{"id":1762,"date":"2018-02-16T10:35:10","date_gmt":"2018-02-16T15:35:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/russian\/?p=1762"},"modified":"2018-04-04T13:36:59","modified_gmt":"2018-04-04T17:36:59","slug":"dana-damenova-19-in-moscow","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/russian\/2018\/02\/16\/dana-damenova-19-in-moscow\/","title":{"rendered":"Dana Damenova \u201919 in Moscow"},"content":{"rendered":"

Dana Damenova \u201819 is a Russian and International Business & Management double major who studied on the Dickinson-in-Moscow program for the fall 2017 semester. Dana\u2019s family emigrated from Kazakhstan when she was five and she grew up speaking Russian at home. During the 2016-2017 academic year, Dana conducted research on the childhood experiences of first-generation Americans born to immigrants from post-Soviet countries. You can learn more about her research project here: <\/em>https:\/\/americantsy.wordpress.com\/<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

Upon returning from her semester abroad in Russia, Dana answered some questions about her experiences in Moscow. <\/em><\/p>\n

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  1. What was your most memorable experience abroad?<\/em><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    After learning about the history of Russia and Moscow for so long, it was surreal to visit all of the historical places throughout the city. I particularly remember feeling excited when we went to see the opera \u201cThe Tsar\u2019s Bride\u201d at the Bolshoi Theatre. I have always heard so much about the theatre, and it was truly amazing to finally see it.<\/p>\n

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    1. What was the biggest challenge for you? <\/em><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

      Since I started formally studying Russian, I often have had to explain that I was a heritage speaker and then justify my choice to study the language. This became more challenging while I was abroad, where I had to do this constantly. In Moscow, I primarily interacted with people face-to-face. Since my speech and comprehension skills are considerably better than my writing and grammar skills (as is the case for many heritage speakers), people often assumed I was completely fluent. While I understand why people were curious, it was sometimes frustrating to explain myself so frequently. Still, I knew that I had made the right decision. Constantly being surrounded by Russian was exactly what I needed to reach the level that I wanted. I would recommend an immersion program to any heritage speaker who wants to improve their Russian.<\/p>\n

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      1. Describe your experiences taking courses in Russian, with Russian students?<\/em><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

        Naturally, courses designed for fluent Russian speakers were more challenging than my other courses. This is especially true for the business course I took at the Higher School of Economics, one of Dickinson\u2019s partner institutions. As I have had very little exposure to Russian business terminology, I was quite intimidated from the start. Once I began to ask for help to understand certain concepts from both the professor and other students, things became significantly easier. In addition, the professor was very understanding after I explained that I was a foreign exchange student with limited Russian.<\/p>\n

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        1. What advice might you give to other students who are either heritage speakers or who have family roots in the post-Soviet world, who may have heard stories (good or bad) about Russia growing up, and who might be hesitant about living and studying in Russia?<\/em><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

          Ultimately, my time in Russia has helped me better understand my parents\u2019 Soviet heritage as well as post-Soviet culture in general. Since the USSR collapsed several years before I was born, I primarily identify with the United States and independent Kazakhstan. Inevitably, both of these cultures heavily influenced my expectations of what Russia would be like. My biggest advice to anybody with a similar background would be to keep an open mind and use this experience to better understand your family history.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

          Dana Damenova \u201819 is a Russian and International Business & Management double major who studied on the Dickinson-in-Moscow program for […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3765,"featured_media":1777,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[85041],"tags":[115630,85042,22768,7048],"class_list":["post-1762","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-abroad-experiences","tag-damenova","tag-dickinson-in-moscow","tag-russia","tag-study-abroad","first-post"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/russian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1762","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/russian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/russian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/russian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3765"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/russian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1762"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/russian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1762\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/russian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1777"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/russian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1762"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/russian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1762"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/russian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1762"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}