European Foundation for Slavic Script and Culture

On October 23-25, 2019 in Bratislava, the VIII International Forum of Russianists of Central and Eastern Europe “Bratislava Meetings - 2019” completed its work.

A plenary meeting was held in the conference room of the Austria Trend Hotel Bratislava, at which the organizers welcomed participants from 13 countries - Austria, Great Britain, Belarus, Bulgaria, Hungary, Germany, Kazakhstan, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Russia, Slovakia and Uzbekistan. The meeting was opened with a folklore duet by a Slovak folk songs.

The forum was organized by the Association of Russianists of Slovakia (ARS), the Russian World Foundation, the Embassy of the Russian Federation in the Slovak Republic, the Russian Center of Science and Culture and the Russian Center of the European Foundation for Slavic Literature and Culture.

This year, the forum’s current motto was chosen - “Language through culture - culture through language. The formula of foreign language education in the XXI century. " The best specialists in the field of teaching Russian as a foreign language and many outstanding personalities came to the forum. A special pride of the organizers was the participation of 30 school teachers of the Russian language, who came from different cities of Slovakia.

There were vivid discussions and speeches at the round tables. Russian scholars discussed new approaches to foreign language education, the role of textbooks and topical issues of digitalization. The speakers concerned both school and university Russian studies.

At the evening reception at the embassy the Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary Ambassador of the Russian Federation in the Slovak Republic - Alexey Fedotov greeted  all participants of the forum. Also, opera singers who performed works of Russian classics performed for the guests of the forum.

The forum participants noted that the “Bratislava meetings” became not only a platform for professional communication, but also a great opportunity to establish contacts with colleagues from other countries.

Slovak teacher Maria Matushkova wrote: "The event was held in the spirit of the search for a more effective methodology in teaching the Russian language ... The results showed the seriousness of improving the methodology and the importance of the role of the teacher."

At the closing plenary session professor of the Saratov National Research State University named after N. G. Chernyshevsky - V.V. Prozorov said: “The Bratislava meetings have become a unique and universal speech and non-verbal genre of professional linguistic, cultural, pedagogical, art history, philological communication. The Russian language in the modern world has been and remains a reliable way of communication, bringing our countries and peoples together.”