Russian and East European Institute

REE History Faculty
Graduate Curriculum and Course Syllabi
East European PhD Qualifying Exam Guidelines and Field Requirements
East European PhD Reading Lists
Funding and Placement
Campus Academic Resources
Library Holdings

1. Expectations for students taking the oral exam in the East European major field

For the eastern European field, the examination shall consist of three areas of concentration: the first two areas will test the student on his/her ability to teach in the eastern European field; the third area will concentrate on the student’s future dissertation work. The first two areas should consist of nineteenth and twentieth century, and should cover the whole of the whole of the region--that is, both northern and southern tiers of Eastern Europe. The student must demonstrate a thorough teaching knowledge of the political, social, economic, and intellectual/cultural history of eastern Europe between roughly the end of the eighteenth century to the present, plus a command of the principal conceptual approaches. The student should prepare two syllabi, one for the nineteenth century and one for the twentieth (with flexibility given as to when the nineteenth century begins and ends, and when the twentieth century begins and ends). The syllabi should be constructed for undergraduate lecture courses at a university such as Indiana, and should serve as an important element of a teaching portfolio at a later time when the student is preparing to go on the job market. In addition, the student should compile reading lists (of approximately 35-40 books plus articles) for each of the three fields; examiners will provide an initial template of reading lists for the first two exam areas, which can then be expanded and modified through consultation and mutual agreement. These lists will form the basis for the exam.

STUDENTS ARE STRONGLY ENCOURAGED TO BEGIN PREPARING THESE LISTS AS EARLY AS POSSIBLE, IN ANY CASE NOT LATER THAN SIX MONTHS BEFORE THE EXAMINATION.

Since a command of the historiography is required, it is required that students take the H645 Problems in East European Historiography course.

The examination committee will comprise of the student’s adviser and at least one other member of the eastern European field, to be agreed upon by student and adviser. It is the student’s responsibility to contact the faculty and keep them abreast of progress on preparation for the exam, from the compilation of the bibliography to the questions to be asked and the scheduling of the examination.

2. Expectations for students taking the oral exam in the East European minor field

For students with a minor in eastern Europe, the examination will have the format and criteria for formulating questions as stipulated above, with three important changes: (a) the student will only be examined in the first two areas (teaching) described above; (b) the student will have to prepare a syllabus to cover those two areas; and (c) the expectations regarding bibliography will be appropriately reduced.

3. Guidelines for the prospectus

The dissertation prospectus shall consist of a 4,000-5,000 word historiographical essay on the proposed dissertation topic, a preliminary table of contents for the dissertation, a 1,500 word dissertation grant proposal, and a preliminary bibliography, separated into primary and secondary sources. The section on primary sources should include a list of archives and, if possibly, specific archival collections that the student intends to use. This package of documents will form the basis of the second stage of the qualifying exam: the defense of the dissertation proposal.

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