Gift Amount: $1.25 million

Funds for: Division of the Humanities at UChicago, the Center for Hellenic Studies,

Summary: The Alexander S. Pissios Family Foundation Fund for Teaching of the Greek Language gave $1.25 million to support the study of Greek language at UChicago. This generous gift is supported by Alexander Pissios, UChicago College ‘26 parent. This gift will support the overall teaching of the Greek language in support of the Division of Humanities and the Center for Hellenic Studies.

Impact of the Gift: "What unifies Greek identity through time and space is the Greek language, which presents a rich repertoire of continuous, unbroken tradition that stretches back for more than three thousand years. The generous gift will allow the Center for Hellenic Studies to continue offering Modern Greek at the University of Chicago, extend its academic initiatives, and further its engagement with the historical Greek community in Chicago by supporting the teaching of Modern Greek, which is currently a small minority language is the U.S. in need of revitalization. At the UChicago, we want to offer an interdisciplinary forum for students and faculty who want to study the rich Hellenic tradition within the unified framework of Hellenic Studies. We hope to be able to establish a dialogue between disciplines in the direction of illuminating how relevant and useful Greek ideas continue to be today, and how transformative it is to study them as we address major current problems in society and try to find solutions.”—Anastasia Giannakidou, founder and inaugural director of the Center for Hellenic Studies and the Frank J. McLoraine Professor in the Department of Linguistics at UChicago