1. Home
  2. Units

Advanced Certificate in Central European Studies

Program level: 
Advanced Certificate
Degree awarded: 
non-degree certificate
Unit: 
Department of History
Department of Medieval Studies
Department of Political Science
Nationalism Studies Program
Department of Economics and Business
Department of Environmental Sciences and Policy
Country of accreditation: 
United States
Program accreditation/registration: 
Program approved and registered by the New York State Education Department
Standard Program duration: 
Other

CEU application details

Course Listing

Program Description

The Advanced Certificate Program in Central European Studies, available to MA students enrolled in one of the participating departments, offers an interdisciplinary perspective on the lands between the Baltic Sea and the Balkan Peninsula as a geo-cultural region, bringing together history, economics, sociology, political science, environmental science, and cultural heritage studies. Its aim is not to pursue “area studies”, essentializing Central Europe on the grounds of supposedly endogenous, distinctive features that might make it unique and incomparable. To a significant extent, regions are social and cultural constructions, representing symbolic as well as physical and human geographies. Central Europe and its experience, seemingly marginal in common perception, is a lens and a prism through which problems of wider, indeed global relevance and implications can be fruitfully studied. The advanced certificate program will provide a systematic inter-disciplinary framing to this endeavor.

Requirements

  • Admission to one of the participating departments
  • Students enrolled in a one-year master's program must complete 8 credits (2-credit mandatory core course and an additional 6 credits in approved electives)
  • Students enrolled in two-year master's programs must complete 12 credits (2-credit mandatory core course and an additional 10 credits in approved electives)

Learning Outcomes

Students pursuing and completing this program will be equipped with broad specialized knowledge relating to the past and present of the Central European region seen from inter-disciplinary perspectives. This complex regional expertise will be focussed on the imbrications between legacies of imperial transformation, nation and state building, and current concerns of (social and environmental) governance, (de-)democratization, illiberalism, the mastery of memory, amongst other subjects. Experience and learning will be acquired through direct, hands-on experience during time spent in institutional contexts in at least one of the regional capital cities. In addition, applying the cutting-edge methodological and theoretical training used by each of the participating departments and programs, analytical and practical skills will be nurtured through the study of empirical topics drawn from the experience of the region. As such, these skills will be applicable in academic as well as non-academic career paths (the latter comprising journalism, advocacy and advisory activity to NGOs and other national and international firms and bodies).