Dear Esteemed Scholars,

The 5th International Symposium on Turkish Language Teaching and Turkology in the Balkans, to be held in 2026, will take place in Skopje on November 5–7, 2026, in cooperation with International Balkan University, under the main theme “Folk Literature and Oral Culture in the Balkans.”

Throughout history, the Balkan region has been a place where different cultures have interacted, possessing a rich heritage of oral culture and folk literature. In this context, oral narratives, folk poetry, folkloric elements, and cultural memory both carry traces of the past and play an important role in contemporary processes of identity formation.

This symposium aims to examine the historical development and current transformations of folk literature and oral culture in the Balkans through interdisciplinary approaches. The evaluation of oral culture elements from the perspectives of Turkish language teaching and Turkology is also one of the symposium’s key focal points.