The Pushkin Project - (Evolution, Cognition, and the Arts) by David Bethea (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

"Bethea's book conveys the story of an amazingly ambitious attempt to preserve the humanities while also saving the future of disadvantaged high school students in Chicago. ... Highly recommended." - Library Journal (starred review)

The Pushkin Project tells the story of how a Russian studies professor changes course late in his career by reeducating himself in evolutionary thought and founding a summer institute that partners with inner-city high schools to implement a new set of learning strategies for underserved youth.
These "cognitive cross-training" strategies involve introducing students from Hispanic and Black neighborhoods in the west and south sides of Chicago to the Russian culture and language, with an emphasis on poet, playwright, and novelist Alexander Pushkin. Through the lens of modern evolutionary thought, students adopt not only a new and different language and culture, but also a different sort of literary hero, one whose African heritage within the majority culture speaks to them directly. This inspiring and compelling story provides fascinating insights into Russia's national poet, brings the sciences and humanities together, and provides new directions in teaching young people from historically disadvantaged backgrounds.

Review Quotes

"The Pushkin Project is both an inspiring memoir
of Bethea's work building an educational program for children from
underprivileged communities and a remarkable essay on literature and
evolutionary thought. At the center of it all are Bethea's captivating readings
of Pushkin's classic works, in the form of lesson plans that will be useful to
educators in any high school or university. Written in an engaging manner,
probing deep questions of cultural history and educational philosophy, this is
a book that effortlessly and gracefully appeals to multiple audiences."

- Kevin M. F. Platt, Professor of Comparative Literature and
Russian and East European Studies, The University of Pennsylvania

"A brilliant, multifaceted, and completely original book
about how a distinguished professor of Russian literature decided to retool his
pedagogy in accordance with the latest findings in evolutionary and cognitive
science to teach Russian language and literature to underserved, minority,
inner-city high school students. Bethea's generous goal was to allow them to
have the same powerful, life-altering experience he did when he learned
Russian--a language with which he had been completely unfamiliar--and discovered
that it revealed a new world and 'added a different gear' to his brain. In
light of today's debates about 'cultural appropriation, ' the decade-long
success of Bethea's initiative is especially noteworthy because it demonstrates
the necessity of deep engagement with cultural alterity to achieve optimal
personal growth. Part memoir, part bridge between Snow's 'two cultures, ' part
paean to the enduring genius of Russia's national writer, Alexander Pushkin,
this is an essential book for our times."

-- Vladimir Alexandrov, B. E. Bensinger Professor Emeritus of
Slavic Languages and Literatures, Yale University

"A fascinating account of how, in teaching Pushkin, one
might also teach students to think about citizenship, risk, evolutionary
neuroscience, and language itself. Exemplary readings of major texts are
embedded in this book, which is pedagogical in multiple ways. I envy David Bethea
the chance to have learned so much from students in the Pushkin Project."

-- Stephanie Sandler, Harvard University

"This book is testimony to an astonishing hybrid. On one
side Alexander Pushkin, Russia's foundational poet of genius and an octoroon;
on the other, an American professor and born teacher who devotes a decade of
his life to making Russian culture inspirational for young people from minority
backgrounds. Prompted by creative visions as vast as those of Charles Darwin
and Iain McGilchrist, all the while urging us on with his trademark faith in
'co-evolutionary spirals' that pit literature against despair, David Bethea, in
this very bad time for our Russian brand, has given us a moving memoir of
poetry, sociobiology, civic conscience, and pastoral care."

-- Caryl Emerson, Princeton University

"David Bethea has combined his love of Pushkin and the
Russian language with his knowledge of evolutionary biology and his deep
reading in other areas to devise an educational project unlike any other. The
Pushkin project is unique and is dedicated to helping Black and Brown teenagers
learn about another language, another culture, and

About the Author

David M. Bethea is the Vilas Research Professor (emeritus) at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. His books and articles on Russian literature and Russian thought have been recognized by the Guggenheim Foundation, the NEH, the ACLS, and the New York Times. Bethea founded the Pushkin Summer Institute in 2012 and currently serves as its academic director.