At the opening of the international academic conference The 41st Kononov Readings, held at Saint Petersburg State University on 23–24 October 2026, Professor Hadi Bak at the 41st Kononov Readings, Professor at Atatürk University (Erzurum, Türkiye) and Associate Professor at the Institute of Humanities of Moscow City University (MCU), delivered a presentation.
His presentation introduced the sociocultural initiative “Türkiye and the Turkish Language in Moscow’s Educational Environment,” implemented at MCU’s Institute of Humanities. The project goes beyond conventional language teaching: it aims to demonstrate how the Turkish language shapes ways of thinking and cultural identity, while showcasing how Turkish culture thrives within Moscow’s multicultural environment. One of the programme’s highlights was a student visit to the Nazım Hikmet Cultural Centre.
Hadi Bak also spoke about the long-standing cooperation between MCU and Atatürk University, including joint Turkish language courses for students, faculty exchanges, and joint academic publications authored by scholars from both universities.
The Kononov Readings have been organised annually by the Department of Turkic Philology at Saint Petersburg State University since 1986 in memory of Andrey Nikolayevich Kononov, a distinguished Russian Turkologist and academician. This year’s programme covered Turkic languages, history, historical sources, ethnography and folklore, and featured a dedicated Young Turkologist section for students. The conference working languages were Russian, English and Turkish.
Photo: Saint Petersburg State University