Current Graduate Students

  • Justina Bandol
  • Susan Bauckus
  • Timothy Beasley
  • Young-Jin Byun
    In 1997, I received my B.A. from Yonsei University (Seoul, Korea) in Russian Language and Literature, and in 2001 received my M. A. for a thesis on "The allegorical System of the Demonic in Gogol's Works." I studied in Moscow at the State Pushkin Institute of Russian Language (1995). In September of 2002, I began my first year of UCLA's graduate program. My academic interests are Myth in Russian and Slavic Literature (especially, the problem of sexuality and the allegories of nomadic, agricultural and urban civilization); Russian Songs and the Folk Tradition; Literary Theory; Nationalism; Modernization of Russian Society in Literature; Modern Russian Poetry (Pasternak, Tsvetaeva and Esenin); and Literary Translation (from Russian into Korean). I would also like to do work in Comparative Literature.
  • Boris Dralyuk
  • Yelena Furman
    I received my B.A. from Stanford University in Feminist Studies and “English with an interdisciplinary Emphasis on French and Russian Literatures (yes, that was the official title of the major). I am currently completing a dissertation on “Writing the Body in Contemporary Russian Women’s Fiction.” My primary academic interests include Contemporary (Perestroika to the present) Russian literature, specifically New Women’s Prose; Feminist Literary and Cultural Theory; General Literary and Cultural Theory; Russian and especially Western Postmodernism; Chekhov, especially the plays. I have also done work in 19th century Russian Literature; 20th century Czech Literature, and Comparative (British, French) Literature.
  • Marilyn Gray
  • Laris Karkafi
  • Jamie Keeton
    I graduated Cum Laude with a BA in History along with a certificate in Russian and East European studies from Arizona State University in May of 2002. I am interested in contemporary distopian literature both in Russian and the United States, particularly in comparing Tatyana Tolstaya and Margaret Atwood. I also enjoy the Absurdist literature of Central and Eastern Europe, as well as early Soviet literature. I do, however, also have non-academic interests, including crocheting, embroidery and jewelry making.
  • MIichelle Kelly
  • Sanja Lacan
  • Naya Lekht
  • Susanna Lim
    I received a B. A. at Korean University (Seoul) in Russian Language and Literature and earned my M. A. there. I am currently writing a dissertation on “The Far East in Russian Modernism, 1890s-1920s.” Among my primary academic interests are Orientalism during the Soviet Period and the Cold War; Post-Colonialism and Gender in Film and Literature; Korean and Japanese Film; Asian-American Literature; Brasilian Literature and Film; Minority Representation in Mass Media and Culture; Translation of Korean Literature into English. I hav chosen Croatian as my second Slavic language.
  • Yulia Morozova
  • John Narins
  • Holly Raynard
  • Nora Ryan
  • Antanina Sergieff
  • Stanislav Shvabrin
    Bio
  • Sonja Tighearnain  
  • Natasha Tikhonova
    I am a Moscow Pedagogical State University graduate (Department of Philology; Russian Literature major). The primary area of my academic interest is Russian literature and film (especially the problem of adaptation). My other fields of interest are methodology and linguistics, general as well as Slavic. As for my hobbies, I enjoy theater, cinema, museums, and the vibrant rhythm of a big city. My greatest passion, however, is classical music (I studied for eight years at a music school in Moscow).
  • Julia Verkholantsev
    I studied three years at Moscow State University (Czech Language and Literature), then transferred to the Hebrew University at Jerusalem, where I received my B.A. in Russian and Slavic Studies and General Humanities (with minors in Greek Language and Literature, and Linguistics) in 1994 and an M.A. in Linguistics in 1997. My primary academic interests are East Slavic and West Slavic Historical Linguistics and Language Contact; Medieval Slavic Literature and Cultural History (Russian, Ruthenian, Muscovite, Czech, Polish, and Croatian); Ruthenian as a Language of Writing in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. I am currently completing a dissertation on “*Lingua Ruthena in Polonia Usitata*: Fifteenth-Century Ruthenian Translations from Czech.” My other interests include Linguistic Historiography, Slavic and Greek Paleography, History of Writing, Literary Contexts of the Visual and Performing Arts, and Jewish Studies.