General and comparative studies
The Department of General and Contrastive Linguistics is a national expert scientific centre, dedicated to the study of linguistic theory and its applications in the field of general and contrastive linguistics aiming at developing advanced linguistic theories in line with the contemporary trends in the sciences of language worldwide.
In the area of general linguistics the members of the Department carry out research on problems of theoretical linguistics, sociolinguistics, psycholinguistics, philosophy of language, anthropological linguistics, language planning and the sociolinguistic aspects of the process of European integration, the reflection of idiolect and national mentality onto language, the cognitive basis of language competence, the theoretical and applied problems of verbal interaction, structural and social semiotics, ethnography of communication, etc. Current research tasks include investigations of the relationships between language cognition and emotion, of language policy, language planning and predictions, and of philosophy of language, philosophy of linguistics and philosophy of grammar.
In the area of contrastive linguistics the Department follows the tradition established at the former Department of Contrastive Study of Bulgarian Language with Other Languages that was created in 2001 as a successor of the former Department of Slavic Linguistics. It aims to study Bulgarian in comparison with other Slavic and Balkan languages as well as with other European and non-European languages. The priorities of the Department’s research development as well as the selection of research projects comply with the framework of the Bulgarian science infrastructure and education, stemming from both national identity and the integration of the Bulgarian research potential in the European research in Humanities. The most recent contrastive linguistic research task deals with the contrastive-typological analysis of the lexico-semantic system of Bulgarian compared to that of other languages.
