Academic Departments University of Calcutta

History

History of the department : The history of foreign language teaching in Calcutta University is almost as old as a century. In 1917 studies in foreign languages started with the teaching of Tibetan, Chinese, German and Dutch. These were followed by French and Japanese (1918-19), Portuguese (1924-25), Italian (1929-30) and Polish (1939-40). When the second world war broke out, some of these languages were withdrawn because the foreign teachers who were teaching these languages left India.

At present 9 foreign languages (Arabic, Chinese, French, German, Korean, Persian, Russian, Spanish and Tibetan) and 5 Indian languages (Bengali, Hindi, Pali, Tamil and Urdu) are taught at this department.

Academic

Faculty Members :
Name of the Teachers Designation  Specialization Language
Lily Banerjee
[Profile]		 Associate Professor & HOD Russian language General, Socio & Psycholinguistics Russian
Mohar Daschaudhuri 
[Profile]		 Assistant Professor Francophone literature French
Visiting faculty members :
Visiting Foreign Teachers
Sung Hee Chang Korean
Eun Hee Jung Korean
Maria Alonso Ruiz  Spanish
Visiting Teachers
Manisha Das  Chinese
Jayeeta Basak  French
Subhasis Sengupta French
Pankaj Kumar Mishra French
Rapti Ghosh French
Debabrata Chakraborty German
Tapan Chatterjee Russian
Malabika Bhattacharjee Spanish
Bimaleswar Dwivedi  Hindi
Bela Bhattacharya Tibetan
Guest Lecturers
Abdul Mannan Mollah Arabic
Hemanta Adhya Bengali
Rekha Chakraborty Bengali
Soney Khanna Hindi
Saheli Das  Pali
Piyali Chakraborty Pali
Bandana Bhattacharjee Tibetan
Subhasis Barua Tibetan
Sahid Jamil Persian
Teachers on Requisition Service
Asraf Ali Arabic
Shamsuddin Mullick Arabic
Jayanti Chatterjee  Pali
Saswati Mutsuddi Pali
Shahnaz Nabi

Urdu

Courses :

Programme Eligibility
Certificate Course in Arabic, Chinese, French, German, Korean, Persian, Russian, Spanish, Tibetan, Bengali, Hindi, Pali, Tamil & Urdu Graduation in any discipline
Diploma Course in Arabic, Chinese, French, German, Persian, Russian, Spanish, Tibetan, Bengali, Hindi, Pali, Tamil & Urdu Graduation + Certificate in the language
Pre - M.A. in Russian Graduation + Diploma in Russian
B.A. (Hons.) in Russian H.S. (10+2) in any discipline
M.A. in Russian
 BA (Hons) Russian/Pre-MA in Russian
Ph.D. in Russian

MA in Russian

Research

Research Scholars Enrolled for Ph.D (Russian) :
  • Abhijit Chowdhury
  • Bichatra Basu Majumder
  • Atmoja Bose
Collaborations :

Collaborations with other Institutions

  • Academic exchange with Chonbuk National University of South Korea.
  • Assistance programme with Embassy of Spain.
  • Book Publication Programme with Akdemia Razvitiya, Russia.
Thrust areas in teaching and research of the academic department :

Thrust areas of research undertaken by the teachers :

  • Indology in Russia.
  • Francophone literature (Canadian, Mexican, Algerian).
  • Linguistic approach to study of Literature.
  • Comparative literature.
  • Teaching of Russian phonetics in Indian auditorium.
Major activities :

Seminar & Conference held at the department :

  • International seminar on ‘Gerasim Lebedev and his legacy – A chronicle of Indo-Russian relation’.
    [February, 2011]
  • Regional seminar on ‘Indian Philosophy, its legacy as seen through Tolstoy literature’.
    [September, 2013]

Additional information :

Exposure to languages of countries of the world through interaction with the native speakers of those languages as methodology of teaching is maintained by visit of scholars and delegations.

  • Prof. Dong Youchen, a teacher of Chinese language for the foreign students in Senzhen university in china delivered a series of lectures for the students of Chinese language of this department [April, 2008]   
  • Prof. Irina Olegovna Mashzirko, a Doctor in Philological Sciences from Moscow State Regional University, Russia delivered a lecture on 'Changes in Russian Education System' [August, 2010]
  • Ms. Ekaterina A. Kostina, Asst. Teacher from Department of Indian Philology, St. Petersberg State University, Russia delivered a series of lectures on 'Teaching of Russian and Bengali Grammar in a foreign auditorium’ [February, 2011]
  • A student delegation from South Korea led by Prof. Young Nam Cha interacted with the students and teachers of Korean language [January, 2012]
  • A Seminar lecture by Ms. Leyre Villate Garcia, Visiting Lecturer from Spain on 'Spanish Language and Culture' [ February, 2012]
  • Workshop on 'Creative Writing' conducted by Spanish novelist Mr. Riben Abella [April, 2012]
  • Prof. Valentina Chernevskaya, historian and an Indologist from Yaroslavl, Russia spoke on 'Present day significance of Gerasim Lebedev's works in the field of Linguistics' [February, 2013]
  • Dr. Tatiana Skorokhodova, Professor from Penza State University, Russia delivered lecturer on 'Bengal Renaissance - A Russian Scholar's view' [ February, 2013]
  • A video conference with Dr. Lonny Harrison, Department of foreign languages, University of Texas, USA on 'People from Underground as described in Dostoevsky's works' [September, 2013]

Contact

Campus : Asutosh Siksha Prangan (College Street Campus)

Address for communication : Department of Languages, Asutosh Building, 2nd floor, University of Calcutta, 87/1, College Street, Kolkata-700 073