The Russian, East European, and Eurasian Center and the Department of Slavic Languages & Literatures are pleased to announce a new initiative in Bulgarian Studies at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. This pilot program, made possible by the generous financial support of the Ministry of Education and Science of the Republic of Bulgaria, will sponsor courses in Bulgarian language, culture, and history at Illinois, as well as create new opportunities to study in Bulgaria for Illinois students and faculty.
The idea for this program was suggested by the Consul General of the Republic of Bulgaria in Chicago, Mr. Svetoslav Stankov. Bulgarian students have been part of the University of Illinois community since at least 1911. Chicago has one of the largest Bulgarian populations of any city outside of Europe. In recent years, however, Bulgarian language has not been taught at Illinois—and rarely anywhere else in the United States—depriving local students of a chance to study it, whether as heritage speakers or as new learners, fascinated by the country and its history. Working with his government as well as with scholars at REEEC and Slavic, Mr. Stankov helped plan this three-year pilot program to correct that situation and establish Illinois as a center for learning about Bulgaria, its language, culture, and history.
One of the project’s main priorities is to ensure that Bulgarian language classes will be offered regularly at the University of Illinois. During the 2025–2026 academic year, Professor Iliyana Dimitrova will teach classes in Bulgarian language and culture as a Visiting Lecturer. In Fall 2025, she will teach an Introduction to Bulgarian class (LCTL 101) and a Bulgarian for Heritage Speakers class (LCTL 201). In Spring 2026, she will offer a class on Bulgarian history and culture as well as second semesters of her language courses.
Professor Dimitrova was selected through a nationwide competition by the Ministry of Education and Science of the Republic of Bulgaria. She is Senior Lecturer in Contemporary Bulgarian Language at the University of Veliko Tarnovo (St. Cyril and St. Methodius). In addition to her teaching in Bulgaria, she has guest-lectured in Spain, Germany, and Czechia. Her research focuses on methodologies for teaching Bulgarian in multilingual contexts, phraseology, lexical semantics, and anthropological linguistics, among other topics.
Another priority of the pilot program is to connect American students with Bulgarian universities. Last summer, at the invitation of the Bulgarian government, two University of Illinois graduate students participated in the famous International Summer Seminar program, which has been offered annually for over fifty years by Bulgarian universities. Joseph Mosse’, a student in the joint MA in REEES/MS in LIS program, attended the Seminar at Veliko Tarnovo, while Brian Yang, a PhD student in Slavic Languages & Literatures, joined the program at Sofia University. Living and studying with other international students, these Illini had a chance to learn the Bulgarian language, be exposed to Bulgarian traditions of dance, singing, and food, and visit many beautiful and historic locations. We certainly hope that they will be the first of many students to have similar experiences.
REEEC and the Department of Slavic Languages & Literatures would like to express their profound gratitude to Mr. Stankov, the Consulate General of the Republic of Bulgaria in Chicago, and the Ministry of Education and Science for their leadership and support of this exciting new pilot program, which has also been widely covered in the Bulgarian media.