Culture

Culture in the European Union

European Capitals of Culture — 04 January 2009, 12:54 CET

Designed to "contribute to bringing the peoples of Europe together", the European City of Culture project has become ever more popular with the citizens of Europe and has seen its cultural and socio-economic influence grow through the many visitors it has attracted. The European Cities of Culture were chosen until 2004 on an intergovernmental basis; from 2005 onwards, the European Capital of Culture are decided each year by the EU Council on a Commission recommendation, which will take into account the view of a jury comprising seven prominent independent members, each of them experts in the culture sector.

European Prize for Contemporary Literature — 03 December 2008, 00:08 CET

The European Commission is launching a new European Union prize for contemporary literature. The aim is to put the spotlight on the creativity and diverse wealth of Europe's contemporary literature, to promote more circulation of literature within Europe and encourage greater interest in non-national literary works. The first edition of the Prize will be awarded in autumn 2009.

Europeana, Europe's Digital Library - briefing — 20 November 2008, 17:02 CET

Culture in the European Union

Europeana - the European Digital Library — 15 November 2008, 01:21 CET

'Europeana' is Europe's single and multilingual online portal opening the doors to books stored by national libraries all over Europe and to a rich variety of other digital works from cultural institutions including, paintings, music, maps, manuscripts, newspapers or even ancient vessels which have been digitised – all of this accessible just at the click of a mouse. 2 million digitised objects were to be available on Europeana as of 20 November. The policy goal of the EU Commission is to include 10 million digitised objects into Europeana by 2010.

Marseille European Capital of Culture for France in 2013 — 18 September 2008, 14:46 CET

The jury responsible for assessing the applications for the title of "European Capital of Culture 2013", which met on16 September in Paris recommends that the title be bestowed on Marseille for France. Four cities were still in contention after the preselection meeting last December: Bordeaux, Lyon, Marseille and Toulouse. The choice of Marseille should be formally endorsed by the Council of Ministers of the European Union in May 2009.

Sport: free movement of workers in the EU — 29 May 2008, 17:19 CET

The application of the Community rules on free movement of workers to sport is not dealt with in any specific Community legal provisions. However, there exists important case-law of the European Court of Justice in this field.

Sport and the European Union - guide — 29 May 2008, 17:12 CET

Culture in the European Union

Europa languages portal — 25 January 2008, 13:06 CET

This portal is your point of entry to information about languages from the European Union - Linguistic Diversity - Language Learning - Language Teaching - Translation - Interpretation - Language Technology

Languages in the EU website — 25 January 2008, 13:01 CET

Listen to all the 23 official languages of the European Union - i.e. the ones used for EU business. On this site you can hear examples spoken by interpreters from the EU institutions.

DGT-TM - DGT Multilingual Translation Memory of the Acquis Communautaire — 20 January 2008, 15:24 CET

The European Commission's is making its collection of about 1 million sentences and their high quality translations in 22 of the 23 official EU languages freely available. This kind of data is highly sought after by developers of machine translation systems in which automatic translation software "learns" from manually translated texts how words and phrases are correctly and contextually translated. The data can also help the development of other linguistic software tools such as grammar and spell checkers, online dictionaries and multilingual text classification systems.

Pavarotti songs — 06 January 2008, 00:55 CET

Pavarotti songs

European Year of Intercultural Dialogue (2008) — 04 January 2008, 17:59 CET

The European Year of Intercultural Dialogue (EYID) 2008 recognises that Europe’s great cultural diversity represents a unique advantage. It will encourage all those living in Europe to explore the benefits of our rich cultural heritage and opportunities to learn from different cultural traditions.

European Digital Library - guide — 29 November 2007, 01:21 CET

Culture in the European Union

Report on the implementation of the Action Plan "Promoting language learning and linguistic diversity 2004-2006" — 28 September 2007, 00:35 CET

The EU Action Plan "Promoting language learning and linguistic diversity 2004-2006" called for a progress review in 2007. A European Commission Working Paper reporting on its implementation was adopted on 25 September 2007. This report outlines the main results of the implementation of the Action Plan "Promoting language learning and linguistic diversity 2004-2006", both at European and national level. It highlights current trends in the reform of educational systems to better promote language learning, takes stock of what has been achieved in the past three years and provides a basis for further action in the field of multilingualism policy.

European Day of Languages 2007 — 27 September 2007, 16:30 CET

At the end of the hugely successful 2001 European Year of Languages, jointly organised by the Council of Europe and the European Commission, it was decided that 26 September each year should be the European Day of Languages, to celebrate the rich heritage of cultures and traditions embodied in all the languages of Europe – and not only the 23 official languages of the EU.

Aspects of European Cultural Diversity (What Is Europe?) — 11 September 2007, 19:32 CET

Culture in the European Union

EU Tube — 03 July 2007, 16:31 CET

The European Commission has launched a dedicated channel on YouTube to make its audiovisual material more widely available to the public. "This initiative reflects the Commission's commitment to better explain its policies and actions on issues which concern citizens across the EU – such as climate change, energy or immigration" said Margot Wallstroem, Vice-President for Institutional Relations and Communication Strategy.

Communication on a European agenda for culture in a globalizing world — 10 May 2007, 22:04 CET

The main purpose of the Communication is to see both what Europe can do for culture and what culture can do for Europe , with two main sets of objectives in mind: developing active European citizenship, respecting cultural diversity, promoting intercultural dialogue, while fostering a sense of 'European identity' complementary to other identities; the economic and social objectives of the Lisbon agenda, and the role of creativity in enhancing the competitive edge of Europe. (Culture and Creativity to Make Lisbon Work, states European Council - 9 March 2007).

Culture & the European Union - Frequently asked questions — 10 May 2007, 16:22 CET

Culture in the European Union

Culture — 09 October 2006, 11:06 CET

Culture in the European Union

Eurydice — 08 August 2006, 10:40 CET

Information Network on Education in Europe includes a searchable database of all the EU's education programmes. Eurydice is committed, first and foremost, to offering policy-makers and all those involved in the provision of education with information and studies geared to their needs. The Network boosts European cooperation in education by developing exchanges of information about systems and policies and producing studies on issues common to education systems.

Eurodicautom — 08 August 2006, 10:39 CET

Eurodicautom is the multilingual term bank of the European Commission. Eurodicautom covers a broad spectrum of human knowledge, but is particularly rich in technical and specialised terminology (agriculture, telecommunications, transport, legislation, finance) related to EU policy.

European Culture portal — 07 August 2006, 11:35 CET

Since its inclusion in the Treaty on the European Union, cultural cooperation has become a new community competency. The European Commission Culture site is aimed mainly at European cultural operators who want to set up cooperation projects with other European partners. Information on the numerous other EU policies for the promotion of culture is available on the European Culture Portal.

Translation Directorate-General of the European Commission — 05 August 2006, 21:12 CET

The European Commission's Directorate-General for Translation is the largest translation service in the world. Located in Brussels and Luxembourg, it has a permanent staff of some 1 650 linguists and 550 support staff, and also uses freelance translators all over the world. Known as the DGT after its English initials, the service translates written text into and out of all the EU's official languages, exclusively for the European Commission. Interpretation of the spoken word is the responsibility of the Commission's Directorate-General for Interpretation.

Languages of Europe — 05 August 2006, 21:09 CET

Official languages of Europe statistics: The official EU languages; Policy issues; Awareness raising; Language teaching; Language learning; EU funding opportunities; Key documents; Useful links