SPECIALIZED COURSE ON EUROPEAN CIVILIZATION AS AN INSTRUMENT OF EUROPEAN IDENTITY DEVELOPMENT

Since Slovakia entered the European Union, there is a great deal of attention paid to the general level of language and communication competence in the country. Each of the governments since 2004 has stressed the importance of learning foreign languages and development of intercultural communication skills. The University of Economics as its name suggests has been a traditional university focused on economic studies until recently. June 1st 2010 it set up its 7th faculty with a completely different domain, namely Faculty of Applied Languages to meet the requirement not only of the governmental and university authorities but first of all the European labor market. Setting up a new faculty and a new study program specialized in languages and intercultural communication meant a development of several new courses which are unique in Slovakia. The course on European civilization serves several important aims. It combines foreign language acquisition with cultural studies of the European environment and most of all, with development of European identity based on a historical and linguistic survey of European continent.