Slavic studies

Slavic (American English) or Slavonic (British English) studies, also known as Slavistics, is the academic field of area studies concerned with Slavic peoples, languages, literature, history, and culture. Originally, a Slavist or Slavicist was primarily a linguist or philologist researching Slavistics. Increasingly, historians, social scientists, and other humanists who study Slavic cultures and societies have been included in this rubric.

In North America, Slavic studies is dominated by Russian studies. Ewa Thompson, a professor of Slavic studies at Rice University, described the situation of non-Russian Slavic studies as "invisible and mute".

History

Slavistics emerged in late 18th and early 19th century, simultaneously with Romantic nationalism among various Slavic nations, and ideological attempts to establish a common sense of Slavic community, exemplified by the Pan-Slavist movement. Among the first scholars to use the term was Josef Dobrovský (1753–1829).

The history of Slavic studies can be divided into three periods. Until 1876 the early Slavists concentrated on documentation and printing of monuments of Slavic languages, among them the first texts written in national languages. At this time the majority of Slavic languages received their first modern dictionaries, grammars and compendia. The second period, ending with World War I, featured the rapid development of Slavic philology and linguistics, most notably outside of Slavic countries themselves, in the circle formed around August Schleicher (1821–1868) and around August Leskien (1840–1916) at the University of Leipzig. At this time, Slavonic scholars focused on dialectology.

After World War II there were developed centers of Slavic studies, and much greater expansion into other humanities and social science disciplines in various universities around the world. Indeed, partly due to the political concerns in Western European and the United States about the Cold War. Slavic studies flourished in the years from World War II into the 1990s, though university enrollments in Slavic languages have declined since then.

Subfields

Following the traditional division of Slavs into three subgroups (eastern, southern, western), Slavic studies are also divided into three distinctive subfields:

• East Slavic studies, encompassing the study of East Slavic peoples and their linguistic, literary and other cultural and historical heritages.
  • Belarusian studies, or Belarusistics (Latin: Belarusistica);
  • Russian studies, or Russistics (Latin: Russistica);
  • Rusyn studies, or Rusynistics (Latin: Rusinistica);
  • Ukrainian studies, or Ukrainistics (Latin: Ucrainistica);
• South Slavic studies, encompassing the study of South Slavic peoples and their linguistic, literary and other cultural and historical heritages.
  • Bosniac studies, or Bosniacistics (Latin: Bosniacistica);
  • Bulgarian studies, or Bulgaristics (Latin: Bulgaristica);
  • Croatian studies, or Croatistics (Latin: Croatistica);
  • Macedonian studies, or Macedonistics (Latin: Macedonistica);
  • Montenegrin studies, or Montenegristics (Latin: Montenegristica);
  • Serbian studies, or Serbistics (Latin: Serbistica);
  • Slovene Studies, or Slovenistics (Latin: Slovenistica);
  • Yugoslav studies, or Yugoslavistics (Latin: Iugoslavistica);
• West Slavic studies, encompassing the study of West Slavic peoples and their linguistic, literary and other cultural and historical heritages.
  • Czech studies, or Bohemistics (Latin: Bohemistica);
  • Kashubian studies, or Kashubistics (Latin: Kashubistica);
  • Polish studies, or Polonistics (Latin: Polonistica);
  • Slovak studies, or Slovakistics (Latin: Slovacistica);
  • Sorbian studies, or Sorbistics (Latin: Sorbistica).

Slavic countries and areas of interest

• By country:
  • Belarus: language, literature, culture, history
  • Bosnia and Herzegovina: language, literature, culture, history
  • Bulgaria: language, literature, culture, history
  • Croatia: language, literature, culture, history
  • Czech Republic: language, literature, culture, history
  • North Macedonia: language, literature, culture, history
  • Montenegro: language, literature, culture, history
  • Poland: languages/dialects (Polish, Kashubian, Silesian), literature (Polish, Kashubian), culture, history
  • Russia: language, literature, culture, history
  • Serbia: language, literature, culture, history (national and ethnic)
  • Slovakia: language, literature, culture, history
  • Slovenia: language, literature, culture, history
  • Ukraine: language, literature, culture, history
  • Other languages: Serbo-Croatian, Upper Sorbian, Lower Sorbian, Kashubian, Polabian, Rusyn, Old Church Slavonic

Notable people

Historical

Contemporary

Journals and book series

• Archiv für slavische Philologie
• The Russian Review
• Sarmatian Review
• Slavic and East European Journal, published by the American Association of Teachers of Slavic and East European Languages
• Slavic Review, published by the American Association for the Advancement of Slavic Studies
• Studies in Slavic and General Linguistics
• The Slavonic and East European Review
• Scando-Slavica
• Wiener Slawistischer Almanach

Conferences

• American Association for the Advancement of Slavic Studies
• American Association of Teachers of Slavic and East European Languages
• Formal Approaches to Slavic Linguistics

Institutes and schools

Academic

• Institute for Slavic Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow, Russia
• Jan Stanislav Institute of Slavistics, Slovak Academy of Sciences, Bratislava, Slovakia
• Institute of Slavic Studies, Polish Academy of Sciences, Warsaw, Poland
• Institute of Slavonic Studies, Czech Academy of Sciences, Prague, Czechia

University

• Institute of Western and Southern Slavic Studies, University of Warsaw, Poland
• Institute of Slavonic Philology, Uniwersytet Śląski, Poland
• Institute of Slavonic Studies, Jagiellonian University, Poland
• Institute of Slavic Philology, University of Adam Mickiewicz, Poland
• Institute of Slavic Studies, University of Wroclaw, Poland
• Institute of Slavic Philology, Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań, Poland
• Institute of Slavic Studies Archived 2022-03-22 at the Wayback Machine, Lviv University, Ukraine
• Department of Slavonic Philology, University of Tartu, Estonia
• Department of Slavic philology Archived 2016-05-03 at the Wayback Machine, University of Belgrade, Serbia
• Department of Slavistics, University of Novi Sad, Serbia
• Department of Russian and Slavonic Studies, Trinity College Dublin, Ireland
• UCL School of Slavonic and East European Studies, University College London, United Kingdom
• Department of Russian and Slavonic Studies, University of Nottingham, United Kingdom
• Department of Slavic Languages & Literatures, Chengchi University, Taiwan
• Department of Slavic Languages and Literatures, Yale University, United States
• Institute of Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies, University of California at Berkeley, United States
• Department of Slavic Languages & Literatures, Harvard University, United States
• Department of Slavic Languages and Literatures, Stanford University, United States
• Slavic Department, Barnard College, United States
• Department of Slavic Languages and Literatures, University of Princeton, United States
• Department of Slavic Studies, Brown University, United States
• Department of Slavic Languages, Columbia University, United States
• Department of German, Nordic, and Slavic+, University of Wisconsin–Madison, United States
• Department of Slavic Languages and Literatures, Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences, United States
• Department of Slavic Languages & Literatures, University of Washington, United States
• Department of Slavic Languages & Literatures, University of Virginia, United States
• Department of Slavic Languages & Literatures, University of Pittsburgh, United States
• Department of Russian and Slavic Studies, University of Arizona, United States
• Department of Slavic and Eurasian Studies, University of Texas at Austin, United States
• Department of Slavic Languages and Literatures, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, United States
• Department of Slavic and Eurasian Studies, Duke University, United States
• Department of Slavic Languages, Georgetown University, United States
• Department of Slavic Languages and Literatures, University of Southern California, United States
• Department of Slavic Languages & Literatures, University of Toronto, Canada
• Department of Germanic and Slavic Studies, University of Victoria, Canada
• Department of Germanic and Slavic Studies, University of Waterloo, Canada
• Department of Slavic Studies(Le département d’études slaves), Universite Paris 8, France
• Institute for Slavistics, University of Vienna, Austria
• Institute for Slavistics, University of Graz, Austria
• Department of Slavic Studies, University of Salzburg, Austria
• Department of Slavonic and Finno-Ugrian Studies, University of Delhi, India
• Department of Slavic Studies, Comenius University, Slovakia
• Department of Russian Language and Literature & Slavic Studies, University of Athens, Greece
• Department of Slavistics, University of Ljubljana, Slovenia
• Department of Slavic Languages and Literatures, University of Maribor, Slovenia
• Department of Slavonic Studies, University of Olomouc, Czechia
• Department of Slavonic Studies, Masaryk University, Czechia
• Department of Slavonic Studies, University of Ostrava, Czechia
• Department of Slavic Studies, Plovdiv University "Paisii Hilendarski", Bulgaria
• Department of Slavic Studies, Sofia University, Bulgaria
• Institute of Slavic Studies, Heidelberg University, Germany
• Institute of Slavic Studies, Justus-Liebig Universität Gießen, Germany
• Institute of Slavic Studies, University of Kiel, Germany
• Institute of Slavic Studies, University of Mainz, Germany
• Institute of Slavic Studies, University of Regensburg, Germany
• Institute of Slavic Studies, Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität Münster, Germany
• Institute of Slavic Studies, University of Hamburg, Germany
• Institute of Slavic Studies, Greifswald University, Germany
• Institute of Slavic Studies, Otto-Friedrich-Universität Bamberg, Germany
• Institute of Slavistics, Technische Universität Dresden, Germany
• Institute of Slavistics, University of Potsdam, Germany
• Institute for Slavic Studies, Humboldt University, Germany
• Institute of Slavic Languages and Literatures, Ludwig-Maximilians University Munich, Germany
• Institute of Slavic Studies, University of Oldenburg, Germany
• Department of Slavic Languages and Literatures, Ankara, Turkey
• Institute of Slavic Studies, Tbilisi State University, Georgia
• Department of Russian and Slavic Philology(Departamentul de Filologie Rusă şi Slavă), Romania
• Department of Russian and Slavic Studies, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel
• Institute of Slavic Studies, University of Pécs, Hungary
• Institute of Slavonic and Baltic Philology, Eötvös Loránd University, Hungary
• Institute of Slavic Philology, University of Szeged, Hungary
• Resource Center for Medieval Slavic Studies, Ohio State University, United States
• Slavic Department, University of Chicago, United States
• Núcleo de Estudos em Eslavística, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
• Núcleo de Estudos Eslavos, Universidade Estadual do Centro-Oeste, Brazil

Others

• Old Church Slavonic Institute, Zagreb, Croatia
• Ghent Centre for Slavic and East European Studies, Ghent, Belgium

Organisations

• American Association of Teachers of Slavic and East European Languages (AATSEEL)
• Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies (ASEEES)
• American Council of Teachers of Russian (ACTR)

See also

• Balkan studies
• Indo-European studies
• Byzantine studies
• List of linguists
• Outline of Slavic history and culture

References

Sources

• Greenberg, Robert D. (2004). Language and Identity in the Balkans: Serbo-Croatian and its Disintegration. New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-151455-5.

External links

• Canadian Association of Slavists (in English and French)
• List of Journals in Russian, Eurasian, and East European Studies at Slavic Review Archived 2009-02-26 at the Wayback Machine
• Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies (ASEEES)
• Slavistik-Portal The Slavistics Portal (Germany)
• André, Mazon (November 1946). "Slavonic studies in France". The Slavonic and East European Review. 25 (64).
• Maslenikov, Oleg A. (April 1947). "Slavic studies in America, 1939–1946". The Slavonic and East European Review. 25 (65).
• Association of Slavists POLYSLAV
• Slavic Linguistics Society

Library guides

• Slavonic and East European studies: a guide to resources (British Library) Archived 2015-11-14 at the Wayback Machine
• "Russian & East European Studies Research Guides". New York, USA: Columbia University Libraries. Archived from the original on 2017-06-21. Retrieved 2013-11-18.
• Slavic Studies Guide (Duke) Archived 2008-05-16 at the Wayback Machine
• Slavic Studies: A Research Guide (Harvard) Archived 2017-02-22 at the Wayback Machine
• Slavic and East European Resources (University of Illinois)
• "Slavic and East European Studies". Resources by Subject. USA: Indiana University Bloomington Libraries. Archived from the original on 2014-06-04. Retrieved 2014-04-23.
• University Library. "German, Russian and Slavonic Studies". UK: University of Leeds.
• Slavic Studies Guide (NYU) Archived 2009-03-14 at the Wayback Machine
• "Slavonic, Central and Eastern European Studies". Oxford LibGuides. Oxford, UK: University of Oxford, Bodleian Libraries. Archived from the original on 2015-10-04. Retrieved 2013-11-18.
• "Slavic/East European/Eurasian Studies Research Guides". Princeton LibGuides. USA: Princeton University Library.
• University Libraries. "German, Slavic, & East European Languages & Literatures". Research Guides. New Jersey, USA: Rutgers University.
• Guides to Resources. University College London, School of Slavonic & East European Studies
• Slavic & East European Collections (Yale) Archived 2006-12-09 at the Wayback Machine