The Department of Slavonic Studies very much welcomes MPhil candidates. Three one-year MPhil programmes are offered in the Faculty of Modern and Medieval Languages:

• The MPhil in Theoretical and Applied Linguistics
• The MPhil in Film and Screen Studies
• The MPhil in European, Latin American and Comparative Literature and Cultures (ELAC).

The Department of Slavonic Studies offers an exciting curricular pathway in Slavonic Studies within the framework of the MPhil in European, Latin American and Comparative Literature and Cultures at the University of Cambridge. This interdisciplinary degree offers advanced training for students with a deep interest in the literatures and cultures of Poland, Russia and/or Ukraine as well as a solid foundation for future doctoral study.

Pathway structure

Core Course (Michaelmas Term)

Students will attend the Core Course lectures and mini-seminars offered within the ELAC MPhil programme. In most years at least one of the mini-seminars offered in conjunction with the Core Course will address topics and/or materials with particular relevance to Russia and/or Eastern Europe (i.e. Bakhtin, Formalism, Post-Socialist Identities, Semiotics). This mini-seminar will be open to all MPhil students, but it is particularly recommended for students following the REES pathway, who are also encouraged to write their core course essay on a topic related to Russian and/or East European Studies.  

Modules (Lent Term)

Students will select two modules, of which at least one should be drawn from those offered on Russian and/or East European topics. Students may also choose to write on REES-related topics for many of the Interdisciplinary modules. Please see here for information on ELAC modules.  REES-themed modules are indicated under the 'Slavonic' heading.

The list of REES-themed modules will vary from year to year; there will usually be at least two on offer. Other topics that may be addressed in REES modules, depending on availability, include (but are not limited to):

• Russian and Soviet Cinema

• Nineteenth-Century Russian Literature and Culture

• Madness in Russian Culture

Questions about the availability of a particular REES module or supervisor in any given year should be addressed to the pathway coordinator.  The Slavonic Studies Section reserves the right to cancel the Core Course mini-seminar and/or any module if fewer than three students are enrolled.

The REES pathway through the MPhil in European and Comparative Literatures and Cultures is entirely optional: it is a recommendation and not a prerequisite for applications for doctoral study. Some students may only realize that they wish to pursue a Phd in Slavonic Studies in the middle of their MPhil course; others may wish to pursue the pathway in Medieval and Early Modern Studies, for instance,and then concentrate in their PhD on Slavonic texts.  These students should not feel that their choices in the MPhil will be a disadvantage when they apply to PhD programmes. Each student will have an individual intellectual rationale for his or her course of study.

Students with questions about the REES pathway are encouraged to contact the pathway coordinator Prof Emma Widdis