The International Language Festival was held at Bashkir State University on November 15, 16. The organizers were Continuing Education Institute, BSU Faculty of Philology, United Student Council and BSU Student Club. The festival brought together about 500 language lovers  from various schools, universities and public organizations of Bashkortostan, as well as from Udmurtia, Irkutsk, Samara, Sverdlovsk, Chelyabinsk regions; the republics of Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan, Poland, Bulgaria, Germany, China, Vietnam and African countries. 

The journey to the world of language diversity started with an opening ceremony during which the organizers wished the participants good luck, and the audience was filled with energy and positive emotions. The culmination of the ceremony was Michael Jackson’s “We’re the World”, which the audience sang standing as a symbol of the people’s unity all over the world. The main events were taking place in lecture-rooms of the BSU main building and, according to the organizers, they were organized the way that each visitor could choose their own *route* and see all the presentations which he or she was interested in, discovering something fascinating and making as many new friends as possible.

This year 45 languages of the various language families - Indo-European, Turkic, Ural, Sino-Tibetan, Afroasiatic, Austroasiatic, Japonic, Austronesian and Kartvelian - were presented at the festival. All the presentations were unique as the languages themselves, thanks to the creativity of the participants. The audience was presented both widespread and exotic languages. One of the key features of the festival was the expansion of its format.

In addition to the traditional presentations 75 master classes and educational lections were introduced to help the visitors enrich their view of the world.

Another interesting feature was the contest held among the participants, where the delegation from Blagoveshchensk won.

Headed by Irina Georgievna Toigildina, a multidisciplinary college teacher, they prepared a substantive presentation of their native Mari language. The people’s choice award went to the presentations from Mishkino and Izhevsk. The festival was well complemented by an excursion to the National Museum of RB and a bus tour around the city which allowed the guests from other cities to get acquainted with the history of the republic, its capital and sights. During the closing ceremony traditional certificates, as well as souvenirs with the university symbols and commemorative souvenirs were presented to the participants.

We want to thank all the participants and guests for their interest in the festival and participation in the survey that will undoubtedly help to improve the event.

The International Language Festival took place at Bashkir State University on November 15, 16, 2014. The festival was realized as a part of the project called “Developing Student Unions Activity”. The aim of the festival was to show a linguistic variety of the world and unique features of every single language. It was a remarkable cultural and educational event dedicated to languages and linguistics.

During the opening ceremony amazing performances were presented to the audience: songs in English, French, Bashkir and other languages, national dances, kurai playing, poem readings, etc.

The key part of the festival were presentations of world’s languages. Every single one of them is a fascinating mini-lecture. During a presentation, a lecturer shares the most interesting facts about the language with the audience. About 40 different languages were presented  – rare and common, ancient and modern: English, Polish, Old Slavonic, Greek, Arabic, Yakut, etc.

 Everyone could choose a section and listen to a report on a language that they were interested in, learn something new or admire something that is well-known, be astonished at the diversity and peculiarities of world’s languages. Everyone had a chance to find a language which they were willing to learn.

The International Language Festival is an opportunity to make the acquaintance of amazing people, to get some useful information and a ton of positive emotions!”

 

Indo-European languages

- German (Australian, British and American English, Iceland, German and its national variants in Luxembourg and Switzerland, Norwegian).

- Greek-Phrygian - Armenian (Armenian, Greek).

- Iranian (Persian, Tajik).

- Celtic (Irish).

- Romance (Latin, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, French in its literary and dialectal forms).

- Slavic (Bulgarian, Old Russian and Old Slavic, Russian in its literary and dialectal forms, Czech, Polish, Ukrainian).

- Indo-Aryan languages (Bengali).

Turkic languages (Bashkir, Kazakh, Tatar, Turkish, Uzbek, Chuvash, Uighur-Karakhanid languages).

Uralic languages (Hungarian, Mari, Mordovian (Erzya), Udmurt, Estonian).

Sino-Tibetan languages (Chinese).

Japanese-Ryukyuan languages (Japanese).

Austro-Asiatic languages (Vietnamese).

Austronesian (Javanese).

Afroasiatic languages (Arabic, Hebrew).

Kartvelian (Georgian).

Korean language.

International Esperanto language.

Non-verbal sign language.

• Photo report
• Video records
• Electronic paper of Festival

International Language Festival in the web:

1. International Language Festival Programme
2. Report by Darya Doroshevich, a BSU student
3. Article in the newspaper “Druzhba” of Mishkinsky district, RB
4. Online materials of BSU Neftekamsk Branch
5. Report at the site of Multi-Disciplinary Professional College of Sterlitamak
6. Information at the portal “Bezformata.ru”
7. Fragments of the performance given by Chuvash Sunday School named after P.M.Mironov