The article highlights the development of Slovene Studies at universities around the world since the establishment of the first Slovene chair at the beginning of the 19th century, the establishment of lectures and studies before and after the founding of the University of Ljubljana in 1919, and the beginning of institutionalised, planned activities for the advancement of the learning of and research into Slovene language, literature and culture at foreign universities from the early 1960s until 1991. This is followed by a post-1991 period, marked by the independence of the Slovene state and its integration into the EU in 2004. A review of the sequence of founding Slovene Studies shows how Slovene became part of study programmes at universities throughout the world, and over a relatively short time of 100 years great progress was made in both the number of universities with Slovene Studies and their development. The paper also presents the activities of the programme Slovene at Foreign Universities, which has been supporting Slovene Studies from the Slovene side for almost 60 years, and the international professional integration of Slovene which will guide the activities of Slovene Studies as a part of a globalised university market in the future.
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