako przekładami oraz nad warsztatem tłumaczy tej literatury.

This paper provides a survey of Italian critical studies on Russian Symbolism and its reception in Italy over the last thirty years (1994-2022). The paper reconstructs the evolution of this tradition through the analysis of three main streams: 1. works on literary theory and philosophy 2. the study of the ‘Italian’ text on the basis mainly of archival documents and biographical texts, and 3. the study, based on comparisons and parallels with other literary movements, of Russian Symbolism as a supracultural and supranational movement. In the final part, the paper proposes an overview of current research perspectives on the topic.

Osualdus de Lasko (OFM Obs, ca. 1450–1511) composed two sermon collections, which were published in print at the end of the fifteenth and the beginning of the sixteenth centuries. However, the readers of his books did not know the name of the author, who was only introduced as “quodam frater hungarus ordinis minorum de observantia”. This paper considers this option for anonymity as a premise for further investigating Osualdus’ identity as an author of sermons and as a preacher, intending to answer questions such as: How is Osualdus presenting or representing himself as an author/preacher? For what reasons and purpose did he compile these sermon collections? How were his homiletic works related to real preaching? Which was his ideal of a preacher? How relevant are the Franciscan affiliation and Hungarian origins for his identity? Grounded on the idea that the author is embedded in his text, this essay explores the prologues of Osualdus’ works and three of his sermons that discuss precisely about preaching’s agents, role, and beneficiaries. The analysis emphasizes that Osvalus’ vision of the ideal preacher and self-representation as author of sermons is shaped by Franciscan concepts of humility, renunciation and imitatio Christi. Anonymity is also presented as a possible sign of humbleness, in the spirit of Franciscan values. Similarly, his understanding of the goal of spreading the Word of God follows the mission of the Friars Minor in general, and their actions in Hungary in particular: fighting heterodox beliefs, converting heretics and schismatic, defending and strengthening faith at the margins of Christendom. Osualdus’ concern for the catechization of simple people might have also been a consequence of the local experience of Franciscans and their contact with the peasantry in their rural convents. The paper concludes that in Osualdus’ case anonymity is not intended to hide or disguise his identity, which is clearly defined around the two elements used as a signature: the Hungarian origins and the Franciscan affiliation. His authority as a preacher and author of sermons resided in his special commission as a member of the Order of Friars Minor and his messages were mainly intended for the local public and for the safeguard of his homeland. The name of the author/preacher was most probably known to his primary audience. Only for the distant readers of his texts the author became anonymous, but they were made aware of the essential components of its identity, representative for the content as well.

The paper discusses F.M. Dostoevsky’s attitude towards the Crimean military campaign (1853–1856) and his understanding of the deep meaning of the armed conflict between Russia and the alliance which included the British, French, and Ottoman Empires, as well as the Kingdom of Sardinia. It is argued that F.M. Dostoevsky may be called a “child of the Crimean campaign,” even though he did not participate in it personally, as he remained, all through those months, first a convict and then an exile. However, it was the Crimean campaign that stimulated him to ponder about Russia’s position in the world and about Russia’s geopolitical interests. The Crimean campaign was also well “remembered” by many characters in F.M. Dostoevsky’s novels. The central theme of the paper is the destiny of the three poems that Dostoevsky wrote during his exile in the town of Semipalatinsk. In those poems, the author pointedly presented his evaluation of the events which formed and defined the basis of his worldview. It is sometimes claimed that the main purpose of writing those poems was just pragmatic, allegedly caused by the plight of the author and his desperate desire to come back to literature at any cost. In this paper, this claim is refuted. Especially emphasized is F.M. Dostoevsky’s later avowal that at the very time of the military confrontation he, even though a convict, wished Russia’s victory and not Russia’s defeat. Next, the paper analyses the utterances about the Crimean war by some like-minded contemporaries of F.M. Dostoevsky (the poets F.M. Tyutchev and A.N. Maykov, the historian N.Ya. Danilevsky) as compared with positions of intellectuals and politicians in Europe. F.M. Dostoevsky rejects the assertion that Russia suffered a humiliating defeat in the Crimean war, an assertion that was firmly rooted in the public consciousness and, for many years, taken almost as a universally recognized truth.

The authors of the paper proceed from the assumption that translation from Arabic into Russian and vice versa will be instrumental in strengthening economic ties of Russia with the Middle East countries and expanding foreign trade of companies in the near future. They substantiate the idea that success of foreign trade activities largely depends on the extent to which differences in the corporate law of Russia and Arab states are taken into consideration. The paper offers a review of differences in the corporate law that affect translation activity and highlights their main reasons related, first and foremost, to different conditions in which legal systems of Russia and the Middle East countries were formed. Using specific examples, the authors consider the main translation problems predetermined by differences in the corporate law of various states as well as in the terminological systems of the corporate law, and offer various means of solving the problems. It is concluded that the main principle of solving problems faced in translation is to transfer the meaning implied by the source text sender.

The paper investigates the morphosyntax of Polish synthetic comparative adjectives and adverbs. It is argued that we can predict the distribution of different classes of adjectival roots and suffixes if we adopt the idea that both types of morphemes lexicalize syntactic constituents, the central tenet of Nanosyntax. The paper makes a case for two central claims. One is that the syn-sem properties of adjectives can be described with a finegrained syntactic sequence proposed for Slovak in Vanden Wyngaerd et al. (2020). The other one is that the lexical properties of Polish gradable adverbs follow from the syntactic representation of the adverb as properly containing the syntactic representation of the adjective.