What is the NYI Institute?

The NYI Global Institute of Cultural, Cognitive, and Linguistic Studies is an advanced LIVE study program focusing on underrepresnted and interdisciplinary fields of study, concerned with human language, culture, and society with seminars, lectures and workshops in critical cultural studies, theoretical linguistics and a range of other fields

V-NYI #8 will be held January 8-19, 2024. 
This will be the 24th consecutive session of NYI and the 8th Virtual LIVE session, available worldwide.

Applications open through december ion a rolling basis. Some seminrs and workshos will be limited in size

Since 2003, over 1800 participants from 70+ countries have received certificates for completing the NYI Seminar Programs

Participants create a program design unique to their own interests, choosing 4-5 seminars from among the following fields
• Critical Cultural Studies
• Decolonial Studies
• Race and Ethnicity Studies
• Gender and Sexuality Studies

• Theoretical Linguistics (Syntax, Semantics, Morphology, Phonology)

V-NYI #8 General Information

• 27 Seminars, 13 General Lectures, 7 Interactive Workshops
• students select 3-5 Seminars and/or Workshops

• all classes synchronous and LIVE only
• seminars meet 5 times over 2 weeks (M/W/F or T/Th/S)
• V-NYI #8 Certificate upon completion

Daily Schedule:
• 8:30-9:50 am (NY) (3:30-4:50 pm, Kyiv, 4:30-5:50 pm, St. P): Workshops & Seminars 
• 10:00 am-11:20 am 
(NY) (5:00-6:20 pm, Kyiv; 6:00-7:20 pm, St. P): Workshops & Seminars
• 11:30 am-12:50 pm (NY) (6:30-7:50 pm Kyiv; 7:30-8:50 pm, St. P): "Distinguished Linguist" Lecture Series / Workshops & Seminars
• 1:00-2:20 pm 
(NY) (8:00-9:20 pm, Kyiv; 9:00-10:20 pm, St. P): "Global Solidarity" Lecture Series

• 2:30 pm (NY): Occasional Special Events

Exact daily schedule with Lecture series.  (reduce to 50% for best viewing)

NYI Philosophy

NYI believes that traditional academic boundaries inadvertently prevent young intellectuals from engaging with many important areas of modern inquiry which do not fall neatly into disciplinary frames, including the cognitive sciences, which study the workings of the human mind, and critical cultural studies, which concentrate on comparative aspects of human societies. NYI is proud to have gathered an international group of faculty who are not only specialists in their fields, but also have experience working in intercultural environments.

NYI was held in St. Petersburg every summer from 2003-2019. In 2020, NYI move to the Virtual Sky, as V-NYI.  247 students in 43 countries participated live, via Zoom. In January, 2021, V-NYI held its first ever Winter Session, Jan. 18-29, 2021 with 243 students in 46 countries. V-NYI #3 was held July 16-30, 2021. The third virtual institute welcomed 236 students in 41 countries. V-NYI #4 was held Jan 10-21, 2022 and reached 196 students in 36 countries. V-NYI #5, free for all partiicants in solidarity with victims of war, was held June 30-July 15, 2022 with 343 students in 54 countries.  V-NYI #6 was held Jan. 15-29, 2023 with 230 students in 48 countries. V-NYI #7 was held June 29-July 14, 2023 with 180 students in 45 countries.
V-NYI #8 will be held January 8-19, 2024. 

In Fall, 2022,  NYI expanded to become the NYI Universe, an on-going series of seminars, lectures, working geoups, publications, and discourse in the controversial areas of our time. Our continuing workign groups are Writing against Borders and Talking about Trees

NYI statement on the invasion of Ukraine

The entire NYI Team stands strongly against the Russian invasion of Ukraine, which we consider an outrageous violation of international law, unjustified by any considerations of historical context.  We believe that the brutal attacks on civilians and civilian infrastructure, the wanton destruction of cities and towns, the overt attempt at general annihilation, the use of banned weapons, the attack on nuclear facilities and on humanitarian corridors, are immoral and inhumane, and constitute war crimes of unprecedented proportions. We stand in solidarity with the people of Ukraine.

We also strongly condemn the repression and censorship that we are witnessing within Russia and we voice our unequivocal support for all those who protest this senseless act of violence, including many current and former NYI students, staff and faculty.

We are also united against those who willingly close their eyes to the realities of the lived experience of people suffering and dying in Ukraine, as well as to those experiencing repression within Russia.

Until Covid forced us to go virtual in 2020, the NYI school had been organized as a joint project between Stony Brook University and universities in St. Petersburg, and ran for 17 consecutive summers, from 2003-2019. It was a non-profit program, open to undergraduates and graduate students from any country and any institutions. People from the US and Iran, Ukraine and Russia, Serbia and Croatia, and dozens of other countries, all participated in open discussion of pressing cultural, cognitive, and linguistic issues in the then safe and always beautiful spaces of St. Petersburg. Over a hundred students each year (over a thousand in all), along with dozens of faculty, came from distances as far as Los Angeles and Pretoria and Khabarovsk over those 17 years to make the trip to St Petersburg for a magic summer of borderless cultural interaction and intellectual exploration.

Then, in the height of the first waves of the global covid pandemic, the school went virtual as V-NYI, and grew to include 200-250 students from 50+ countries attending each session live via zoom, starting in summer 2020, continuing in winter and summer 2021, winter and summer 2022, and most recently in winter 2023, with V-NYI #6.  The six V-NYI Institutes have hosted over 1400 students from over 70 countries.  In March, 2022, we became the NYI Global Institute of Cultural, Cognitive and Linguistic Studies.

As of Fall, 2022, NYI is now active year-round. All former NYI students, TAs and faculty are invited to participate in ongoing live NYI programming. 

Нет войне. 

With peace and solidarity,
The V-NYI Team