Education & Professional History
Kurgan State University, BA, MA; University of Wisconsin-Madison, MA; PhD
I have a PhD in Slavic Languages and Literatures from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. At Carleton College, I teach all levels of Russian language and a variety of courses on Russian and Russophone literature and culture. I am also the Program Director for Carleton College’s Off-Campus Program in Kazakhstan, called “Russophone Studies in Central Asia.”
I have lived and worked all over the world. I immigrated from Russia to Saint Paul, Minnesota in 1999, and then left to pursue my PhD. After moving to the East Coast, I taught Russian language, literature, and culture at Yale University, the University of Pennsylvania, and the Kathryn Wasserman Davis School of Russian at Middlebury College. In 2022, I returned to Minnesota via Kazakhstan, where I was an assistant professor at Nazarbayev University in Astana. I taught world and Russian literature for eight years and advised MA theses in the Master of Arts Program in Eurasian Studies (MAES).
My primary research specialty is the 19th-century Russian polemical novel. I write on Dostoevsky, Leskov, the nihilist countercultural movement, Russian revolutionary intelligentsia, the intersections of literature and science, and on realism. Currently, I am working on a book-length study of Russian conservative novelist Boleslav Markevich. I also publish translations and develop materials on teaching Russian as a foreign language.
Please come to my office hours, join us for “Russian Table,” or take one of my classes!
Education
- D., 2013, Slavic Languages and Literatures, Minor in Comparative Literature, University of Wisconsin-Madison. Dissertation: “The Dialog with Nihilism in Russian Polemical Novels of the 1860s-1870s.” Advisor: Alexander Dolinin
- A., 2004, Slavic Languages and Literatures, University of Wisconsin-Madison
- A., B.A., Diploma with Honors, 1997, Russia; English and German Philology, Kurgan State University
- Jagiellonian University, Krakow, Poland, Summer 2005, language studies (Polish)
Professional Appointments
- Lecturer in Russian, Carleton College, 2022 – present
- Assistant Professor; Languages, Linguistics and Literatures, Nazarbayev University, Kazakhstan, 2014-2022
- Director, SSRES (Summer School of Russian and Eurasian Studies), Nazarbayev University, Astana, Kazakhstan, 2016-2017
- Instructor, Kathryn Wasserman Davis School of Russian, Middlebury College, Summer 2013, Summer 2014
- Lecturer, Slavic Languages and Literatures, University of Pennsylvania, 2010-2012
- Lector, Slavic Languages and Literatures, Yale University, 2008-2010
- Lecturer, Slavic Languages and Literatures, University of Wisconsin-Madison, 2006
- Instructor, Department of Foreign Languages, Kurgan State University, Russia, 1998-2001
At Carleton since 2022.
Highlights & Recent Activity
Faculty Director OCS Program in Qazaqstan
Russian Language Associate Coordinator
Recent Publications:
“Anti-Darwinism as Anti-Nihilism: The Conservative Response to Darwinism in Mikhail Katkov’s Russian Messenger and The Moscow News and Boleslav Markevich’s Pedagogical Romance Marina from Alyrog (1873),” in Reading Darwin in Imperial Russia, edited by Andrew M. Drozd, Brendan G. Mooney, and Stephen M. Woodburn, Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2023, pp. 121-168.
Translations:
“from Metamorph,” by Anuar Duisenbinov. Co-translated with Mariya Deykute. Asymptote, Winter 2022.
“Два сбоя.” Russian translation of Sam Cha’s poem “Two Glitches.” With student participation. Angime Conversation. Available from: https://www.angime.com/sam-cha-two-glitches-rus. March 27, 2021.
“A Spectral Path in the Azure or Testimonies about Tea.” English translation of poetry and testimonies by Anuar Duisenbinov. “Slavs and Tatars.” Heyward Gallery. Southbank Centre, London, UK, 2021.
Recent Conference Presentations:
“Boleslav Markevich: The Types of the Past,” Presentation and Workshop, “The Other 19v” research seminar, Zoom, September 30, 2022.
“Peacocks and Crows: Populist Discourse on Progress and Individual Happiness in the Works of Osipovich-Novodvorsky and Kushchevsky,” Panel: “Populism I: Russian Populism and Literary Narrative,” ASEEES, November 10-13, 2022.
Discussant at the section “The Sisters Khvoshchinskaya IV: Historical Themes,” ASEEES, November 10-13, 2022.
Organizations & Scholarly Affiliations
Association for Slavic, East European and Eurasian Studies (ASEEES)
American Association of Teachers of Teachers of Slavic and East European Languages (AATSEEL)
North American Dostoevsky Society
ALTA (American Literary Translators Association)
Current Courses
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Fall 2024
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Winter 2025
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Spring 2025
RUSS 110:
Russophone Studies: Intensive Beginning
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RUSS 207:
Russophone Studies in Central Asia: Intermediate Intensive Grammar
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RUSS 209:
Russophoe Studies in Central Asia: Intermediate Conversation
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RUSS 228:
Russophone Studies in Central Asia: Contemporary Kazakhstani Culture and Post-Colonial Identity
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RUSS 228F:
Russophone Studies in Central Asia: Contemporary Kazakhstani Culture and Post-Colonial Identity in Russian
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RUSS 307:
Russophone Studies in Central Asia: Advanced Intensive Grammar
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RUSS 309:
Russophone Studies in Central Asia: Advanced Practicum
Journal Articles
“’All Sorts’ of Fires: Suvorin’s Roman-Feuilleton Vsiakie and Russian Polemical Novel of the 1860s,” Russian Literature, 113 (April–May, 2020), pp. 61-86.
“Nihilist Fashion in 1860s–1870s Russia: The Aesthetic Relations of Blue Spectacles to Reality,” Clothing Cultures, Bristol, UK: Intellect Ltd, 3:3, 2016, pp. 265–281.
“The Inkwell of the Russian Messenger: Editorial Politics and the Serialization of Dostoevskii’s Demons and Leskov’s At Daggers Drawn (1870-1872),” The Russian Review 75:1 (January 2016), pp. 20-44.
Articles in Edited Volumes
“Anti-Darwinism as Anti-Nihilism: The Conservative Response to Darwinism in Mikhail Katkov’s Russian Messenger and The Moscow News and Boleslav Markevich’s Pedagogical Romance Marina from Alyrog (1873),” in Reading Darwin in Imperial Russia, edited by Andrew M. Drozd, Brendan G. Mooney, and Stephen M. Woodburn, Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2023, pp. 121-168.
“Darwin, Dostoevsky, and Russia’s Radical Youth,” co-authored with David Bethea, in Dostoevsky Beyond Dostoevsky: Science, Religion, Philosophy, edited by V. Golstein and S. Evdokimova, Brighton, MA: Academic Studies Press, 2016, pp. 35-62.
Conference Proceedings
“On the Survival of Words and Things: The Task of Intelligentsia in Alexander Chudakov’s Novel-Idyll A Gloom is Cast Upon the Ancient Steps” in Vestnik Kurganskogo gosudarstvennogo un-ta, No. 3 (54), 2019, pp. 41-49.
“Brodsky’s Axioms and Formulas: Metaphysics of the Textbook and the Real Meaning of Space Exploration” in Universal’noe i kul’turno-spetsifichnoe v iazykakh i literaturakh: sbornik statei uchastnikov 1-oi mezhdunarodnoi konferentsii (Kurgan, 17 fevralia 2012 g.), edited by D.V. Portniagin, Kurgan: Izd-vo Kurganskogo gos. un-ta, 2012, pp. 64-71.
“Boris Pasternak i David Lean: nekotorye problemy v kinoadaptatsii ‘Doktora Zhivago’” in Iazyk i mezhkul’turnaia kommunikatsiia: Problemy lingvistiki i metodiki prepodavaniia: materialy nauchnoi konferentsii 16 maia 2001 g. Kurgan: Izd-vo Kurganskogo gos. un-ta, 2001, pp. 52-54.
Book Reviews
Rev. of Russian Literature and the West: A Tribute to David M. Bethea, eds. Dolinin, Alexander, Lazar Fleishman, and Leonid Livak, Slavic and East European Journal 55.2 (Summer 2011), pp. 294-297.
Web-Based Publications and Curriculum Development
RAILS (Russian Advanced Interactive Listening Series), UW-Madison, 2007, co-author
Translations
“from Metamorph,” by Anuar Duisenbinov. Co-translated with Mariya Deykute. Asymptote, Winter 2022.
“Два сбоя.” Russian translation of Sam Cha’s poem “Two Glitches.” With student participation. Angime Conversation.
“A Spectral Path in the Azure or Testimonies about Tea.” English translation of poetry and testimonies by Anuar Duisenbinov. “Slavs and Tatars.” Heyward Gallery. Southbank Centre, London, UK, 2012.
Manuscripts in Preparation and Under Review
“Peacocks and Crows: Populist Discourse on Progress and Individual Happiness in the Works of Osipovich-Novodvorsky and Kushchevsky” (book chapter, edited volume Russian Radicals Reconsidered, under contract with Lexington Press, submission date: November 2023).
“Petr Boborykin’s “Nihilism in Russia”: Philosophy or Polemics?,” journal article in an article cluster on Russian Literary Nihilism, under review at Wiener Slawistischer Almanach (WSA)
A Grand Marshal in Service of the Muses: Boleslav Markevich and the “Positive Direction in Russian Literature (book manuscript)
Metamorph, Anuar Duisenbinov, co-translated with Mairiya Deykute (book manuscript)
Current Courses at Carleton College
RUSS 102 Elementary Russian (Winter 2022)
RUSS 103 (Spring 103)
RUSS 204 Intermediate Russian (Fall 2022, Winter 2024)
RUSS 239 The Warped Soul of Putin’s Russia (Winter 2023)
RUSS 228 Dialogs in the Russophone World (Spring 2023)
RUSS 244 The Rise of the Russian Novel (Fall 2023)
RUSS 263 Madness and Madmen in Russian Culture (Winter 2024)
RUSS 335 Oral History: Narrative and Memory (Spring 2024)
Previously taught courses
Nazarbayev University, Department of Languages, Literatures and Linguistics, Astana, Kazakhstan
Texts and Contexts (Research Methods in Humanities), a core curriculum course (Spring 2021)
Introduction to the Novel (Spring 2018, Spring 2022)
Contemporary Russian and Russophone Literature; graduate seminar (Spring 2017, Spring 2019, Spring 2022)
Survey of Contemporary Russian Literature and Culture (Summer 2017, Spring 2019, Fall 2020)
Terrible Perfection: Heroines of Classical Russian Literature (Spring 2016, Spring 2017, Fall 2020)
Accursed Questions of Classical Russian Literature (19th-Century Literature Survey) (Fall 2014, Fall 2015, Fall 2017, Fall 2019, Fall 2021)
Petersburg Text in Russian Literature (Spring 2015, Fall 2018, Spring 2021, Fall 2021)
Introduction to Literary Studies (Spring 2015, Fall 2017, Fall 2019)
Introduction to Translation Studies (Fall 2015, Spring 2016, Summer 2016, Fall 2018)
Introduction to the Critical Issues in Humanities and Social Sciences (Fall 2014)
Internship in Russian as a Foreign Language (Spring 2015, Summer 2016, Summer 2017)
Elementary Russian for Faculty and Staff (Fall 2015)
The Kathryn Wasserman Davis School of Russian at Middlebury College
Fourth-Level Russian (Summer 2013, Summer 2014)
University of Pennsylvania, Department of Slavic Languages and Literatures
Madness and Madmen in Russian Culture (Spring 2011)
Russia and the West (Fall 2011)
First-Year Russian (Fall 2010)
Second-Year Russian (Spring 2012)
Third-Year Russian (Fall 2010, Spring 2011)
Life and Art of Anton Chekhov (Spring 2012)
Russian Utopia in Literature, Film and Politics (Spring 2012)
Portraits of Soviet Society (Spring 2011, Fall 2011)
Yale University, Department of Slavic Languages and Literatures
First-Year Russian (Fall 2008, Spring 2009, Fall 2009, Spring 2010)
Second-Year Russian (Fall 2009, Spring 2010)
University of Wisconsin-Madison, Department of Slavic Languages and Literatures
Russian Life and Culture through Literature and the Arts (Before 1917) (Fall 2006) (taught as a lecturer)
Graduate Russian Workshop (Spring 2006, Fall 2007)
University of Wisconsin-Madison, Department of Slavic Languages and Literatures (taught as a teaching assistant)
First-Year Russian (Fall 2002, Spring 2002)
Nineteenth-Century Russian Literature in Translation (Fall 2005)
Twentieth-Century Russian Literature in Translation, (Spring 2006)
Kurgan State University, Kurgan, Russia, Faculty of Foreign Languages
English as a Foreign Language (Fall 1997, Spring 1998)
Supervisor of Student Teachers (Fall 1997)
MA THESIS SUPERVISION
Aiganym Jampeissova. “Art Bazaar: a new virtual domain in the Kazakhstani art field during the COVID-19 crisis.” MAES Program. Nazarbayev University. Primary Adviser. (2020-2021)
Yuliya Ten. “Gender Nonconformity and Homosexuality in Kazakhstan’s Contemporary Visual Culture.” MAES Program. Nazarbaev University. Primary Adviser. (2018-2020)
Dmitry Melnikov. “Toward Russophone Super-Literature: Making Subjectivities, Spaces And Temporalities In Post-Soviet Kazakhstani Russophone Writing.” MAES (Master of Arts in Eurasian Studies) Program. Nazarbaev University. Primary Adviser. (2016-2017)
Yuan Gao. “Captivity And Empire: Russian Captivity Narratives In Fact And Fiction.” Second Reader. (2014-2016)
Current Courses
-
Fall 2024
-
Winter 2025
-
-
Spring 2025
RUSS 110:
Russophone Studies: Intensive Beginning
-
RUSS 207:
Russophone Studies in Central Asia: Intermediate Intensive Grammar
-
RUSS 209:
Russophoe Studies in Central Asia: Intermediate Conversation
-
RUSS 228:
Russophone Studies in Central Asia: Contemporary Kazakhstani Culture and Post-Colonial Identity
-
RUSS 228F:
Russophone Studies in Central Asia: Contemporary Kazakhstani Culture and Post-Colonial Identity in Russian
-
RUSS 307:
Russophone Studies in Central Asia: Advanced Intensive Grammar
-
RUSS 309:
Russophone Studies in Central Asia: Advanced Practicum