Greetings from the Central Eurasian Studies Summer Institute!

Undergraduate, graduate, and adult learners are all welcome to apply to CESSI, which will be conducted entirely online Monday-Friday June 16-August 8. Upon completion of the program, students receive 8 UW-Madison credits.

Read on for additional information and be sure to follow us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and LinkedIn, visit our website, or contact cessi@creeca.wisc.edu if we can be of assistance.

For more information, see https://cessi.wisc.edu/costs-funding/

Kazakhstan was well-represented at this month's Languages of the World Day, an all-day event hosted by UW-Madison’s Language Institute for high school students from around the state to learn about diverse world languages and culture. CESSI alumni shared two presentations about Kazakhstan. "Reviving Kazakh: How Q-Pop is Making the Language Cool Again!" was presented by CESSI 2024 alumna Avery Coleman and UW-Madison’s Kazakh instructor, Gulnara Glowacki (pictured above left). "Hip-Hop and Pop Music in Kazakhstan" was presented by two-time CESSI alum Jacob Aehl and Russian Flagship student Sydney Kurszewski (pictured above right), both of whom have studied abroad in Kazakhstan. For more information about Languages of the World day, click here.

To enjoy CESSI’s Spotify playlist featuring Central Asian artists, click here.

In the March 2025 issue of NewsNet, "Central Asian Literature in English Translation Today" by Kristen Fort features CESSI alumna Shelley Fairweather-Vega, who studied Kazakh in 2021, and Zaure Batayeva, who taught Kazakh in 2012 and 2015. Fort spotlights the translation by Batayeva and Fairweather-Vega of Amanat, a 2022 collection of Kazakhstani women authors and Fairweather-Vega's translation of Tajik author Shahnoza Samarqandi's Mothersland in 2024. 

To read the full article, click here.

The American Center for Mongolian Studies, along with Metropolitan State University of Denver and Ulaanbaatar-Denver Sister Cities Committee are calling for proposals for their upcoming conference "Under Shared Blue Skies: Mongolia and the North American West." This conference will take place in Denver, Colorado on November 8 and 9. The abstract deadline is March 31.

For more information and to submit an abstract, visit the conference website here.

Students and staff are invited to celebrate Nauryz: Central Eurasian Spring Festival! This event will take place Saturday, April 5, at 5:15-7:30pm in the Frank Holt Program Room (1650 Kronshage Dr.). Nauryz is widely celebrated throughout Central Asia and is one of the most important holidays in the region.

Participants will join the local Central Asian community for a program of presentations, performances, and activities, followed by a dinner of Central Asian cuisine catered by Silk Road restaurant.

In accordance with university event policy, registration is required to attend this event. To help the event organizers, please click here to register by the end of the day Tuesday, April 1.

Are you a U.S.-based high school or community college educator interested in deepening your understanding of the history, culture, and current events of Russia and Eurasia? Applications are now open for the 2025-2026 Engaging Eurasia Teacher Fellowship, which will be devoted to the theme “Eurasian Environments.” Over the 9-month fellowship, fellows will participate in 8 content webinars, hearing from scholars with expertise on topics such as water management, environmental change, and the impacts of colonialism and industrialization on landscapes and communities. Fellows also will meet for a weekend workshop in fall 2025. For more information and to apply by April 15, click here.

Save the dates for four upcoming virtual educator workshops on "Minority Literatures of East Asia: Diversity and Difference" hosted by the National Consortium for Teaching About Asia. Workshops will be held at 6-7:30 pm EST March 27 (Tibetan), April 22 (Uyghur), May 15 (Zainichi Korean), and June 17 (Okinawan). Educators can register for individual workshops or choose to register for the entire series. For each workshop in the series that an educator attends, they will receive a complementary book.

To learn more and register, visit their website here.