In this course, students will develop skills in the command and use of grammatical categories in Russian through an understanding of the relevant conceptual categories, e.g. the cases, aspect, mood, connective words through explanations of the semantic meanings of these categories. Students will acquire conscious knowledge of the meanings of the grammatical forms applied to discourse, i.e. to specific verbal situations, based not only on the underlying linguistic phenomena, but rather on the content of lingua-cultural situations. Students will be given three written exams; they will prepare oral and written assignments, three essays and presentations based on the texts.

Required texts: Laskareva, E.R. Chistaia grammatika. St. Petersburg: Zlatoust, 2008. Koprov, V.Yu. Variantnye formy v russkom iazyke. Moscow: Russkii iazyk, 2006. ISBN: 5-88337-098-5