Center for Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies Records

The Center for Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies was founded in 1974 by Queens College Political Science Professor Harry J. Psomiades with support from the Ikaros Club, Queens College's Hellenic Orthodox Club. At the time of the Center's founding, other Ethnic Studies Programs began to emerge at Queens College, including Jewish Studies and Italian-American Studies. In 1974 there was a rise in the enrollment of Greek and Greek-speaking students at Queens College, and Dr. Psomiades created the center to respond to the growing interest of students in the languages, history, and culture of the Greek people from late Byzantine times to the present, as well as to respond to the needs of the Greek American community. The first full-time professor of Greek Studies, Dr. John Alexander was also hired in September of that year.

Currently, the major objectives of the Center are the following:

• The initiation, support and coordination of teaching Byzantine and Modern Greek subjects at Queens College.
• The promotion of Byzantine and Neo-Hellenic Scholarship and publications.
• The sustained effort to integrate the needs and interests of the Greek American community of New York and beyond to the Center’s academic teaching and research.

Until his retirement in 2003, Psomiades advocated for the continued growth and development of the Center for Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies. Critically, Professor Psomiades played the main role of spearheading fundraising efforts and developing a robust network of community leaders, academic leaders, and faculty, administration, and students to act as stakeholders in the program and to support the Center's growth (securing new faculty and administration lines, and general improvements to the center such as the addition of computers and development of the growing Greek Studies Library).

In 1978 an Advisory Council for the center was established with Professor Harry J. Psomiades as its head alongside other Queens College faculty. The Advisory Council took on the task of planning and securing grants and funding for the center, as well as discussing the development of courses and events. The following year, 1979, served as the start of the Annual Certificate of Achievement Awards Dinners held by the center, which served to honor student achievements, and were highlighted by hosting various important keynote speakers in the field of Byzantine and Modern Greek studies.

In the spring of 1984, the New York State Board of Higher Education approved a fully developed Bachelor of Arts in Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies. The B.A. was designed to provide students with detailed knowledge of the history, language, and culture of the Greek people from Byzantine times to the present.

Throughout the 1980s and 1990s, the Center was able to build back from the cuts of the 1970s New York City fiscal crisis and secure multiple full-time tenure track positions, increase the number of part-time faculty positions available per semester, and gradually increase its course offerings per semester. Numerous new courses were created for the B.A. program during this time, including Seminars on the Greek American Community (GRST 300), Greece and the New Europe ( Pol Sc 269), History of the Balkans 1821-Present (Hist 240), Middle Eastern World Politics (Pol Sc 260), as well as Early Christian and Byzantine Art (Art 211) as examples.

The Center of Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies has amassed a 6,000-volume library dedicated to illuminating Hellenism and Modern Greek Studies, which was renamed the Harry J. Psomiades Greek Studies Library. The center has sponsored and collaborated on dozens of conferences and lectures, the most influential being The Constantinos D. Paparrigopoulos Lectures and The Linos Politis Lectures. The center also contributes to Greek academic literature through various publications: the Journal of Modern Hellenism, which is a scholarly journal with annual publications starting in 1984, and several book publications that were published through Pella Publishing, “Foreign Interference in Greek Politics” by Couloumbis, Petropoulos, and Psomiades; “Essays on the Cyprus Conflict” by Couloumbis, and Ioatrdes; and “Greek American Relations” by Van Coufoudakis.