This course will focus on the key elements of Russian political discourse (svoboda, demokratiya, tolerantnost’, liberalizm, etc.) and briefly characterize how the Russian understanding of these terms differs from that of analogous or cognate terms in English. We will distinguish elements of political discourse that derive from Soviet propaganda, those that revive the political language of Imperial Russia, and those that were borrowed from Western political discourse. We will analyze Russian political metaphors (society as a building, society as mechanism, society as organism, etc.) and also examples of manipulation techniques that are possible in the Russian language.