Jahrbücher für Geschichte Osteuropas

Im Auftrag des Instituts für Ost- und Südosteuropaforschung Regensburg
herausgegeben von Martin Schulze Wessel und Dietmar Neutatz

Ausgabe: 63 (2015), 3, S. 455-456

Verfasst von: Curtis Richardson

 

E. A. Višlenkova / R. Ch. Galiullina / K. A. Ilina: Russkie professora. Universitetskaja korporativnost ili professionalnaja solidarnost. Moskva: NLO, 2012. 649 S. = Istorija nauki. ISBN: 978-5-86793-945-8.

Contents:

http://bvbr.bib-bvb.de:8991/exlibris/aleph/a21_1/apache_media/XB4DNYIPVYP37E67N9L34T8A67PX5X.pdf

 

The early to middle nineteenth century was a critical era in the history of both the Russian Empire and its universities. These were formative years in the growth of Russias bureaucratic state and the opening of post-secondary educational opportunities to staff that bureaucracy in order to expand autocratic power. In the process of educating Russias bureaucrats, the tsarist administration also unintentionally fostered the birth of Russias intelligentsia. The discussions of these processes have occupied scholars for many years. This collaborative monograph is another effort to understand this process, albeit focused specifically on the changing nature of the universities, their faculties and staffs, and the mission of the faculty. The writers attempt to analyze the development of a corporate solidarity among the faculty and the creation of an identity as Russian professors.

This book is the product of a collaborative project from 2008–2010, in which the authors posed a series of questions about the changing nature of Russias universities in the first half of the nineteenth century. The primary question they asked wasWhere is the university, there and in Europe: the transfer and adaptation of the university idea in the Russian Empire of the second half of the eighteenth century through the first half of the nineteenth century?(p. 9) In order to facilitate the analysis of this overarching question, they worked in Russian archives in order to publish primary sources germane to their question in addition to composing a research narrative based on the smaller questions and what they gleaned from the repositories. They additionally sought to publish the primary sources in order to deconstruct these texts and offer their audience not only their interpretations, but to present the readers the opportunity to read the documents for their own analysis of the sources. They conducted their research in the archives of the universities of Moscow, Kazan, and Kharkov, in addition to working in the archives of the Ministry of Public Enlightenment.

The primary goal of the authors was to address a number of questions relating to the changing nature of university faculty from the early nineteenth century to the middle of the century. They posed several questions in the introduction about what they wanted to discern. The first and most important question was why did university intellectuals develop their renowned political opposition to the authorities, when, at the beginning of the century, they worked as bureaucrats without opposition to the state? The authors additionally asked if it is accurate to consider, when comparing the faculty of the early nineteenth century, who suffered from internal conflicts, to their counterparts in the middle of the century, who enjoyed a much greater community, a cultural-psychological precipice?

The authors intentionally set themselves the task of approaching their analyses differently from what they perceived was the typical methodology of Russian social sciences, that is the assumption that the history of Russian universities and their staffs in these years was depersonalized and static. Instead, they decided to address this question by seeking to explain and understand how groups, despite their diversity in age, lifestyles, etc., maintained unity.

The authors believe that the professorial corps only developed a strong corporate sense by the reign of Nicholas I. Previously under Alexander I, the creator of Russias university system, they served largely as state bureaucrats more than as educators. They additionally preferred to minimize their involvement in studentslives, leaving such activities to the appointed officials, such as inspectors and sub-inspectors. The authors divide the developments of the main ethos of Russias universities as: a focus on scholarship and gentility in the 1810s and 1820s, a focus on devotion to the fatherland and science in the 1830s and 1840s, and finally supporters of the people and focusing on serving the people, not the state, in the 1850s. This first part of the book is useful for synthesis of the existing scholarship; it lays out clearly the changes of the 1830s and 1840s that facilitated a greater professionalization of the professoriate, closer connections with their students, and the increasing efforts at self-regulation as the professors gained confidence in their great knowledge and experience. The monograph here offers little new in interpretation.

The second part of the monograph is prefaced with a brief introductory essay on the history of the amassment of the universitiesarchival sources and consists, in the main part, of a lengthy collection of archival documents (more than 300 pages). Particularly useful for scholars of early to mid-nineteenth-century Russian universities are these voluminous printed archival materials that dominate the second part of the book. They represent a wealth of information to offer a more nuanced understanding of the dynamics of change and continuity in Russian universities. They additionally offer critical insight into the differences between Russias universities, especially the divide between the capitalsuniversities and the provincial universities.

In sum, this monograph is a welcome addition to the literature on Russian universities in the nineteenth century in addition to a useful study of the changing role of the bureaucracy in Nicholas Is Russia. It is particularly valuable as a resource for scholars of Russian universities in large part because of the excellent, extensive bibliography, replete with published sources in English, German, and Russian.

Curtis Richardson, Maryville, MO

Zitierweise: Curtis Richardson über: E. A. Višlenkova / R. Ch. Galiullina / K. A. Il’ina: Russkie professora. Universitetskaja korporativnost’ ili professional’naja solidarnost’. Moskva: NLO, 2012. 649 S. = Istorija nauki. ISBN: 978-5-86793-945-8, http://www.dokumente.ios-regensburg.de/JGO/Rez/Richardson_Vislenkova_Russkie_professora.html (Datum des Seitenbesuchs)

© 2015 by Institut für Ost- und Südosteuropaforschung Regensburg and Curtis Richardson. All rights reserved. This work may be copied and redistributed for non-commercial educational purposes, if permission is granted by the author and usage right holders. For permission please contact jahrbuecher@ios-regensburg.de

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