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Russian, Book 1: Russian Through Propaganda
This is the third edition of the first volume of the Russian Through Propaganda series, now with free video lessons via YouTube. This new series of Russian textbooks provides a rigorous but rewarding approach to the language. It assumes no prior knowledge of Russian, and is intended for ambitious beginners — or for more advanced students seeking a highly structured review of the language. It assumes that its readers are interested in long-term mastery of the language, within the rich historical, cultural, and literary contexts that often draw students to Russian in the first place. It therefore takes the time to explain challenging grammar topics in depth, striving to provide the full picture as clearly as possible. It is richly illustrated with Soviet-era propaganda posters, whose slogans serve as examples of each lesson's grammar. It is structured as a series of 50 daily lessons, which build upon one another and give a clear sense of progress. It is the equivalent of a semester of intensive college-level study of Russian. Visit www.russianthroughpropaganda.com for more information and to access video lessons.
The series continues with Book 2 of "Russian Through Propaganda," and then with Books 3 and 4, entitled "Russian Through Poems and Paintings." Students who complete this course can expect to begin reading Russian classics in the original — including in the "Reading Russian" series of parallel-text Russian readers, which feature such authors as Dostoevsky, Pushkin, Gogol, Tolstoy, and Chekhov.
The series continues with Book 2 of "Russian Through Propaganda," and then with Books 3 and 4, entitled "Russian Through Poems and Paintings." Students who complete this course can expect to begin reading Russian classics in the original — including in the "Reading Russian" series of parallel-text Russian readers, which feature such authors as Dostoevsky, Pushkin, Gogol, Tolstoy, and Chekhov.
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309 pages, Paperback
Published May 29, 2020
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16 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
November 27, 2023
I wasn't planning on writing up a review of Russian Through Propaganda: Book 1 (or even posting it on my Goodreads "read books" list), but maybe someone out there will find this useful, so here it goes.
Some Personal Background
I was once fluent in Russian (former Russian major here), but I hadn't used the language in over a decade before starting this book. I could piece together a few basic sentences but my active knowledge of grammar and vocabulary was next to nil. As I want to use the language for research purposes, my tremendously atrophied reading/listening skills are of peak importance. Speaking and writing are less important, although desired. And for reference, I have taught several languages (including Russian, briefly), so I have some knowledge of textbook pedagogy.
About the Book/Series
This book series is divided into days, with 50 days per book for a total of four books. Each book is the equivalent of one college semester. The first book focuses almost exclusively on grammar. Vocabulary is tossed in but treated as an afterthought. There are no formal vocab lists, dialogues, or stories in the first book, and cultural content is sprinkled throughout by dint of the framing of the series: "through propaganda" is not just a cutesy title - Pettus provides 2-5 works of propaganda per chapter and talks about what they say and the cultural context behind them. This is treated less as a formal lesson and more as just interesting facts to know.
Positives
As someone who has studied roughly 8 languages to varying degrees of fluency, I find the structure of this textbook/series very unique - and actually great for my purposes, as someone who is familiar with Russian. Pettus crams the bulk of Russian grammar into the frontend of the series and then, it appears, spends several books deepening understanding while explicating the super nuanced details of grammar through real literature, art, and history. This is something I've long thought would be an interesting approach for a language series; it's great to see in action. I'm also very pleased with the sheer quantity of exercises - a minimum of 5 per day, covering just about every new grammatical point.
Issues
That being said... there are some issues. I am VERY skeptical that this series would work well for people new to or otherwise unfamiliar with Russian or Slavic languages. There is a LOT of grammar, and Pettus gets quite nuanced. In the first book alone we are introduced to the present/past/future tenses; imperfective and perfective verbs; every case; and verbs of motion (!!!!!), just to name a few. This is a LOT. Like, I don't remember even learning verbs of motion until my second year of Russian the first time around, and by Day 35 of this book I was already meant to use and differentiate between ездить/ехать/поехать.
Frankly, the book just keeps going and going at an overwhelming pace. I was relieved that the pace started to slow down towards the end of the book, when we started to review the grammar in a more comprehensive way - such as throwing all the cases together in one exercise and letting the student answer based on what they've learned. But then, suddenly, we get brand new sentence structures on Day 50. This structure is really not the best, honestly.
My Big Question
Ultimately, I'm left wondering... who is this book/series for? I feel like the audience is limited to the following:
- Autodidacts with extensive language-learning experience.
- People who know other Slavic languages.
- People who want to read Russian literature... and fulfill the above.
- Graduate students who need a language for their language exams and would rather not go for the typical - and far easier - French or German. (I suspect that this overlaps with the above as well.)
In Summary
Honestly, if you want to self-study Russian, you're patient, and you're good with grammar... yeah, this is a great book. Even though I'm wildly confused by the structure and audience and found it challenging, I really enjoyed it. The fact that Pettus provides video lessons for most of the lessons in the series (stopping around Day 150) is fantastic too - it's like you're taking a real class. I'm going to keep using the series. Feel free to send me a message if you see this post in the distant future and are curious about how the rest of the series treated me.
Some Personal Background
I was once fluent in Russian (former Russian major here), but I hadn't used the language in over a decade before starting this book. I could piece together a few basic sentences but my active knowledge of grammar and vocabulary was next to nil. As I want to use the language for research purposes, my tremendously atrophied reading/listening skills are of peak importance. Speaking and writing are less important, although desired. And for reference, I have taught several languages (including Russian, briefly), so I have some knowledge of textbook pedagogy.
About the Book/Series
This book series is divided into days, with 50 days per book for a total of four books. Each book is the equivalent of one college semester. The first book focuses almost exclusively on grammar. Vocabulary is tossed in but treated as an afterthought. There are no formal vocab lists, dialogues, or stories in the first book, and cultural content is sprinkled throughout by dint of the framing of the series: "through propaganda" is not just a cutesy title - Pettus provides 2-5 works of propaganda per chapter and talks about what they say and the cultural context behind them. This is treated less as a formal lesson and more as just interesting facts to know.
Positives
As someone who has studied roughly 8 languages to varying degrees of fluency, I find the structure of this textbook/series very unique - and actually great for my purposes, as someone who is familiar with Russian. Pettus crams the bulk of Russian grammar into the frontend of the series and then, it appears, spends several books deepening understanding while explicating the super nuanced details of grammar through real literature, art, and history. This is something I've long thought would be an interesting approach for a language series; it's great to see in action. I'm also very pleased with the sheer quantity of exercises - a minimum of 5 per day, covering just about every new grammatical point.
Issues
That being said... there are some issues. I am VERY skeptical that this series would work well for people new to or otherwise unfamiliar with Russian or Slavic languages. There is a LOT of grammar, and Pettus gets quite nuanced. In the first book alone we are introduced to the present/past/future tenses; imperfective and perfective verbs; every case; and verbs of motion (!!!!!), just to name a few. This is a LOT. Like, I don't remember even learning verbs of motion until my second year of Russian the first time around, and by Day 35 of this book I was already meant to use and differentiate between ездить/ехать/поехать.
Frankly, the book just keeps going and going at an overwhelming pace. I was relieved that the pace started to slow down towards the end of the book, when we started to review the grammar in a more comprehensive way - such as throwing all the cases together in one exercise and letting the student answer based on what they've learned. But then, suddenly, we get brand new sentence structures on Day 50. This structure is really not the best, honestly.
My Big Question
Ultimately, I'm left wondering... who is this book/series for? I feel like the audience is limited to the following:
- Autodidacts with extensive language-learning experience.
- People who know other Slavic languages.
- People who want to read Russian literature... and fulfill the above.
- Graduate students who need a language for their language exams and would rather not go for the typical - and far easier - French or German. (I suspect that this overlaps with the above as well.)
In Summary
Honestly, if you want to self-study Russian, you're patient, and you're good with grammar... yeah, this is a great book. Even though I'm wildly confused by the structure and audience and found it challenging, I really enjoyed it. The fact that Pettus provides video lessons for most of the lessons in the series (stopping around Day 150) is fantastic too - it's like you're taking a real class. I'm going to keep using the series. Feel free to send me a message if you see this post in the distant future and are curious about how the rest of the series treated me.
October 1, 2023
As a Russian learner, I think this is the most useful textbook, especially because of the availability of excellent Youtube videos accompanying it, presented by the author. I looked at a lot of textbooks and tried to use them, but this is the best. The concept of embedding Soviet posters and Russian history & literature is also very charming.
(My only minor problems were the moments when the author was far more sarcastic towards the posters than I thought it was necessary. As a socialist, I am also very critical to the Soviet experience, yet that does not make me an anti-Soviet, politically. I respect the author's own political position, which by the way wasn't imposed to the listeners anywhere; but just passing...)
To cut it short, an excellent source to learn Russian!
(My only minor problems were the moments when the author was far more sarcastic towards the posters than I thought it was necessary. As a socialist, I am also very critical to the Soviet experience, yet that does not make me an anti-Soviet, politically. I respect the author's own political position, which by the way wasn't imposed to the listeners anywhere; but just passing...)
To cut it short, an excellent source to learn Russian!
December 26, 2024
As a teacher of foreign language I cannot warn anyone against this book enough.
It is an obvious vanity project that focuses more on Pettus showing off his knowledge than actually trying to teach the language.
He continually throws a lot of unnecessary information at the learner (most of the time with an * that reads we will learn this later) leaving them both overwhelmed and confused.
There is a full YouTube series where Pettus very dryly reads straight from the book and then puts the examples on the screen.
I made a helpful critique on one video and Pettus attacked me and told me to stop reading the book and watching the videos.
He then turned off all comments on the videos before I could respond.
Ego has no place in the classroom!
It is an obvious vanity project that focuses more on Pettus showing off his knowledge than actually trying to teach the language.
He continually throws a lot of unnecessary information at the learner (most of the time with an * that reads we will learn this later) leaving them both overwhelmed and confused.
There is a full YouTube series where Pettus very dryly reads straight from the book and then puts the examples on the screen.
I made a helpful critique on one video and Pettus attacked me and told me to stop reading the book and watching the videos.
He then turned off all comments on the videos before I could respond.
Ego has no place in the classroom!
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews