The Second international Summer School "The Topography of Imperial Power: The Political and cultural Space of St. Petersburg"

The school was organized by the Department oif History at HSE in St.Petersburg and was generously supported by the DAAD. The school lasted for three weeks and included a number of courses, presentations, workshops and a cultural programme. The classes were held in both English and German.

The economic, social, political, religious, and cultural developments of the Russian Empire and its capital were the central topic of the school. Participants also discussed the political life and regime of modern Russia and the everyday lives of its citizens.

Classes were held both indoors and outdoors. In one lecture, participants learned about the Orthodox Christianity of Saint Blessed Xenia of St. Petersburg Chapel at the Smolensky cemetery, the city’s oldest graveyard. The St. Petersburg Metro stations, which are striking in their elegance and decorations, were chosen as classrooms for a presentation on Soviet avant-garde architecture. The programme included a tour of Velikij Novgorod (Novgorod the Great), the ancient town where Russian democracy was born ten centuries ago. 

Participants    56 applications

                                35 accepted application

32 participants of the Summer School летней

Overall 54 participants of the Summer School for 2 consecutive years

15 of them completed written works (term papers of essays) and received corresponding ECTS Points

                                3 Master's degree students decided to take research internship at the Department of History, HSE in St.Petersburg

     Representatives of 23 German Universities, 1 applied science university

     20 German Universitites, University of London, University of Vienna

     University of Freiburg (4 students),Humboldt University of Berlin (4 students), Oldenburg University (3 students). 29 students - citizens of Germany с гражданством Германии (3 of them - Russian native speakers), 1 student from China, 1 from Austria, 1 from Serbia

    16 studentts of Bachelor's porgrammes,  16 students of Master's level

    14 students form different study areas of history; there have also been students with such research areas as law, geography, physics, political science. linguistics, cultural studies, social anthropology, architecture, Slavic studies. etc.

    20 recipients of the DAAD scholarships , 12 self-funded participants.

Work Format

а. Russian language course (75 academic hours) in 3 groups according to the level of knowledge

б. Course in HIstory (30 academic hours) in 2 seminar groups, leaded by 7 Associate professors of the Department of History; around 70% - in-door classes, around 30% - outdoor seminars.

в. outdoor lectures, that included trips to Peterhof, Velikij Novgorod, Kronshtadt, Peter and Paul's Fortress.

г. other events (lectures on up-to-date issues of Russian politics, meetings with Russian students etc.)

Lecturers of the Summer School

	Professor Alexander Semyonov PhD (Central European University), Professor, Chair of the History department, Director of the Center for Historical Research, HSE in St.Petersburg, member of the Editorial Board of international scholarly journal “Ab Imperio. Studies of New Imperial History and Nationalism in the Post-Soviet Space”  Research Interests: intellectual history, history of the Russian Empire in the 19th-20th centuries, comparative history of empires, colonialism and nationalism.
	Associate Professor Dietmar Wulff Dr. Dietmar Wulff was appointed through the cooperation between the HSE and the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) to create a long-term associate professorship at the HSE Faculty of History in St. Petersburg.  Dr. Wulff received his PhD in Berlin at the Institute of World History.  Dietmar Wulff has published widely on German-Russian relations in the 19th and 20th century and organizes the annual DAAD HSE Summer School for German students in Saint-Petersburg.
	Associate Professor Nathan Marcus,  Department of History, HSE in St.Petersburg PhD (New York University)  Nathan Marcus is an economic historian with a forth-coming book on Austrian history of the 1920s (HUP 2016). His next project compares the German and Austrian currency reforms that followed upon WWII.
	Professor Zhanna Kormina,  Department of Sociology, HSE in St.Petersburg. PhD in Theory and History of Culture Research areas: Anthropology of religion; religion and secularization; pilgrimage; social memory; post-soviet studies; Orthodox Christianity, Charismatic Christianity.
	Associate Professor Alexandra Bekasova,  Department of History, HSE in St.Petersburg. Senior Research Fellow of the Center for Historical Research,  PhD in National History Research Interests: history of mobility and transportation, environmental history, history of technology, history of science and education in the 18th – 19th centuries.
	Associate Professor Julia Lajus Department of History, HSE in St.Petersburg. Leading Research Fellow at the Center for Historical Research,  PhD in History of Science and Technology, Head of the Programme: “Applied and Interdisciplinary History ‘Usable Pasts’” Research interests: history of biological and Earth sciences in the XX century, history of the Arctic, marine environmental history, environmental history of St. Petersburg.
	Associate Professor Marina Loskutova,  Department of History,  HSE in St.Petersburg. Senior Research Fellow at the Center for Historical Research PhD in History (Central European University) Research Interests: history of science, history of education, environmental history, oral history.
	Senior Lecturer Nikita Balagurov,  Department of History, HSE in St.Peterbsurg Research Interests: Modern history of Russia, Methodology and methods of historical science, theory and methodology of Art, Sociology of Art, Art History