What you must do in this unit
- Read the textbook chapter 27.
- Read Ivan Turgenev, Fathers and Sons
- Read some short remarks by Petr Kropotkin about growing up with serfdom.
- Check the remarks by Professor Blois and Professor Evans on the Great Reforms.
- Study the Questions to Consider and the Key Terms for the Unit.
- Submit the Turgenev paper.
What you can do this unit
- Read Professor Hammond's notes on the "Campaign to Assassinate the Tsar" (*.PDF file). The Russian revolutionaries tried for quite some time to assassinate Alexander II before finally succeeding in 1881. The story of the "hunt for the tsar" is actually very fascinating, and here, in Professor Hammond's lecture notes, you can get a brief account of what was involved.
- Read chapter 23 and chapter 24 from Mary Platt Parmele (1843-1911) A Short History of Russia (1907, 4th edition). These are short chapters, and this is optional reading.
Some videos that you can watch for this unit
- Understanding Russia: Emancipation of Russia's Serfs
- For extra credit please suggest to your instructor a relevant video for this unit of the course. Send the title of the video, the URL and a brief explanation of why you find the video interesting and applicable to the material that is being studied in this unit.
Extra Credit Options
- For up to 25 points of extra credit, read Ivan Goncharov (1812-91), Oblomov (1858) and write a one-page paper about why it took Oblomov so long to get out of bed in the morning.
- For up to 25 points of extra credit, read W. Bruce Lincoln, The Great Reforms: Autocracy, Bureaucracy and the Politics of Change in Imperial Russia (1990) and write a one-page paper about why the tsar actually undertook the Great Reforms.
- For up to 25 points of extra credit, read Mikhail Saltykov-Shchedrin (1826-89), History of a Town (1869-70) and write a one-page paper in which you explain why the book was so funny yet so realistic.
- For up to 10 points of extra credit, read the Emancipation Manifesto (also in Russian at schoolart.narod.ru/1861.html) and write a paragraph that answers the question, What was the underlying political rationale for the Emancipation?
- For up to 5 points of extra credit, submit the answers to the Turgenev study questions.
Unit Learning Objectives
- Upon successful completion of this unit, you will be able to (1) identify the Great Reforms and (2) explain their importance in transforming Russian society in the 1860s and (3) analyze a historical primary source.