The Bulgarian voice in the world Russianists’ choir

The author thoroughly examines the emergence, formation and development of the Russian studies in Bulgaria as a scientific field, both in retrospect and in the context of its current state. The author traces the influence of historical, political and socio-economic factors on teaching Russian to Bulgarians. Keeping in mind the changes in the political and socio-economic orientation of the Republic of Bulgaria and of the Russian Federation in the last three decades, it appears relevant at the present states of development of the two countries to comprehensively describe the various development trends of the Russian studies and Russian language teaching in Bulgaria. Representative material from scientific publications and collective monographs on heterogeneous aspects of the Russian studies (linguistic, literary and applied) has been used in the research. Traditional methods of analysis and evaluation of scientific literature, observation, description and generalization of pedagogical experience are applied in this study. It also includes analysis of data from the National Statistical Institute of Bulgaria on the number of schoolchildren studying Russian at different stages and in different types of secondary schools. The official statistical data show a stable interest in the Russian language among Bulgarian pupils and students, regardless of changing attitudes in the society. The Russian language remains the second most frequently chosen after English. The pragma-tic attitude of pupils and students, a combination of subjective and objective factors contribute to their choice to study Russian. The specific feature of the Bulgarian model is teaching Russian at all levels: preschool, school, university and continuing education in accordance with the European policy of lifelong learning.