About the Institute
It is the oldest centre of Ukrainian studies in Poland, continuing the tradition of earlier, pre-war Ukrainian scholars, such as Prof Ivan Ohijenko – theologian, linguist and cultural historian, Prof Roman Smal-Stocki – linguist, diplomat and politician, and Prof Myron Korduba – historian. The Chair of Ukrainian Studies was established by Prof. Przemysław Zwoliński, a graduate of the Jan Kazimierz University in Lviv and an eminent Polish linguist who dealt with issues of onomastics, word formation and the history of Slavic languages. The professor headed the department for many years in cooperation with, among others, Dr Tatiana Hołyńska and Professor Florian Nieuważny – its later head, a literary scholar, translator and populariser of Ukrainian literature in Poland.
The history of Ukrainian Studies was created by many scientists. It is impossible to mention them all. One person who contributed a great deal both in terms of the scientific condition and functioning of the Chair, as well as human values, was Prof. Marian Jurkowski – an eminent Ukrainianist, a linguist with an extremely broad profile of interests, which is implied by the title of one of his works: From the Tower of Babel to the language of aliens. The professor conducted research in historical linguistics and onomastics, terminology, borderland Polish and teaching Polish as a foreign language. He eagerly devoted himself to popularisation and translation activities.
Recognition for contribution to the development of Ukrainian Studies in Warsaw is due to Professor Stefan Kozak, its long-time head, for whom Ukrainian literature, the history of the Orthodox Church in Ukraine, and the development of national consciousness and Polish-Ukrainian relations became the main research areas. The professor was the organiser of international scientific conferences ‘Polish-Ukrainian meetings: history, language, literature and culture’. These meetings resulted in the consolidation of academic circles from Poland and abroad and the acclaimed publishing series Warszawskie Studia Ukrainistyczne (Warsaw Ukrainian Studies).
Today, the Institute of Ukrainian Studies is one of the most important centres of Ukrainian studies outside Ukraine. Over the years of its history, it has met new demands and challenges of successive eras. It has tried to join the process of successive transformations and meet new demands. This is also the case today.
After a few difficult years, the staff made an effort to reorganise its functioning in order to meet the reality of new market expectations and system requirements dictated by Poland’s presence in EU structures. They made efforts to renew cooperation with Ukrainian and European universities, exchange of lecturers and students, and participation in international scientific undertakings.
The subject matter of current research at the Institute grows in part out of earlier traditions. Work in the fields of Ukrainian literary and cultural studies focuses on the literature of the Kyiv Rus’ period, the Baroque and Neo-Baroque periods, Romanticism and Realism, as well as emigrant literature and the revival of Ukrainian literary life in German refugee camps, and contemporary literature: the issue of the city in contemporary Ukrainian prose and the specificity of feminist discourse. The staff also conduct research on the Polish-Ukrainian borderland – in particular on the literary relations and the culture and art of this area, aspects of iconographic art and national identity. Research interests also include issues related to the methodology of teaching Ukrainian literature.
The department’s linguistic research is devoted to the status of the Ukrainian language in Ukraine, ethnolinguistics and linguocultural studies. The research also includes the comparative grammar of the Ukrainian language, the word formation of Ukrainian and other Slavonic languages, semantics, issues of Polish and Ukrainian onomastics, especially the problem of language contacts in historical anthroponymy of the Polish-Ukrainian borderland, lexicography and methodology of teaching Ukrainian in Poland. Russian and English speakers employed at the Institute study pragmatic aspects of language modelling, the terminology of civil law and issues of knowledge understood as one of the immanent elements of the human mind.
The result of these works is a significant and systematically growing scientific output of the employees: monographs, textbooks, lexicographical studies, articles. A new publishing series, Studia Ucrainica Varsoviensia, devoted to current problems of Ukrainian studies, linguistics, literary and cultural studies, was also created. Our intention was to create a forum for dialogue and integration of Ukrainian studies. Three volumes of Studies have been published, the following one, co-financed by the authorities of the UW, was published in early 2016. The Institute has also created a publishing series called ‘Z Ukraińskim na Ty’, in which two textbooks for learning Ukrainian at B1 level have been prepared by a team of staff and PhD students. In 2014, a Textbook was published for the study of Ukrainian at C1 level, Dialogue of Cultures. Ukraine-Poland. Prepared by Svitlana Romaniuk, the work was co-authored with lecturers from I. Franko University in Lviv and the Ukrainian Catholic University. Another one is in preparation: a Handbook for the Study of Legal Ukrainian in Two Parts by Oksana Borys, Magdalena Jeż and Irena Mytnik.
Seven monographs on linguistics have been published in the last few years, viz. Прикметник у слов’янських мовах and Українська та польська мови: контрастивне дослідження by Iryna Kononenko, Структура категорії темпоральності в сучасній українській мові by Svitlana Romaniuk, Antroponimia Wołynia w XVI-XVIII weku by Irena Mytnik. As part of a new monograph series entitled W Kręgu języka, literatury i kultury, published in cooperation with the University of Carpathia, a collective monograph in linguistics was published, namely Тенденції розвитку українсьської лексики та граматики. The monograph was preleased in two parts. The book was edited by Iryna Kononenko, Irena Mytnik and Svitlana Romaniuk. The work by Anna Kizinska Ekwiwalencja w tłumaczeniu tekstów prawnych i prawniczych na przykładzie polskiego i brytyjskiego prawa spadkowego [Equivalence in the translation of legal and juridical texts on the example of Polish and British inheritance law] has also been published. Work on the preparation for publication of two further monographs is nearing completion: Agresywna wypowiedz jako sposób realizacji polityki perswazyjnej. Analiza środków werbalnych w ukraińskim dyskursie politycznym w latach 2000-2013 by Svitlana Romaniuk and Imiennictwo w dawnej Ziemi Chełmskiej w XVI-XVII w. by Irena Mytnik.
As far as works in the field of literary studies are concerned, six monographs have been published as part of the aforementioned series, namely: Kobieta we współczesnej kulturze ukraińskiej [Woman in Contemporary Ukrainian Culture], edited by Katarzyna Jakubowska and Lidia Stefanowska’s Mission Impossible: MUR i odrodzenie ukraińskiego życia literackiego w obozach dla uchodzców na terytorium Niemiec (1945-1948) and Antologia [Anthology]. Notable are also Marta Zambrzycka’s Sacrum i profanum w prozie Wałerija Szewczuka, Katarzyna Jakubowska-Krawczyk’s Kształtowanie się ukraińskiej tożsamości narodowej a literacki obraz Polaka i Ukraińca [The Formation of Ukrainian National Identity and the Literary Image of the Pole and the Ukrainian], as well as collective monographs: Przemiany we współczesnej literaturze ukraińskiej and Współczesne badania nad kulturą ukraińską – both ed. by Katarzyna Jakubowska-Krawczyk, Paulina Olechowska and Marta Zambrzycka. More are in the pipeline: Barok ukraiński. Texts and Contexts by Valentina Sobol and Feminist Discourse in Contemporary Ukrainian Prose by Paulina Olechowska.
Recent years have also brought three lexicographical studies: the Polsko-ukraiński słownik tematyczny by Iryna Kononenko, Irena Mytnik, Elżbieta Wasiak; as well as Tezaurus enologii (polsko-angielski) and Thesaurus of Oenology (English-Polish) by Piotr Nagórka. Other works are also being prepared, some of the most prominent among them being Polsko-ukraiński oraz ukraińsko-polski słownik terminologii prawa cywilnego by Magdalena Jeż and Etymologiczno-historyczny słownik antroponimii ziemi chełmskiej w XVI-XVII w. [Etymological-historical dictionary of anthroponymy of the Chełm area in the 16th-17th centuries) by Irena Mytnik.