German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) has supported a network project "Cultural contact- and conflict zones in Eastern Europe". The main initiator and coordinator of the project was Giessen Center of Eastern Europe represented by its Director Prof. Monica Vingender. Kazan Federal University is one of the participants, along with the Belarusian State University (Minsk), Kazakh University of International Relations and World Languages (Almaty), University of Cluj (Romania) and the University of Lodz (Poland). All these universities are located in centers of political, cultural and scientific interest that attract scientific community by their national, cultural and linguistic diversity. The span of topics includes: the phenomenon of imperialism and nationalism, multilingualism and language contact, regionalism, history of cities and urbanization, cultural transfer and others.
At KFU the project will be implemented by the Institute of Philology and Arts. The project involves a wide range of research in the field of linguistics, literature, culture and history, as well as intensive scientific collaboration between graduate students, teachers, young scientists from the partner universities. Networking will expand the usual scope of bilateral cooperation with Giessen University.
The project has received four-year funding for mobility programs and other activities from the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (Germany) under a new DAAD grant program «Strategic partnerships and theme networks". Total number of selected projects is 21 (including five projects with Russian universities) out of 117 project applications.