Faculty of Arts, Charles University in Prague

Faculty of Arts
Filozofická fakulta
The main building of the Faculty of Arts in the Old Town of Prague.
Former names	Artistická fakulta
Established	1348 (1348)
Type	Faculty
Academic affiliation	Charles University in Prague
Location	Prague, Bohemia, Czech Republic
Dean	doc. Mirjam Friedová, Ph.D.
Students	ca. 9,000 (ca. 13,500 including U3A and other courses)[1]
Undergraduates	ca. 5,000[1]
Postgraduates	ca. 2,200[1]
Doctoral students	ca. 1,500[1]
Website	www.ff.cuni.cz

The Faculty of Arts, Charles University, is one of the original four faculties of Charles University in Prague.^[2] When founded, it was named the Faculty of the Liberal Arts or the Artistic Faculty. The faculty provides lectures in the widest range of fields of the humanities in the Czech Republic, and is the only university faculty in Europe which provides studies in all the official languages of the European Union. The faculty has around 1,000 members of staff, over 9,000 students, and a flexible system of more than 700 possible double-subject degree combinations.^[2]

History

The faculty was founded as the Faculty of Liberal Arts of Charles University by Emperor Charles IV on April 7, 1348, part of the emperor's attempt to establish the Kingdom of Bohemia as the permanent centre of the Holy Roman Empire and to place greater emphasis on the development of learning and culture in Prague. At that time, students attended the Faculty of Liberal Arts to receive education primarily in rhetorics and philosophy, later going on to pursue other subjects. The Faculty of Liberal Arts soon became the largest part of the university. In 1366, Emperor Charles IV endowed it with the first Prague college, the Collegium Carolinum; as part of the college, the first library of the artistic faculty was established, of manuscripts donated by the king.^[3]

Seal of the Faculty of Arts from the second half of the 17th century

Following the Hussite wars, the Faculty of Liberal Arts became the nucleus of the university for two centuries. From the 17th century, the faculty was known as the Faculty of Arts and, until the middle of the 19th century, its programme served as a compulsory preparatory higher education for future students of all the other faculties.

From the 18th century, as well as philosophy, the faculty offered programmes in aesthetic theory, pedagogy, mathematics, astronomy, natural sciences, engineering sciences, economy, and history. These were complemented in the 19th century by oriental studies, archaeology, religious studies, and philology. Study of languages such as Czech, Italian, French, and Hebrew, and their respective literature and culture, also began to develop. Following the liberalization of the academic environment in the second half of the 19th century, the faculty started to accept women students in 1897.

The faculty was divided into Czech and German parts in 1882, and the Faculty of Natural Sciences became a separate institution between 1920-1939. In 1939, the school was closed by the occupying forces of Nazi Germany, and brutal persecution of teachers and students followed. Following the end of the occupation in 1945, the Faculty of Arts flourished again for a few years; this was forcibly terminated in 1948 by the Communist coup in 1948. The prestige of the faculty rapidly decreased as a result of the forced departure of numerous respected teachers and the introduction of Marxist–Leninist studies. In the 1960s, the faculty slowly began to open to prominent thinkers of the time, but this trend was reversed by the Soviet occupation in 1968, which Jan Palach, a student of the faculty, protested against by setting himself on fire. After the end of the Communist regime in Czechoslovakia in 1989, and the departure of its representatives in the faculty, it was re-established as one of the country's most highly regarded university institutions.

Organization of study

Faculty activities

As of 2008, the total number of students is over 8,000; 7,040 studying for Master or bachelor's degrees, and 1,701 for a doctoral degree.^[7] The faculty is composed of 46 basic working units and six specialized working units, as well as two scholarly research institutes (the Czech Institute of Egyptology and the Institute of the Czech National Corpus). Each year authors of the faculty publish an average of 35 book titles.

The faculty participates in a number of international exchange programmes, including LLP Erasmus, the Central European Exchange Program for University Studies (CEEPUS), AKTION, exchange programmes under the auspices of the Visegrad Fund, and governmental scholarships.^[8] The number of visiting students within the LLP Erasmus programme was 280 in 2008.^[7]

Notable alumni and academics

John Hus being burned at the stake

References