Students learn the Serbian language at Sorbonne, Bordeaux, and Strasbourg
The division of one into several languages that followed the disintegration of Yugoslavia reflected the interest in these languages in the world, and thus it affected the study of the Serbian language, for which there is the greatest interest in the countries where Serbia has strongest cultural, political, economic ties…
There are five official languages in this place in Serbia: Even the documents are issued in those languages
Ilona Sanzel Ponjavic from the Institute for Eastern Languages and Civilizations in Paris, a participant of the 16th International Congress of Slavists, who studied the Serbian language at Sorbonne, and currently teaches Czech at the Institute for Eastern Languages and Civilizations, notes that interest in Slovene languages is greatly changed due to political and economic circumstances.
I studied the Serbian language at the beginning of the 2000s, just after the war in former Yugoslavia and 10 years since the fall of communism, when there was great interest in Slavic languages in the west. A part of Europe opened that did not exist before. There were a lot of students who needed Serbian (Serbo-Croatian) for work. A lot of soldiers went for education, diplomats, and all of that is gone now. All of the students are mostly the descendants of families of Slavic origin or those who want to study something exotic.
She said that division of one to four languages also reflected the interest for those languages in universities in France, they are studying Serbian in Strasbourg, in Bordeaux students can choose between Serbian and Serbo-Croatian, and at Sorbonne between Serbian, Croatian, Bosnian or Montenegrin, which is still not included in the curriculum.
As far as the Serbian language is concerned, there are plenty of students compared to the interest in other Slovenian languages, which Ponjavic also ties with the number of Serbian diaspora in France, especially in Paris.
Serbian in Paris can be studied as a separate subject at Sorbonne and the Institute for Eastern Languages and Civilizations, and as an electorate in Bordeaux and Strasbourg, and the possibility of studying Bosnian, Montenegrin, Croatian and Serbian at Sorbonne, that is, Bosnian, Croatian and Serbian at the Institute, is explained that those are four standards or three standard variations of one language system.
– It is a desire for students to master all these variants and to be aware that this is a standardized system, perhaps for political reasons, in four ways. It was a little confusing to me, because I began to study Serbian in Prague, where students of the Serbian language would enroll one year, the second Croatian and in Paris I had to take exams from one year before since I knew nothing from Croatian standard and literature – Ponjavic told Tanjug and she said that she had the greatest interest on Sorbonne for Serbian variant.
Russians love Pavic, Andric, and Nusic
There is a great interest for the Serbian language in Russia according to the words of Ekaterina Jakushkina from the Moscow State University Lomonosov. It can be seen in the fact that many people who enroll in Russian philology chose Serbian as an elective course during the studies and many of them later find employment exactly for the Serbian language.
Her colleague Ala Sesken from the Department of Slavic Studies at the same university, draws attention that Serbian literature is well known in Russia and that there is a long tradition of translating the works of Serbian authors that date back even before Pushkin.
Milorad Pavic contributed mostly to the interest for Serbian literature during the nineties, he was even popular with those who didn’t even know whose writer he is. Andric is liked even by those who are not dealing with the Serbian language, and Nusic is popular as well, Sesken said.
Source: telegraf