CE5239: Red Star Rising: the Soviet Union,1917-1945

School Continuing and Professional Education
Department Code LEARN
Module Code CE5239
External Subject Code 100766
Number of Credits 10
Level L4
Language of Delivery English
Module Leader Dr Michelle Deininger
Semester Autumn Semester
Academic Year 2020/1

Outline Description of Module

The Russian Revolution of 1917 and the consequent establishment and consolidation of the Soviet Union (USSR) was one of the most significant and momentous developments in the world in the twentieth century. This module examines the circumstances which led to the revolutionary upheavals of 1917, before considering the various factors that shaped the dramatic history of the Soviet Union from its formation through to the end of the Second World War and the onset of the Cold War, by which point the USSR had emerged as a global superpower. Exploring cultural, social and economic history alongside the politics of the Soviet Union, this module encourages students to reflect critically upon the centrality of ideology within Soviet society, particularly with reference to the ‘cult of personality’ established by Stalin. Suitable for those with no previous knowledge of the subject, the module is organised chronologically, drawing out key themes and debates that continue to have a pertinence in the uncertain political circumstances of the twenty-first century. 

On completion of the module a student should be able to

On completion of the module a student will be able to:

 

  • Display knowledge and understanding of the main historical events discussed in the course;
  • Display knowledge and understanding of the key cultural, social, political and economic history of the Soviet Union in this period;
  • Display knowledge and understanding of ongoing historical debates surrounding the establishment and consolidation of the Soviet Union.

 

Intellectual Skills:

 

  • Demonstrate a basic knowledge of the underlying concepts and principles associated with the study of history.
  • Initiate, undertake and articulate a basic analysis of historical information.
  • Develop explanations and support them with evidence.
  • Communicate, in both verbal and written form, the knowledge and understanding acquired on the course, and to be able to distinguish between myth and reality.

 

Discipline Specific (including practical) Skills:

 

  • Identify strengths, weaknesses, problems, and or peculiarities of alternative historical interpretations.
  • Initiate, undertake and articulate a basic analysis of historical information.
  • Deepen understanding of the broad themes and developments considered in the course through the analysis of an historical source or sources.
  • To research, plan and structure history essays and/or projects.
  • To recognise, evaluate and interpret different types of historical evidence.
  • To develop, at a basic level, subject-specific and critically-discerning information literacy skills.

 

How the module will be delivered

This module is taught in 10, two-hour sessions, delivered on a weekly basis.

 

  • Tutor-led sessions: these introduce the basic information to the students, and will form the bulk of provision. Hence there will be basic seminar-style sessions with tutor leading with talk and PowerPoint presentations during the first part of the session as basis for group discussion and questions and answers in the second part. Students will be invited to read up on relevant topics for homework including specific passages.
  • Students will be issued with handouts and a reading list, allowing them to read up on relevant topics, as well as allowing them to develop their own interests and identify the key questions which they need to answer in their assessment project.

 

Skills that will be practised and developed

Skills that will be practised and developed

By the end of the period of learning, the typical student will have:

  • found relevant resources in the library and online;
  • assessed the reliability of different sources of information;
  • demonstrated a critical approach to academic texts.

Transferable/employability Skills:

By the end of the period of learning, the typical student will have shown that s/he can:

  • work effectively as part of a group;
  • present an argument, accurately, succinctly and lucidly, and in written or oral form.
  • time manage and organise study methods and workload;
  • gather, organise and deploy evidence, data and information; and familiarity with appropriate means of identifying, finding, retrieving, sorting and exchanging information

 

How the module will be assessed

Type of assessment    % Contribution Title Duration (if applicable) Approx. date of Assessment

EITHER:

Summary/ Comprehension  50              750 words    Set in Week 3, submit at end of week 5

Essay                                   50               750 word essay  Set in Week 5, submit at end of course

OR:

Formulate Essay Question   10                  Essay question with 100 word justification Set in Week 3, submit at end of week 5

Essay                                     90                  1,500 words           Set in Week 5, submit at end of course

Assessment Breakdown

Type % Title Duration(hrs)
Written Assessment 100 Red Star Rising: The Soviet Union, 1917–1945 N/A

Syllabus content

 

1) Tsarist Russia in the Early Twentieth Century

2) 1917: Year of Revolution

3) War Communism, 1918–21  

4) The New Economic Policy (NEP), 1921–8

5) The Rise of Stalin

6) Cultural Revolution and the First Five-Year Plan, 1928–31

7) Stalinism and Soviet Society

8) Terror, Purges and Show Trials, 1936–8

9) The Great Patriotic War, 1941–5

10) Conclusion: the USSR as a Cold War superpower

Essential Reading and Resource List

Essential Texts

 

Read, Christopher, War and Revolution in Russia, 1914-1922: The Collapse of Tsarism and the Establishment of Soviet Power (Basingstoke, 2012).

Read, Christopher, From Tsar to Soviets. The Russian People and Their Revolution (London, 1996).

Suny, Ronald G., The Soviet Experiment: Russia, the USSR, and the Successor States (New York, 2010).

 

Background Reading and Resource List

Recommended Reading

 

Brovkin, Vladimir, Russia after Lenin: Politics, Culture and Society, 1921-1929 (1998).

Figes, Orlando, A People’s Tragedy: the Russian Revolution, 1891-1924 (London, 1997).

Fitzpatrick, Sheila, Everyday Stalinism. Ordinary Life in Extraordinary Times: Soviet Russia in the 1930s (New York, 1999).

Fitzpatrick, Sheila, The Russian Revolution (Oxford, 2008).

Gill, Graeme, Symbols and Legitimacy in Soviet Politics (Cambridge, 2011).

Hosking, Geoffrey, Russia and the Russians. From Earliest Times to 2001 (London, 2001).

Kenez, Peter, A History of the Soviet Union from the Beginning to the End (Cambridge and New York, 2006).

Priestland, David, Stalinism and the Politics of Mobilization: Ideas, Power, and Terror in Inter-War Russia (Oxford, 2007).

Rabinowitch, Alexander, The Bolsheviks in Power. The First Year of Soviet Rule in Petrograd (Bloomington, 2007).

Read, Christopher, The Making and Breaking of the Soviet System: An Interpretation (Basingstoke, 2001).

Roberts, Geoffrey, Stalin’s Wars. From World War to Cold War, 1939-1953 (New Haven, CN, and London, 2006).

Ryan, James, Lenin’s Terror. The Ideological Origins of Early Soviet State Violence (London and New York, 2012).

Rzhevsky, Nicholas, The Cambridge Companion to Modern Russian Culture, 2nd Edition (Cambridge, 2012).

Shearer, David R., Policing Stalin’s Socialism. Repression and Social Order in the Soviet Union, 1924-1953 (New Haven, CN, and London, 2009).


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