From May 14-21, Adjunct Professor Natalia Khomenko of York University, Canada, gave a lecture on medieval culture at the Faculty of Philology of Saint Tikhon’s Orthodox University of Humanities, aimed at students of Germanic and Romance languages.
Prof. Khomenko’s first lecture was on medieval Arthurian literature and the figure of the knight Gawain in various works.
During the second lecture, she examined the functions of quotations from Shakespeare’s plays The Merchant of Venice, Romeo and Juliet, Henry VI, The Tempest, and King Lear in the problem field and structure of the film The Shouters and the series The World of the Wild West. In Natalia Khomenko’s opinion, apart from the philosophical dimension, both cinematic works actualize historical and political issues, and “high” culture, as marked out by the quotes from Shakespeare, becomes part of the political allegory: the fear of globalization and of encountering the cultural Other, or the phantasy of an idyllic national past.
The lecture was followed by a lively discussion and was attended by members of staff and both undergraduates and Master’s students from the Faculty of Philology.