PRESIDENT
Honorary Professor Vesselin Metodiev, Ph.D.
Member of the Board of Trustees of NBU since 26.05.2000 and of the Chair’s Council – since 12.12.2011. Chair of the History department of NBU.
Honorary Prof. Veselin Metodiev was member of the Parliament in the 40th National Assembly and Vice-Chair of the Parliamentary Group of the party “Democrats for Strong Bulgaria”. In the period 1997-1999 he was Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Education and Science.
Before joining NBU, Veselin Metodiev worked in the General Directorate of Archaives at the Council of Ministers and was member of the Parliament in the 37th and the 38th National Assemblies.
His publications include the monograph ‘The Council of Ministers in Bulgaria. The Beginning 1879-1886’ and the following co-publications: “120 years Council of Ministers in Bulgaria”, “Bulgarian Constitutions and Constitutional Projects”, “State Institutions in Bulgaria 1879-1986”.
Honorary chairman (President) of NBU
Prof. Bogdan Bogdanov has been Chairman of the Council of Presidents since June 4, 2016.
Bogdan Bogdanov initiated the idea of New Bulgarian University as a continuation of the Society for New Bulgarian University together with an organizing committee consisting of scholars, researchers and entrepreneurs. Prof. Bogdanov was President of the NBU Board of Trustees in the period 14.03.1994 – 21.05.2011.
He is a philologist in classical studies and university lecturer in Ancient Greek literature and culture. As President of the Managing Board of the Open Society Foundation he focused on modernization of libraries, integration of minority groups, human rights, unlimited availability of Internet access for academic institutions, provision of scholarships to Bulgarian students, promotion of Bulgarian history, language and culture.
In 1991-1993 he served as Ambassador of Bulgaria to Greece and contributed to the overcoming of distrust between Bulgaria and Greece accumulated during the Cold War period.
Prof. Bogdanov has published Bulgarian translations of The Characters of Theophrastus, Dialogues of Plato, ‘Daphnis and Chloe’ by Longus, ‘The Life of Alexander of Macedon’ by Pseudo-Callisthenes, and ‘Meditations’ by Marc Aurelius. Some of his prominent books are ‘From Homer to Euripides’, ‘Homer’s Epic’, ‘Ancient Greek Literature’, ‘Orpheus and the Ancient Mythology on the Balkans’, ‘Europe – Understood and Made’, ‘Separate and Together’, ‘The University – a Special Realm of Freedom’, ‘Past and Modern Times, ‘Modelos de realidad’ (published in Spain), ‘Reading and Its Functioning’ (published in Germany), the creation of World Historic Heritage series and many others.
Among his awards are the Grand Cross of the Order of the Phoenix for his service as Ambassador, the national Hristo G. Danov Award in humanities, Europe – Pass On Award – for European intergration. His activities in the Board of NBU are focused on the achievement of NBU’s mission and development of creativity and entrepreneurship at NBU.
MEMBERS
Honorary Professor Vasil Garnizov, Ph.D.
Member of the Board of Trustees of NBU since 26.05.2000 and of the Chair’s Council – since 12.12.2011.
Prof. Vasil Garnizov is Vice-Chair of the Association of Balkan Anthropology and the Head of the Central Coordination Unit within the Special Preparatory Programme of the European Union for Bulgaria.
In the period 1999-2001 he was Deputy Minister of the Regional Development and Public Works of Republic of Bulgaria. Earlier he worked for the Folklore Institute at the Folklore Theory Section of Bulgarian Academy of Sciences. and also as parliamentary expert on local government, regional development and public works. V. Garnizov was General Director of the National Center on Territorial Development and Housing Policy and member of the International Pragmatics Association - Amsterdam, the Association of Europeanists in Brussels, the Steering Committee on Local and Regional Authorities of the Council of Europe, the Interdepartmental National Council on Ethnic and Demographic Issues at the Council of Ministers, the Programme Council of Bulgarian National Television.
He has more than 100 publications in the sphere of folklore, ethnology and social anthropology. V. Garnizov also participated in numerous radio and television broadcastings on educational, cultural, social and political issues. He has provided expert advices on different issues of Phare programme, UNDP, British Know-How Fund, Council of Europe, European Union etc.
George Tekev, Ph.D.
Member of the Board of Trustees of NBU since 15.12.2008 and of the Chair’s Council – since 12.12.2011.
George Tekev is Executive Director of New Bulgarian University.
He started working for NBU in1991 as a coordinator of NBU financial activities and rules and regulations. In the period 1992-1994 he was Director of the Free Faculty and later - till 2000, Director of the Central University Administration. In 2000 he became Executive Director of NBU.
George Tekev is involved in NBU strategic planning, development of university structure and internal rules and regulations as well as in NBU financial management, development of facilities and expansion of information resources. He is Chair of the Board of Foundation ”For New Bulgarian University” and a member of the Executive Board of Raina Kabaivanska Fund and of the jury of Viotti International Music Competition in Vercelli, Italy.
His academic interests are in the field of university management. He specialized at the Faculty of Political Studies of Bologna University, at the University for Foreign Students in Siena, Italy and at Surrey University, UK. G. Tekev received the Golden Quill Award for his contribution to Bulgarian culture and creative art practices introduced in a number of socially significant projects aimed at discovering, developing and promoting young talents.
Prof. Bochkov’s professional interests are in the field of folklore studies (Bulgarian heroic epos, legends, folklore history and theory), anthropology (gender and social roles, migration and cultural identity) and ethnology (men and women ethical images, ethical communities and cultures). He specialized in folklore studies in Russia and Finland.
In the period 2002–2006 Prof. Bochkov was Dean of NBU Basic Education Faculty, in 2006 till 2010 he was Vice-Rector responsible for Education and Accreditation. His publications include the monograph “The Unknown Hero” (1994), “An Introduction to the Folklore Culture” (2002) and ‘We vs. ‘the Others’. Studies in Ethnology (2009).
Professor D. Sc. Plamen Doynov
Professor D. Sc. Plamen Doynov is rector of New Bulgarian University since 01.07.2020. He teaches history and theory of literature, academic and creative writing at NBU.
Professor D. Sc. Plamen Doynov is among the founders of the Department of New Bulgarian Studies and had been a head of it for two mandates (2012–2020). He is an author of the preliminary design and director of the scientific program "The literature of the People's Republic of Bulgaria (1946-1990)".
He is a poet, playwright and literary historian. He has been awarded twice for his poetry with the "Nikolay Kanchev" (2012 and 2016) and "Ivan Nikolov" awards (2004 and 2012), for his dramatics - with "Ivan Radoev" (2001) and "Askeer" (2006) awards, for his research - with "Hristo G. Danov" in the category "Humanities" (2012), "Ivan Meshekov and Ivan Radoslavov" (2015) and "Ivan Dinkov" (2016) awards. His books have been published in France, Hungary and Poland, and his texts have been translated into all European languages. In 2013, the President of the Republic of Hungary awarded him the Golden Cross of Merit in the field of culture, and in 2018 he was nominated for the international award "European Poet of Freedom" in Poland. He is a longtime editor of the weekly "Literary Journal" (since 1993).
Professor D. Sc. Plamen Doynov is an author of 12 literary-historical monographs and books with literary criticism, including "Bulgarian poetry at the end of the twentieth century" (in two parts, 2007), "Bulgarian social realism: 1956, 1968, 1989" (2011), "The alternative Canon: The Poets "(2012)," Bulgarian Literature and the Beginning of the XXI Century "(2013)," Literature, Thawing, Fault: 1962" (2015)," Literature of Cases. From "Tobacco" to "Hunt for Wolves" (2017), etc. He is a compiler of over 50 scientific and documentary collections in eight publishing series in the field of the history of literature from the period of the People's Republic of Bulgaria.