Prof. Michael Flier named director of Harvard Ukrainian Research Institute (08/01/04)

Prof. Michael Flier named director of Harvard Ukrainian Research Institute

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. - Effective July 1, Prof. Michael Flier was named director of the Ukrainian Research Institute at Harvard University by Dr. William Kirby, dean of Harvard's Faculty of Arts and Sciences. Dr. Flier is the Oleksander Potebnja Professor of Ukrainian Philology at Harvard University. His areas of specialization include the history of the Ukrainian language, as well as comparative morphology (the study of word forms) and phonology (the study of distinctive speech sounds) of the Slavic languages.

Prof. Flier is the Harvard Ukrainian Research institute's fourth director. He succeeds Prof. Roman Szporluk, who headed the institute for the past eight years. Prof. Szporluk will continue as the Mykhailo Hrushevskyi Professor of Ukrainian History in the Department of History. Previous directors of the Institute were Dr. Omeljan Pritsak, Mykhailo Hrushevskyi Professor emeritus of Ukrainian History (together with Prof. Ihor Sevcenko, co-founder of the institute), and Dr. George Grabowicz, Dmytro Cyzevskyi Professor of Ukrainian Literature.

Since becoming the Potebnja Professor of Ukrainian Philology in 1991, Dr. Flier has taken an active role in various areas of academic life at Harvard. From 1994 to 1999 he chaired the department of linguistics, and from 1999 to the present, he has headed the department of slavic languages and literatures.

Additionally, as advisor to graduate students, he has guided research on important historic sources of the Ukrainian language, such as the Peresopnytske Gospel (an illuminated 16th century manuscript from Volyn, on which Ukrainian presidents now take their oath) and various chronicles of Ukraine's medieval princely era.

Prof. Flier is also the chair of the American Committee of Slavists, which arranges participation of American scholars in the International Congress of Slavists, an event that takes place every five years (most recently, last year in Ljubljana, Slovenia).

Prof. Flier is a member of the institute's executive committee and editorial board, and an editor of the "Harvard Library of Early Ukrainian Literature," a multi-volume series of Ukrainian literary works from the late medieval and early modern periods published by the Institute. The series is one portion of the Harvard Project in Commemoration of the Millennium of Christianity in Rus'-Ukraine. Currently, nine volumes have appeared in the texts series (original works in facsimile or transcription) and six in the English translations series.

He is also a member of the editorial board of the journal Harvard Ukrainian Studies (25 volumes of which have already been published), and oversaw a special edition of the journal on linguistics, philology, dialectology and historical linguistics. He is now preparing the next thematic issue on studies of the Ukrainian language, which is scheduled to come out next year.

Prof. Flier has authored over 80 research articles and reviews, and has written, edited or co-edited 14 books and collections on Slavic linguistics and Ukrainian, Belarusian and Russian philology. He has also written articles on Ukrainian and general Slavic themes for well-known encyclopedic and reference publications, such as the forthcoming "Oxford Dictionary of the Middle Ages."

His approach to scholarship is broad and includes a wide spectrum of interests, such as in the culture of Eastern Europe in the late middle ages (e.g., the symbolism of icons from that period) and more modern phenomena, such as "Surzhyk."

Every director of HURI provides the Institute with a unique sense of mission. The institute concentrated its early efforts in the 1970s on gaining visibility for Ukrainian studies in North American and European academic communities. Appearing for the first time at Harvard University Press were books in English about Ukraine's early and modern history and about Ukrainian literature, economic history and culture that were well received and favorably reviewed in many international publications.

On the eve of Ukrainian independence, HURI concentrated its efforts on supporting state-building processes in Ukraine. Taking advantage of the resources at Harvard University, the institute increased its cadre of personnel who specialized in Eastern European history, sociology, international relations and politics, in order to provide research and expertise to the American and international community, which began to interact with Ukraine under new and changing conditions. In September 1991, through the mediation of the institute and the John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard hosted the first-ever government delegation from independent Ukraine to the United States.

Most recently, HURI has been concentrating on meeting present needs: compiling and analyzing new information about Ukraine, establishing contacts, organizing conferences, carrying out joint publishing projects with other research centers, and preparing young scholars who are to continue in Ukrainian studies as the older generation of scholars retires.

Prof. Flier is assuming the directorship at a time when HURI's profile is expanding. Besides the traditional activities of teaching, research and publishing, the institute's personnel is actively increasing collaboration with other institutions at Harvard, as well as with scholars at other universities. Foremost in these efforts are scholars from Ukraine and other Eastern European countries who frequently visit Harvard University.

Prof. Flier has outlined important priorities for the institute in publications, support for research in Ukrainian studies, development of Harvard's Ucrainica (one of the best Ukrainian library collections in the world), and advocating Ukrainian culture and art in the Cambridge and Boston area.

To accomplish these tasks, Prof. Flier is counting on the fresh research of scholars worldwide and on the support of the Ukrainian community, which, in the course of decades, has constructed a most valuable and sturdy financial base for the Ukrainian studies program at Harvard University.

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