- Local SEELRC Resources
- Russian Language Fonts
- Language Materials
- Online Dictionaries
- Online Media and News
- Online Videos - Language, Music and Culture
- History and Culture
- Government and Politics
- Country Studies
- Country Analyses
- Travel Guides
- Professional Organizations and Library Consortia
- Universities, Centers of Study, Volunteer/Exchange Programs
Local SEELRC Resources
(These entries are also included later in the Language Resources section.)
Russian Reference Grammar The Russian Reference Grammar, by Edna Andrews, Duke University, is part of a set of SEELRC reference grammars designed for advanced-level language users and linguists to compare semantic categories across languages. Completed are comparative grammars in BCS, Czech, Macedonian, Polish, Romanian, and Russian. Others are under development.
Russian Grammatical Dictionary The Grammatical Dictionaries project is a set of comprehensive reference works for Slavic and East European languages. The SEELRC Grammatical Dictionaries are unique in that they provide full word paradigms, native pronunciation, and semantic linkage in a user-friendly, web-accessible format.
Language and Culture through Film Language and Culture Through Film is an interactive, multimedia course/course companion for advanced level users of Slavic and East European languages.
Russian Language Fonts
Yahoo Font Archive Because sites come and go on the Internet, a good resource for language fonts may be this Yahoo! Search "find it yourself" link.
Google.com Search - Preset for Russian The Google search engine has been preset for you to search the Internet using the Russian language. Also ideal for target language lexical and contextual searches and other language-oriented uses. Requires Russian fonts. (Also included in Language Materials links below.)
Search Engine Colossus - Russia Links to primary Russian and English language search engines and gateways. Truly colossal!
REESWeb - Search Russia Do a "search keyword" for "Russia" in the University of Pittsburgh's Center for Russian and East European Studies website database. Strong in links throughout Eastern and Central Europe as well as with the NIS.
British Library: Slavonic and East European Collections - Russian Internet Resources Finest Internet resource site for Slavonic studies in the UK. Many links to Russian resources. There are also links to the British Library's collections in other Slavonic languages from Belarusian to Ukrainian, as well as links to the Library's collections in non- Slavonic former Soviet republics and Communist Eastern European countries.
DMOZ Open Directory - Russia Useful resources page, includes links to Interactive Portals, Music and Art, Country/Regions, etc.
Best Russian Websites Webpage maintained by Professor Jim Becker, University of Northern Iowa.
Wikipedia - Russian Language Very rich and deep encyclopedia entry.
Beginning to Intermediate
Russian Writing System Basic introduction to Russian alphabet with addition information and language related links.
Robert Beard's Russian - An Interactive Online Reference Grammar Solid basic grammar, from Cyrillic Alphabet and Rules of Pronunciation to Verbal Word Formation.
NCLRC The Week's News in Simplified Broadcasts "The Week's News in Simplified Broadcasts" delivers a survey of the previous week's news in simplified standard Russian. Listeners of Voice of America's "Special English" broadcasts will recognize the slightly slower rate of speech and textual redundancy which characterize these webcasts. With exercises and scripts.
George Mitrevski's Homepage Includes: Learn to Read Russian: The Russian Alphabet with audio; Russian with NACHALO Syllabi and exercises for introductory level course based on the textbook Nachalo, Book 1; and Russian Web Tutor.
Intermediate to Advanced
Rockin' Russian An intermediate to advanced language course that uses Russian music videos to teach language, culture and a lot more. From the University of Texas.
Russian Language Mentor Site includes interactive courses for Developing Language Proficiency in Reading and Listening, a Russian cultural literacy course (in English), Intermediate Grammar Exercises, a massive Russian Listening/Reading Library, Virtual Slavic Club, Country Study ePortfolio template, and a lot more.
SEELRC Russian Reference Grammar The Russian Comparative Grammar, by Edna Andrews, Duke University, is part of a set of SEELRC Reference Grammar Network designed for advanced-level language users and linguists to compare semantic categories across languages. Completed are comparative grammars in BCS, Czech, Macedonian, Polish, Romanian, and Russian. Others are under development.
Russian Interactive Pages Video/audio-based reading/listening comprehension course consisting of 10 chapters produced at University of Pennsylvania. A lot of material!
Russian Language Learning Website This is the product of a joint project between two British institutions, the University of Sussex and the London School of Economics and Political Science. Based on short prose works by Pushkin, Gogol and Tolstoy and a poem by Blok, this intermediate level course includes the Russian text, a Russian/English parallel text, an audio reading of a stressed version of the text, and related comprehension, vocabulary and grammar exercises. Included as well are related scholarly articles written in English and video interviews and discussions of materials with native speakers.
Google.com Search - Preset for Russian The Google search engine has been preset for you to search the Internet using the Russian language. Also ideal for target language lexical and contextual searches and other language-oriented uses. Requires Russian fonts.
Gramota.ru This is one of the most extensive and helpful Russian language sites on the Internet. Links include Online Dictionaries, Reference Works, Online Classes, and the list goes on and on. Well worth exploring - something that can take days! (Also included in Online Dictionaries links below.)
Encyclopedia "Krugosvet" This Russian language encyclopedia is excellent and a wonderful tool for developing your language skills. Enter most any topic and you get a nice article written in perfect Russian.
Slovari/Sluzhba Russkogo Yazyka Another outstanding Russian language site hosted by the V.V. Vinogradov Russian Language Institute, Russian Academy of Sciences. Links to almost every available online dictionary. Also provides online assistance to grammar questions. Registration required for some resources. Take a serious look!! (Also included in Online Dictionaries links below.)
Philology.ru A Russian language portal dedicated to presenting theoretical and practical philological materials on the Internet. The focal point of the portal is the library of philological texts which includes articles and monographs.
Kulichinskaya Enciklopediya An unusual "encyclopedia" that includes both serious and esoteric links and articles, many back into the nooks and crannies of Kulichki.net itself.
Multitran - RussianEnglish Online Dictionary Simply the best online dictionary available.
Russian Abbreviations/Acronyms Online Dictionary From Sokr.ru, This Russian website advertises itself as the "largest Russian abbreviations dictionary in the world" and, with regular updates to its 100,000+ entries, it most definitely deserves this claim.
Google Translate Enter text or a webpage URL and get machine translation both RussianEnglish. A version of the EnglishRussian dictionary is very solid. There is also a Russian dictionary available.
Google Translated Search How does this work? 1. Search for St. Petersburg Restaurants in English. 2. We translate your query into Russian and find Russian web page results. 3. Finally, we translate the Russian web page results back into English for you.
YourDictionary.com - Russian Extensive list of online dictionaries, both general and specialized.
Gramota.ru This is one of the most extensive and helpful Russian language sites on the Internet. Links include Online Dictionaries, Reference Works, Online Classes, and the list goes on and on. Well worth exploring - something that can take days!
Slovari/Sluzhba Russkogo Yazyka Another outstanding Russian language site hosted by the V.V. Vinogradov Russian Language Institute, Russian Academy of Sciences. Links to almost every available online dictionary. Also provides online assistance to grammar questions. Registration required for some resources. Take a serious look!
Vesna - Belarusian, Ukrainian, Polish, Russian, English Dictionary This online dictionary can be used in any of the above languages and will translate between the same languages.
Online Media and News
OnlineNewspapers.com - Russia Great collection of online newspapers in Russian and English.
Russian Alliance Produced by RTV-1 in New York, daily segments from America, Russia and Israel.
Channel One Russia Official state television site. Provides video, audio and the corresponding text. To use this site users need to have downloaded Windows Media Player 2.
History of Russia: Primary Documents Part of EuroDocs project of online sources for European History at Brigham Young University.
The Face of Russia This PBS series website based on James Billington's book of the same title contains an interactive timeline of Russian history and culture, references, and forums, as well as schedules for the series.
The Meeting of Frontiers From the Library of Congress. About the Project: "Meeting of Frontiers is a bilingual, multimedia English-Russian digital library that tells the story of the American exploration and settlement of the West, the parallel exploration and settlement of Siberia and the Russian Far East, and the meeting of the Russian-American frontier in Alaska and the Pacific Northwest. It is intended for use in US and Russian schools and libraries and by the general public in both countries. Scholars, particularly those who do not have ready access to major research libraries, also will benefit from the mass of primary material included in Meeting of Frontiers, much of which has never been published or is extremely rare."
Beyond the Pale - History of Jews in Russia Hosted by the Friends-Partners website: "This exhibition depicts the history of anti-Jewish attitudes -- and of anti-Semitism today, a form of intolerance that in our century caused the death of millions of people. The exhibition also portrays the history of Jews in Europe and in Russia to help understand their life, religion and culture. But above all, the exhibition wants to warn of the great dangers of prejudice and intolerance, particularly in times of political uncertainty and increased social tension."
The Empire that was Russia: The Prokudin-Gorskii Photographic Record Recreated Another site from the Library of Congress. From About: "The photographs of Sergei Mikhailovich Prokudin-Gorskii (1863-1944) offer a vivid portrait of a lost world--the Russian Empire on the eve of World War I and the coming revolution. His subjects ranged from the medieval churches and monasteries of old Russia, to the railroads and factories of an emerging industrial power, to the daily life and work of Russia's diverse population."
Alexander Palace Time Machine - Everyday Life in a Romanov Palace "The site started out as a virtual tour of the home of the last Tsar and his family, evolving into a databank of information on the last years of Imperial Russia. Here you can browse from a wide range of options - from rare online books, to palaces, recipes, antique cars and travelogues."
History House - Rah, Rah, Rasputin No webliography of Russian Imperial History would be complete without at least one link to the life, times and death of Russia's greatest Mad Monk. Link from this article to other History House essays, including "Peter the Great: Peter as Frat-boy," "Catherine and Peter: The Odd Couple," and others.
The Russian Revolution This website is maintained by David Barnsdale in the UK. It is basically a resource site with links to websites dealing with the Russian Revolution.
Early Soviet History A website for those with serious interests in early Soviet history. With complete eTexts of John Reed's Ten Days that Shook the World, Leon Trotsky's History of the Russian Revolution, and other works.
GULAG Site presents a history of the Soviet GULAG prison system through a series of pictures and memoirs.
Memorial "Memorial is a movement which arose in the years of perestroika. Its main task was the awakening and preservation of the societal memory of the severe political persecution in the recent past of the Soviet Union." Available in English and Russian.
Revelations from Russian Archives From the Library of Congress: "Shortly after defeating the attempted coup of August 1991, a group from the victorious democratic resistance led by the chief archivist of Russia, Rudolph Pikhoia, took over the previously top secret archives of the Central Committee of the Communist Party and began the process of both consolidating democratic control over all archives in Russia and attempting to make them available for the first time for public study. This exhibit [is] the first public display of the hitherto highly secret internal record of Soviet Communist rule. The legendary secretiveness and general inaccessibility of the entire Soviet archival system was maintained throughout the Gorbachev era. The willingness of the new Russian Archival Committee under Pikhoya to cooperate in preparing this exhibit with the Library of Congress dramatizes the break that a newly democratic Russia is attempting to make with the entire Soviet past."
Russian Culture - General
Russian Cultural Literacy - An Introduction Part of the Russian Language Mentor website. An interactive course based on 100 questions with Mentor Essay answers and hyperlinks to English and Russian versions of Wikipedia and other sites, covering "Everything you ever wanted to know about Russian geography, history, literature, religion, art and the like!"
Wikipedia - Russian Culture Wikipedia article with focus and supplemental links on Visual Arts, Performing Arts, web sites, Cuisine, and even Humor.
Biblioteka Maksima Moshkova This huge Russian e-library/portal contains links to e-texts of just about everything - from histories, TV guides and cookbooks, to most of the world's classics and pulp fiction.
From the Ends to the Beginning: A Bilingual Anthology of Russian Verse Produced by the Department Slavic Languages and Literatures at Northwestern University, this web anthology includes a selection of 250 works by Russia's leading poets from the 18th century to the present. Included as well are some 75 rare recordings of poetry readings by Akhmatova, Mayakovsky, Mandelshtam, Pasternak, et al.
Early 20th Century Russian Drama Also produced by the Slavic Department at Northwestern: "An overview of the directors, designers, artists and playwrights in Russia who shaped modern drama during the first two decades of the twentieth century. Web site is dedicated to the Russian theater of Stanislavsky and Meyerhold, Chekhov, Mayakovsky and Bulgakov, Malevich and Tatlin, Stravinsky and Shotakovich."
An Overview of Russian Philosophy An essay by Professor Epstein of Emory University. Dr. Epstein also provides links to all important related websites.
Russian Philosophy Forum "An informal group of persons interested in Russian philosophy. Russians, Americans and West Europeans, our group includes both students and scholars. Our purpose is to expand transnational communication, education, research and publication in this field."
Russian Philosophy A historical survey of Russian philosophic thought from 18th century to post-Soviet era.
Wikipedia - List of Russian Philosophers An extensive list hyperlinked to main articles beginning with members of the 18th Century Russian Enlightenment through 20th Century Aestheticians like Mikhail Bakhtin.
Science and Technology
WWW Virtual Guide to the History of Russian and Soviet Science and Technology The webmaster for this site is Slava Gerovich, a Dibner/Sloan postdoctoral researcher at the Dibner Institute for the History of Science and Technology at M.I.T.
Social History of Russian Science In Russian, an electronic archive and library.
Russian Folklore Links This webpage of links is provided by Professor Andrew M. Drozd of the University of Alabama. It has links to folk tales, fairy tales, folk art, Slavic paganism and witch craft, to include vampires and werewolves.
Russian Painting By Professor Alexander Boguslawski of Rollins College, provides illustrated essays on Russian paintings, artists and art movements from the early icons through the 20th century. Beautiful site!
Wikipedia - Russian Music Overview of Russian music with excellent links.
Russian Music Oldies on YouTube Excellent collection of links by a true and very knowledgeable fan.
Association for Women in Slavic Studies "The Association of Women in Slavic Studies is a networking resource for people concerned with the problems, status, and achievements of women in the profession. It also attempts to cover research and teaching in women's studies and questions of gender and family life in Central/Eastern Europe and the Former Soviet Union."
Foreign and International Law - Russia From the Washburn University School of Law Library, links to country sites for Constitutional Law, Government and Politics, Law and Legislation, Legislative Bodies, etc.
Russia - A Country Study Exceptionally detailed presentation from the Library of Congress. Includes sections on: Geography, Society, Economy, Government and Politics, Very Detailed History and Historical Development, Contemporary Trends, etc.
BBC News Country Profiles - Russia Full profiles provide an instant guide to history, politics and economic background of countries; also biographic sketches of leaders, essay on media, and historic timelines. They also include audio and video clips from the BBC archives.
Russia - Wikipedia Excellent encyclopedia entry with many links to sub articles.
U.S. Department of State Background Notes - Russia Background Notes are updated/revised as they are received from regional bureaus and are added to the database of the Department of State web site. Categories include: Geography, People, History, Government, Political Conditions, Economy, Defense, Foreign Relations, U.S. Relations, and Travel/Business.
International Monetary Fund - Russian Federation Latest developments in Peace and Security, Economic Development, Humanitarian Aid/Refugees, Environment/Shelter, Human Rights, Women/Children/Population, Health/Poverty/Food Security, Culture/Education.
The World Trade Organization "The World Trade Organization (WTO) is the only global international organization dealing with the rules of trade between nations. At its heart are the WTO agreements, negotiated and signed by the bulk of the world’s trading nations and ratified in their parliaments. The goal is to help producers of goods and services, exporters, and importers conduct their business." Includes detailed information on Members and Observers - Russia (Observer)
World Health Organization - Russia About WHO" "The World Health Organization, the United Nations specialized agency for health, was established on 7 April 1948. WHO's objective, as set out in its Constitution, is the attainment by all peoples of the highest possible level of health. Health is defined in WHO's Constitution as a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity."
International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies - Russia The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies is the world's largest humanitarian organisation, with 178 member National Societies.
Amnesty International - Russian Federation Amnesty International is a champion defender of human rights worldwide. Familiarity with a given country's human rights issues can provide a unique insight into many other aspects of its culture and politics.
Human Rights Watch - Russia Human Rights Watch is dedicated to protecting the human rights of people around the world.
Lonely Planet Destinations - Russia The people at the offbeat Lonely Planet website are not your typical travel guides -- they're very bright and know what they're talking about. Their goal is not to "sell the country" to travelers. Instead, they tell it how it is. Typical headings include: "Warnings" (in case travel is not recommended - the "why's"); Facts for the Traveler, When to Go, Events, Money and Costs, Attractions, Off the Beaten Track, Activities, History, Culture, Environment, Getting There and Away, Getting Around, and Further Reading and Related Weblinks. Link here directly to LPD guides to Moscow and St. Petersburg.
Yahoo Travel Guide - Russia Includes links to history, basics, transportation, dining, shopping and climate.
Professional Organizations and Library Consortia
American Association for the Advancement of Slavic Studies (AAASS) From About: "The American Association for the Advancement of Slavic Studies (AAASS) is a nonprofit, nonpolitical, scholarly society which is the leading private organization dedicated to the advancement of knowledge about Russia, Central Eurasia, and Eastern and Central Europe."
Canadian Association of Slavists ~ Canadian Slavonic Papers "The Canadian Association of Slavists is an organization of teachers and scholars in the field of Slavic and related studies in Canada for the purpose of improving and advancing such studies."
British Association for Slavonic and East European Studies BASEES, according to its constitution, exists to "advance education for the public benefit in the United Kingdom in the humanities and the social sciences as they relate to the former Soviet Union and the countries of Eastern Europe".
Universities, Centers of Study, Volunteer/Exchange Programs
Russian Institutions and Universities From WWW Virtual Library, Russian History site, an extensive list of institutions and universities.
Russian Colleges and Universities Large list of links to major institutions of higher learning.
EuroEducation.net - Russia Description of Russian education system, K-12 and universities.
International Research and Exchanges Board (IREX) IREX is the premier U.S. nonprofit organization specializing in higher education, independent media, Internet development, and civil society programs in the United States, Europe, Eurasia, the Near East, and Asia.