Аннотация:Almost every language student or university graduate in Russia probably
remembers that apart from other disciplines, to one degree or another, they
completed an academic course of Country/Regional studies, that is usually a
course designed to provide the most general information about the country
(countries) of the language they are learning, its history, geography, and culture.
Traditionally, such a course was taught in Russian (less often in a foreign
language) and was considered as a compulsory supplement to the disciplines of
the linguistic cycle: phonetics, grammar, oral speech practice, etc. It is under the
name of ―Country studies‖ (―stranovedeniye‖) that they are implemented in the
structure of the basic educational programs of most Russian universities that
train specialists with a command of foreign languages. However, it seems that
today it's time to figure out what discipline is at stake, what its status and place
are among other subjects of university curricula, and, ultimately, in terms of the
competence approach that has reigned supreme in the Russian education, what
competencies it is supposed to shape.