Graduate Students
Reed Johnson
B.A. Russian and Eastern European Studies, Wesleyan University (Phi Beta Kappa); MFA Creative Writing, University of Virginia (Henry Hoyns Fellow)
Study Abroad: Hertzen University, St. Petersburg (ACTR full-year academic exchange)
Research Interests: Early Soviet literature; Russian and Soviet satire; Chekhov's short fiction, his correspondence with other writers and theories on writing; the works of Sigizmund Krzhizhanovsky and other twentieth-century absurdist and phantasmagorical writers; theory and praxis of literary translation
Papers Presented:
"Translation and Palimpsest: Natalya Klyucharova's 'One Year in Paradise,'" University of Virginia Slavic Forum, February 2011
Languages: Russian
Courses Taught: Contemporary Satire; Fiction Writing; Second-Year Russian
Awards: Jefferson Fellowship, Jefferson Scholars Foundation; Henry Hoyns Fellowship, University of Virginia; Ivan Klima Fellowship, Prague Summer Program; Emily Balch Award for Best Short Story by UVa Graduate Student
Katya Jordan
Ph.D. Candidate; M.A. Slavic Languages and Literatures, University of Virginia; B.A. English and TESOL Certificate, University of Utah
Study Abroad: The London Program of the University of Utah, Renaissance Plays and Modern Theater, May – June, 2002; Chelyabinsk State University, Department of Linguistics and Translation, 1997-1999
Research Interests: 19th and 20th century Russian literature, representation of visual art in literature, Russian cultural and national identity
Papers Presented:
“A.S. Pushkin and His Dunya’s Progress: A Journey Without End.” University of Virginia Slavic Forum, February 2011.
“Seeing Is Believing: Bashutsky’s Nashi and Gorky’s Kanal imeni Stalina.” Mid-Atlantic Slavic Conference (MASC), Swarthmore, PA, March 2010.
“Name That Tune: Creating a Subversive Musical Subtext in Gaidai’s Ivan Vasilievich: Back to the Future.” Southern Conference for Slavic Studies (SCSS), Charlottesville, VA, March 2009.
Publications:
A translation of poems by Albina Sineva in Ezra: An Online Journal of Translation (forthcoming).
“Tricorn Hats in Russia: A Fashionable Miscommunication.” In Materials from IV International Conference Lichnost' i obshchestvo: problemy vzaimodeistviia, Chelyabinsk University of the Russian Academy of Education (forthcoming).
“Muzyka kak sredstvo obshcheniia v povesti A. Kuprina Granatovyi Braslet.” In Materials from II International Conference Lichnost' i obshchestvo: problemy vzaimodeistviia, Chelyabinsk University of the Russian Academy of Education, 2009. 197-199.
Languages: Russian, Polish, French
Courses Taught: Dostoevsky; America Through Russian Eyes; Russian Phonetics Workshop; Second- and Fourth-Year Russian; Advanced Russian Conversation
Awards: Presidential Fellowship
Seth L. King
B.A Russian Language and Literature, Purdue University 2009;
B.S Geology, Purdue University 2009
Study Abroad: Pedagogy of Technical and Scientific Russian and English, ACTR Summer Russian Teachers' Program, Moscow State University, 2011
Research Interests: Slavic science fiction, technical and scientific
translation and pedagogy, ancient Russian civilization, mythology,
archaeology
Papers Presented:
"Defying Physics: The Soviet Union’s Doomed Northern
River Reversal Project," University of Virginia Slavic Forum, February 2011
"High-pressure phase diagrams of Hydrogen-Helium systems with Diamond Anvil Cells," American Geophysical Union, 2008
Languages: Russian, Spanish, Latin, German
Awards: Fulbright-Hays Scholar at Moscow State University, 2011; Special Commendation in Foreign Language, Purdue University 2008; Carnegie Institute for Science Undergraduate Fellow, Washington DC, 2007
Lydia Manon
B.A. International Affairs, The George Washington University, 2009
Study Abroad: CIEE Summer Russian Language, St. Petersburg, 2008
Research Interests: Post Cold-War revisions history in Russia and implications on contemporary international relations, role of Russian literature in shaping the national perception of diplomacy in Russia and abroad, the Gulag, Russian-American relations
Languages: Russian
Michael Marsh-Soloway
B.A. History and Slavic Studies, Northwestern University
Study Abroad: ACTR Advanced Russian Language and Area Studies Program, Herzen University, St. Petersburg, Fall 2007; U.S. Department of State Critical Language Scholarship (CLS), Bashkir State Pedagogical University, Ufa, Russia, Summer 2011.
Research Interests: The depiction of mathematics in Russian literature, the auxilliary careers of Russian thinkers, interactions between artists and leaders of state, conceptions of Russian empire and identity, Russian Poetry, the Cold War, contemporary international relations
Papers Presented:
"When Country Poets Transition to City: Comparing the Lives and Writings of Sergei Esenin and Langston Hughes," Mid-Atlantic Slavic Conference, Swarthmore, PA, March 2010.
"The Mathematical Aesthetics of Dostoevsky's Linguistics and the Significance of these Patterns for the Theme of Existentialism in his Short Fiction." University of Virginia Slavic Forum, February 2011.
"Poetry Praising the Ascension of Elizaveta I and Ekaterina II: A Comparison of the Odic Verses of Lomonosov and Derzhavin." Mid-Atlantic Slavic Conference, New York, NY, March 2011.
"A Multidimensional and Metaphysical Approach to Cinema: A Gogolian Critique of Tarkovsky's View of the Image as the Indivisible Building Block of Film." Southern Slavic Conference, Alexandria, VA, April 2011.
Publications:
"Interactions Along the Fault Lines of Civilizations: Investigating Literary Legacies and Transitions in Textual Presentations of the Caucasian Conquest (1817-1864)," Northwestern Undergraduate Research Journal (NURJ) 5 (Fall 2009). 18-25.
"When Country Poets Transition to City: Bucolic Nostalgia of Twentieth-Century Urban Movements in the Writings of Sergei Esenin and Langston Hughes." Ed. Mikhail Sergeev. Symposion: A Journal of Russian Thought, 15 (2010). 65-79.
"Что возмутило американских студентов," Letter to Editor Pavel Nikolayevich Gusev of Московский комсомолец. Ed. Anna Sharogradskaya. Журналист 2 (February 2011). 74.
Languages: Russian
Courses Taught: Intermediate Russian Conversation
Jill Mackenzie Martiniuk
B.A. Russian Area Studies, Emory University; M.A. Central and Eastern European Studies, La Salle University; M.A. Slavic Languages and Literatures, University of Virginia
Study Abroad: Emory University Study Abroad, St. Petersburg, 2003; University of Arizona Study Abroad, St. Petersburg and Moscow, 2008; The American House, Vladimir, 2010; Graduate Assistant for "UVA in Russia," 2011
Research Interests: the Russian novel, gender studies, Ukrainian literature, madness in Russian literature, children’s literature
Papers Presented:
“Beyond the Margins: Determining Printing Format via Margins in Venedikt Erofeev’s Moskva-Petushki.” University of Virginia Slavic Forum, February 2011.
"Using Google Earth To Map Works of Russian Literature." UVA Slavic Department Brown Bag Series. February 2011
“Alluding to Alice: The Influence of Lewis Carroll’s Alice stories on Kharms’ ‘Starukha’.” University of Chicago Slavic Forum, April 2010
Publications:
“The Very Best of Moscow in 3 Days." Unanchor.com. (Online)
Languages: Russian, Polish, French, Spanish
Courses Taught: First-Year Russian, Second-Year Russian, Ritual and Family Life (UVa); Russian Masterpieces of the 20th Century: Magic, Murder and Madness (Semester at Sea)
Oguljan Reyimbaeva
B.A. Sociology, American University of Central Asia
Research Interests: Nineteenth-century Russian literature, especially Gogol and Dostoevsky
Languages: Russian, Turkmen
Courses Taught: Second-Year Russian, Intermediate Conversation
Stanley Stepanic
B.A. Philosophy and Art History, St. Vincent College
Study Abroad: St. Petersburg 2001, 2002
Research Interests: Russian animation, the Gulag, Russian politics, China, Chinese Laogai, Chinese politics, Russian children's literature, Russian Gothic literature
Papers Presented:
“Slavic Identity: The Violent Underground of Modern Russia,” Southern Conference on Slavic Studies, 2009.
Languages: Russian, Chinese, Polish, German
Courses Taught: Dracula; Ritual and Family Life; First-Year Russian; Second-Year Russian
Kathleen Thompson
B.A. University of Virginia; M.A. Slavic Languages and Literatures, University of Virginia
Study Abroad: St. Petersburg State University, 2003; Petrozavodsk, 2008
Research Interests: Émigré literature, 21st-century authorship, the digital humanities
Papers Presented:
"Gary Shteyngart and the Case of the Misplaced Identity", Brown University Graduate Student Conference, 2011
"Poetry as Cinema: Juxtapositions of Word and Image in Tarkovsky's Mirror," Mid-Atlantic Slavic Conference, 2010.
“Beards, Babki, Lyres and Lenin: An Examination of the Development of Russian Satire Through Comparison of Lomonosov and Sumarokov to Zoshchenko,” Southern Conference on Slavic Studies, 2009.
Languages: Russian, Polish, French, Spanish
Courses Taught: First-Year Russian; Second-Year Russian; Intermediate Conversation; Amerika Through Russian Eyes
Vicky Vutova
Humanitarian Profile (Summa Cum Laude), American College of Sofia, Bulgaria; B.A. Russian Area Studies (Magna Cum Laude), Washington and Lee University
Research Interests: Slavic folklore (fairy tales, myths, legends, art, traditions, holidays, dances), Nina Sadur, Russian Modernism, Pushkin and classical mythology, Karamzin, Nabokov’s space organization, Bulgarian and Russian purge literatures
Papers Presented: "Witch’s Tears: Sadur’s Moral Scary Fairy Tale of the Modern Day Rusalka," University of Virginia Slavic Forum, February 2011.
Languages: Bulgarian, Russian, Spanish
Courses Taught: English as Second Language (American College of Sofia); First-Year Russian
Publications:
"10 Things You Would Have Never Guessed Bulgaria Gave to the World," SSGS Obrazovanshchina Newsletter (December 2010).
Translation of a poem by the Bulgarian poet Peyo Yavorov into English, SSGS Obrazovanshchina Newsletter (May 2011).
Awards:
First Year Russian Award (2006-2007), Washington and Lee University
Linda Cooper and Bobby Henderson Award (2009), Washington and Lee University
Miri Zengina
B.A. Philosophy and Film Studies, summa cum laude, Tel Aviv University
Research Interests: the relationship between Russian literature and philosophy, cultural history, Russian literary criticism and theory
Papers Presented:
"Pagan Priests and Unclean Spirits: Heart of a Dog as a Spiritual Satire of Possession,” University of Virginia Slavic Forum, February 2010.
"Two-Faced and Double-Voiced: the Dynamics of Truth, Falsehood, and Language in The Death of Ivan Il'ich," University of Virginia Slavic Forum, February 2011.
Languages: Russian, Hebrew
Courses Taught: Guided Reading in Descartes’ Meditations (Tel Aviv University); Second-Year Russian
Awards: Rector Award for Academic Excellence, Tel Aviv University, 2006; Dean of the Arts Award for Academic Excellence, Tel Aviv University, 2007; Atia and Gordon Memorial Fund Award for Academic Excellence, Tel Aviv University, 2008