The language courses focus on the development of all four skills (listening, speaking, reading and writing), and emphasize the learning of contemporary Russian communicative norms. We prepare our students for communication with Russians in Russia and in the greater Boston area, which has a large population of Russian-speaking immigrants from the former Soviet Union.The department offers a four-semester sequence of Russian language courses which allows students to reach intermediate level of proficiency. These classes are followed by content courses in the third and fourth years of language study which teach language through various aspects of Russian culture (i.e., Russian through the study of Russian and Soviet films, Russian language and contemporary Russian culture, Russian through the study of Russian literature of the 19th and 20th centuries).