A Profile of the Undergraduate Russian Major 1958-1968

Abstract

Introduction. The launching of the first Soviet space satellite on 4 October 1957, stimulated an upsurge of interest in studies in the US. The subsequent decade has seen a rapid growth of all aspects of and Slavic teaching and research in America, from high school beginning classes to Ph.D. dissertations.? One interesting manifestation of this growth, which has been less studied than others, is bachelor's degree recipients majoring in or Slavic (henceforth Russian BAs). And from the vantage point of today, a decade after the Sputnik-inspired rise in enrollments and majors began to be felt (in the 1958-1959 academic year), it is instructive to draw up a detailed profile of the undergraduate careers and previous background of BAs during that period at one university. Previous studies of enrollment, degrees, etc., have been mostly of the extensive type, with the advantage of nation-wide coverage, and the disadvantage of incomplete data (failure to identify all concerned institutions, their failure to respond) and non-comparable data (nomenclature and standards varying widely from institution to institution). The present study is an intensive analysis of all the BAs at one institution. Such a microcosm can be examined in greater detail than that currently possible in an extensive study, and may provide guidelines for the compilation of just such an extensive study in the future. The institution analyzed, for reasons of access to complete data and direct contacts with the students, is the University of Illinois.2 Its Department of Slavic Languages and Literatures also has the advantage of being typical-neither the smallest nor the largest, neither the best nor the worst-of those Slavic departments which reached national importance within the last decade. The data of this study represent only Urbana, but may offer some interest for comparison with other Slavic departments, and serve as a clue to general developments in the field. The data will be presented as directly and simply as possible, avoiding sophisticated statistical terminology. For those who might wish to extend the analysis to include other schools, or to make more complex calculations