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The Canadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies (CIUS) is a leading centre of Ukrainian studies outside Ukraine. It is an integral part of the University of Alberta in the Faculty of Arts. Founded in 1976, following joint efforts by Ukrainian community leaders and academics, to provide an institutional home for Ukrainian scholarship in Canada, CIUS is dedicated to the development of Ukrainian studies in Canada and supports such studies internationally. In addition to its main office at the University of Alberta, CIUS maintains a branch office at the University of Toronto.
CIUS fulfills its mandate by organizing research and scholarship in Ukrainian and Ukrainian-Canadian studies: it publishes books and a scholarly journal, develops materials for Ukrainian-language education, mainly for western Canada’s bilingual school program, organizes conferences, lectures, and a seminar series, and awards graduate and undergraduate scholarships, as well as research grants to scholars. CIUS also contributes to the cultural and educational development of community groups in Canada by providing specialists and resources for their activities. It fosters international links of mutual benefit to Canada and the world, especially with Ukraine.
CIUS is financed in part from the operating budget of the University of Alberta. Other support comes from grants for specific projects and income earned from endowment funds.
CIUS organizes its work through the following major units and programs:
CIUS Press is a leading publisher of scholarly books about Ukraine and Ukrainians in Canada. Its primary focus is on new and original scholarship in English on Ukrainian history, language, and literature, Ukrainians in Canada, and contemporary Ukraine. CIUS Press also publishes English translations of Ukrainian scholarly monographs and fiction, as well as monographs in Ukrainian. As of 2008, it has issued over 160 books and more than 60 research reports. CIUS Press maintains a Web site including descriptions of CIUS publications in print and a secure online system for ordering them at www.ciuspress.com
The Journal of Ukrainian Studies, published semi-annually by CIUS since 1976, is the only scholarly serial in Canada devoted solely to Ukrainian and Ukrainian-Canadian studies. The journal publishes articles in English by Canadian, Ukrainian, and other scholars; scholarly material in English translation; reviews of scholarly publications and textbooks in Ukrainian studies; and occasional literary translations and guides to research.
Since its establishment, the Institute has supported the development of Ukrainian-English bilingual education and teaching Ukrainian as a second language. Through ULEC and in partnership with Alberta Education, CIUS develops print and digital learning resources. Its major publishing project has been the Nova: Ukrainian-Language Development Series for grades one through six. ULEC also serves the professional development needs of Ukrainian language teachers by co-sponsoring inservices. As a founding member of the Ukrainian Knowledge Internet Portal Consortium Association (UKiP-CA), ULEC has helped develop www.oomroom.ca, an Internet portal of language and cultural resources designed for students, teachers, and parents. For teachers of Ukrainian, ULEC maintains a library of more than 7,000 print, film, audio, and visual materials. As part of its mandate, ULEC also undertakes research and publishes research reports.
CIUS’s first major project, the five-volume Encyclopedia of Ukraine (University of Toronto Press, 1984–93), was prepared in co-operation with the West European centre of the Shevchenko Scientific Society (Sarcelles, France) and jointly funded by the Canadian Foundation for Ukrainian Studies (CFUS). A volume containing a name index and list of errata was published by CIUS Press in 2001. In the same year, the Internet Encyclopedia of Ukraine (IEU) project was launched. Its objectives are to provide free and unrestricted access to the original Encyclopedia, as well as to update and expand it. Once completed, the IEU will be the most comprehensive source of information in English on Ukraine, its history, people, geography, society, economy, diaspora, and cultural heritage. In addition to more than 20,000 articles prepared by leading specialists in a variety of fields, it will contain thousands of graphic and audio materials. As of 2008, more than 3,000 articles have been prepared and displayed at the IEU Web site: www.encyclopediaofukraine.com
The Peter Jacyk Centre for Ukrainian Historical Research was established at CIUS in 1989 on the basis of an endowment initiated by Mr. Peter Jacyk (1921–2001) of Toronto. The Centre’s major ongoing project is the editing and publication of an English translation of Mykhailo Hrushevsky’s classic ten-volume History of Ukraine-Rus'. The English translation includes extensive introductions on the scope of Hrushevsky’s work and its impact, full bibliographies of sources and literature cited in each volume, and discussions of subsequently published literature. Five volumes were issued in the years 1997–2008. The Centre also sponsors conferences, issues an English-language monograph series and a series of Ukrainian translations of Western historical works, and prepares documentary publications. The Centre offers research grants to scholars.
In 2007 the Ukrainian Canadian Program was renamed the Kule Ukrainian Canadian Studies Centre (KUCSC) in recognition of a generous endowment established by Drs. Peter and Doris Kule of Edmonton. The Centre conducts and promotes scholarly research, organizes conferences, and encourages the preservation of archival materials in the field of Ukrainian Canadian studies. In addition to advising on media stories and film projects, it facilitates the publication of manuscripts on Ukrainian Canadian themes. The Centre continues to play a role in the Kalyna Country Ecomuseum within Canada’s oldest and largest Ukrainian bloc settlement, situated in rural east-central Alberta. The Centre is also involved in various community outreach activities, such as hosting public lectures and issuing a quarterly digital newsletter. A new component of the Centre is the Diaspora Studies Initiative, which is dedicated to studying Ukrainian communities abroad and is working to nurture the establishment of Canadian studies in Ukraine.
Founded in 1990 on the basis of the Stasiuk Family Endowment Fund, the Stasiuk Program provides current analysis of events in Ukraine for the scholarly community, government, media, and the general public. This includes hosting a blog page containing commentaries by in-house scholars and guests at ukraineanalysis.wordpress.com.The Program also has an information centre, maintains an archive on twentieth-century Ukraine (particularly strong on the Gorbachev period and dissidence in the 1960s and 1970s), and conducts research projects. Areas of special interest have been the Chornobyl disaster, the Orange Revolution, and their consequences for Ukraine. Currently the key focus of the Program is the production of a monograph on the Famine-Holodomor of 1932–33. The Program hosts visiting scholars and lecturers, has provided research assistantships for graduate students, and sponsors the annual Stasiuk Lecture on Ukraine at the University of Cambridge.
The Research Program on Religion and Culture (formerly the Ukrainian Church Studies Program) is devoted to the study of the sacral culture of Ukrainian churches in Ukraine and the diaspora, especially in Canada. The program is spearheading Sanctuary: The Spiritual Heritage Documentation Project, a major effort to record churches and other sacred monuments and artifacts in the three prairie provinces. The program has a particular interest in the architecture, art, and music of the Ukrainian churches, and it is hosting a series of conferences on those topics. It maintains and develops the Bohdan Bociurkiw Memorial Library, which contains many unique items and documents pertaining to the Ukrainian churches and serves as the basis of the program’s reference library.
The Kowalsky Program for the Study of Eastern Ukraine was established in 1998 on the basis of a donation by Michael Kowalsky (1908–2000) and Daria Mucak-Kowalsky. The Program, which supports Ukrainian studies and the national revival in eastern Ukraine, established the Kowalsky Eastern Ukrainian Institute at Kharkiv University in 1999 to direct and co-ordinate work and activities there. The Program gives grants to scholars, sponsors seminars, and supports museum development and publications, including the journal Схід-Захід (East-West). In 2003, the Kowalsky Eastern Institute established a Zaporizhia branch that is active in publishing and fieldwork, including the compiling and publication of oral history sources. Since 2001, the Kowalsky Program has been the main sponsor of the Baturyn Archeological Project in Ukraine.
The Danylo Struk Program in Ukrainian Literature was established in 1999 in memory of Danylo Husar Struk (1940–1999) to promote Ukrainian literature in the English-speaking world. It sponsors research, writing, and translating, promotes access to texts through print and electronic publications, and organizes public lectures and readings. The Program supports the annual Danylo Husar Struk Memorial Lecture in Toronto and has initiated a project to publish English translations of scholarly essays on Ukrainian literature.
General inquiries should be addressed to the director of the Institute. To obtain a copy of the Institute’s newsletter, or any other information, please write or call:
Canadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies
430 Pembina Hall
University of Alberta
Edmonton , AB
Canada T6G 2H8
Tel.: (780) 492-2972
Fax: (780) 492-4967
E-mail: cius@ualberta.ca
Web site: www.ualberta.ca/cius
Canadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies, Toronto Office
University of Toronto
256 McCaul Street , Rm. 308
Toronto , ON
Canada M5T 1W5
Tel.: (416) 978-6934
Fax: (416) 978-2672
E-mail: cius@chass.utoronto.ca