The Institute of English and American Studies, the second oldest of its kind in Hungary, traces its roots to the first Department of English, founded in 1938. Its 60th anniversary was marked in 1998 with the unveiling of an Országh László commemorative plaque, honoring the “father of English and American Studies” in Hungary, who had been Professor of English at the University of Debrecen. In 1997, the first Országh Chair in American Studies was established, sponsored by the Fulbright Commission, and has since hosted several visiting professors.
Over the decades, the university has trained more than 3,000 English teachers, many of whom have contributed across Hungary and abroad. Although Debrecen’s English Department was founded later than Budapest’s, it soon gained national significance despite wartime and political hardships. Established in 1938 with just eight students and a small staff under Sándor Fest, the department was disrupted by World War II, during which its facilities were occupied and Fest was killed during an air raid in 1944.
Teaching resumed in 1945 under temporary leadership until László Országh became head in 1946. He rebuilt the department from scratch, but a 1949 government decree halted teacher training for seven years. When it reopened in 1957, Országh again restored and expanded the program. By the mid-1960s, a new generation of scholars—including Péter Egri, Anna Katona, and others—had established the department’s academic reputation.
In the mid-1980s, Kossuth University merged its English, French, and German departments to form the Institute of Western Languages and Literatures. Due to increasing enrollment, English became an independent institute in 1991, later adding a Department of English Language Learning and Teaching in 1996. Since 2000, the Institute of English and American Studies has been part of the University of Debrecen following institutional unification.
László Országh
Professor László Országh (1907–1984) profoundly shaped English and American Studies in Hungary. His bilingual dictionaries remain indispensable for students, and his book Az amerikai irodalom története (1967) is still a standard reference. He also founded Hungarian Studies in English in 1963, editing it for ten years and helping it gain international recognition. Országh donated his extensive personal library to the University of Debrecen, where the “Országh Collection” remains a vital academic resource. His greatest legacy, however, is the personal and scholarly influence he had on his students.
The Institute has honored him through several commemorations. His ninetieth birthday was marked at the 1997 ESSE/4 international conference, where a round-table discussed his life and work, later published in HJEAS (1998). In 1998, the Institute’s seminar room was named after him, and a marble plaque was unveiled in his memory. On the centenary of his birth in 2007, a national event gathered scholars and family members to celebrate his achievements through academic talks and personal tributes. The main campus “high street” of the University of Debrecen was also named after him, serving as a daily reminder of a professor whose impact extended far beyond academia.
- Interviews, articles, commemorations (in Hungarian):
- Interjú Országh Lászlóval (Új tükör, 1983)
- Kerekasztal-beszélgetés Országh László életéről és munkásságáról, moderátor Virágos Zsolt (In memoriam Országh László, EKF, 2007)
- Walkóné Békés Ágnes emlékezése Országh Lászlóra (születésének 100. évfordulóján) (Élet és Irodalom, 2007)
- Abádi Nagy Zoltán emléktábla-avató beszéde (Magyar Szemle, 2007)
- Virágos Márta, Virágos Zsolt: Emlékezés Országh Lászlóra (Gerundium, 2023) (angol)
- Igazgatói kerekasztal-beszélgetés, moderátor: Venkovits Balázs (Gerundium, 2023)
