The Kashubian Institute is an association of scholars operating in Gdańsk since 1996. It brings together over 150 people mainly representing the academic community of the Tricity and Pomerania (Słupsk, Toruń, Szczecin, Bydgoszcz), other academic centres located in Poland (Warsaw, Poznań, Kraków, Olsztyn, Wrocław etc.) and abroad (Canada, Denmark, Estonia, Czech Republic, Germany and Japan).
The basic tasks of the Institute include arranging research on Kashubia and popularizing its results, enriching and developing the Kashubian-Pomeranian movement, integrating the Kashubian scholarly community and supporting its development.
The Kashubian Institute is the most important scholarly institution dealing with Kashubian issues. Its achievements include nearly 300 publications of fundamental importance for research into Kashubian culture and its documentation.
- Historia Kaszubów w dziejach Pomorza [History of Kashubians in the History of Pomerania] (volumes I–V), covering the period from the Middle Ages to the present day (2019–2024),
- Gniazdo Gryfa: Słownik kaszubskich symboli, pamięci i tradycji kultury [The Griffin’s Nest: Dictionary of Kashubian Symbols, Memory and Cultural Traditions] (2020),
- the series Biblioteka Pisarzy Kaszubskich [Kashubian Writers’ Library] (since 2007, 19 scholarly editions of classic literary texts in the Kashubian language have been published),
- over twenty volumes of the scholarly yearbook Acta Cassubiana, which not only publishes texts about Kashubia, but also promotes the academic variety of the Kashubian language,
- several dozen scholarly and scientific monographs representing various disciplines (including publications in Kashubian),
- a bilingual series under the collective title Vademecum, presenting – in an attractive and accessible form – the most important issues regarding Kashubia, e.g. language, history, literature, contemporary Kashubian culture, the Kashubian movement, Kashubians in the period of transformation after 1989, Kashubian theatre and the Kashubian natural world,
- scholarly biographies of key figures in the Kashubian movement and culture (e.g. Aleksander Majkowski, Jan Karnowski, Franciszek Sędzicki, Rev. Józef Wrycza, Bernard Szczęsny etc.),
- bibliographic publications, translations of texts about Kashubia and of Kashubian literary texts from and into other languages etc.
Additionally, the Kashubian Institute conducts various types of research projects, organizes conferences, seminars and debates, and awards the prestigious Gerard Labuda Award every three years. Moreover, it strongly supports educational activities, and its members participate in the development of the discipline of Kashubian ethnophilology at the University of Gdańsk, are organizers and lecturers in postgraduate studies for teachers, conduct classes for teachers, e.g. at the Kashubian Folk High School etc.
Very important activities, also from the point of view of the self-knowledge and self-identification of Kashubians, as well as in combating a feeling of cultural inferiority, are activities disseminating knowledge about Kashubs in Poland and abroad. Cooperation with various academic circles and others results in numerous publications about Kashubians, their language, Kashubian education, contemporary culture etc.
