After successfully completing his/her studies the graduate is able to:

• understand a complicated literary or general text and perform a textual and stylistic analysis of it
• translate, in an adequate, high-quality, and timely fashion, any Russian text into Czech
• effectively use the specialized, technical, factual, and aesthetic knowledge and skills obtained during the studies to achieve the best translation possible
• use available current translation tools and aids effectively during the translation process
• examine and proofread other people’s translations of literary or non-literary texts

Graduates can find employment as professional translators of non-literary (technical or journalistic) texts from Russian, as well as in managing translation projects, in editorial practice, and in national and European institutions.

The regular length of study is four semesters. To be allowed to sit the final state examination, the students must earn 120 credits in type A/required, type B/selective, and type C/elective courses. Type A/required courses form the expert basis of the study programme and they amount to 62 credits – including credits in courses aimed to help students write the Master’s thesis. Single-subject students further take type B/selective courses offered for their field (at least 28 credits), as well as type C/elective courses from an open offer of the department or other philological, historical, and aesthetical study programmes at the Faculty of Arts (at least 22 credits). During their studies, all students have to pass an exam from another world language (English, French, German, or Spanish) except for the students who have already passed the exam in their Bachelor’s degree study programme.

Students in the double-subject study programme have to earn at least 120 credits in both their subjects together (70 credits in their primary and 50 credits in their secondary study programme). The Master’s degree study programme is concluded by the Master’s thesis defence (or by submitting the Master’s degree minor thesis for the secondary study programme) and passing the final state examination.

The study programme is concluded by a thesis defence (in the single-subject study programme or in the primary field of the double-subject study programme) and passing the final state examination. The main body of the Master’s thesis has to contain at least 80 standard pages. The final state examination provides a comprehensive written and oral test of the knowledge obtained by completing obligatory translation studies courses, as well as a written test of translation skills. The written exam consists of two parts: 1) translation of three Russian texts (literary, technical, and journalistic) into Czech; and 2) a written test of theoretical basics of the field (the theory and history of translation, translation and translation studies, textual and discourse analysis, problems of Czech-Russian equivalence, and the basics of stylistics). It is obligatory to pass this part to be allowed to move on to the oral part of the exam. The topics of the questions in the oral part of the exam are based on set topics and literature about the theoretical basics of the study programme. The other part of the oral exam is a discussion about problematic solutions in written translation and potentially their defence.

For more information, please visit the department website: http://www.phil.muni.cz/wusl/home/studium/informace/statni-zaverecne-zkousky-a-zaverecne-prace

After completing the Master’s degree study, it is possible to continue further studies in a doctoral degree study programme in Russian Language, Russian Literature, or Philological Area Studies.