Master's Programme
MA The Ottoman Empire and the Bulgarians: History and Heritage (in English)
Sofia University | Faculty of History
About the Programme
The Мaster’s Program The Ottoman Empire and the Bulgarians: history and heritage, 4 semesters is aimed at deepening the professional training of students in the research and applied fields of the history of the Bulgarians and of the other ethnic and religious groups who lived on the territory of the Ottoman Empire in the Late Middle Ages and the Early Modern times. Its in-depth study optimizes the realization of masters in the public sphere. The study and discussion of the specific conditions and dynamics of social, demographic and economic processes in the context of a multi-confessional and ethnically diverse environment occupies an important place in the training process.
The aim of the Master’s program is: to further develop the students’ skills for independent and critical work with historical sources, analysis and synthesis of the significant historical processes taking place on the territory of the Ottoman Empire and in particular in the Bulgarian space; to create the necessary preparation of the Master’s students for successful application and realization in the third educational and scientific degree “PH D”. The program enables students to select such courses that will direct them to the research field or prepare them as experts in the fields of state and municipal administration, tourism, cultural management, non-governmental (Bulgarian and international) organizations and the sphere of culture, education and human rights, banking consultants, work in book repositories, archives, scientific institutions. Future MA students will receive a good grounding in the history of society, religions and religious community’s characteristic of our area, as well as ethnic and national relations and the more complex social, economic and cultural processes of the Balkans in the past and today.
Admission requirements
Eligibility: applicants must hold a Bachelor’s (180 ECTCS credits) or Master’s degree.
Bachelors of all humanities majors are eligible to apply for the Master’s programme The Ottoman Empire and the Bulgarians: History and Heritage. In addition to the courses in History, Archaeology, Ethnology/Ethnology and Cultural Anthropology, Archival Studies, History and Geography, History and Geopolitics of the Balkans, History and Philosophy, History and Foreign Languages, Bachelors are required to take general courses in History of the Bulgarian Lands XV-XVII Centuries, Bulgarian Revival and New Balkan History.
The course for all is taught over four semesters.
Admission to the Master’s programme ‘The Ottoman Empire and the Bulgarians: History and Heritage’ for state-subsidised places consists of an interview with the candidates, which takes place in September. The interview is based on questions about their views on the place of research on the Ottoman Empire and that on the Bulgarians in the context of social, economic and cultural changes, the development of religious phenomena, as well as the analysis of the contemporary situation and the state of research in an aspect chosen by the candidate from the above thematic fields.
Professional and general competences
Graduates of the Master’s degree program “The Ottoman Empire and the Bulgarians: History and Heritage in English ” acquire the following professional and general competences in the fields of scientific and social activity:
– abilities to make sense of and critically analyze social, political, cultural, and economic processes and phenomena in the past and present;
– the skills to work in libraries and archives; those wishing to do so may acquire the skills to work with a specific group of historical sources and/or material monuments, and through participation in complex studies, they can acquire the skills for historical and anthropological field research;
– the ability to research and analyze a variety of primary historical sources and their publication;
– the ability to prepare scientific texts, including the mastery of different systems of scientific citation, the preparation of a scientific bibliography, the structuring of a scientific text, the argumentation of scientific theses;
– the skills to argue and present one’s own scientific theses and research to specialist and wider audiences.
Specific competencies acquired in the Master’s program include:
– knowledge of the historical roots and circumstances of processes with lasting influence in the history and modernity of the Bulgarian lands and the Balkans, such as the functioning of pre-modern ethnic and religious communities, the emergence and establishment of Islam and Muslim communities in the region, the formation and evolution of imperial institutions, the construction of the cultural, including material heritage of the various communities in the Ottoman Empire, etc.;
– the skills to analyze these processes and to apply this analysis in different spheres of scientific and social life, such as research and teaching, museum and archive work, media, etc.
– skills in working with Ottoman Turkish, domestic, Western, and other sources requiring specific linguistic and methodological training.