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REEES Speaker Series

The REEES Speaker Series features interdisciplinary research by invited scholars as well as NU faculty and graduate students.

Information about events, commentary, and faculty media appearances related to Russia's war on Ukraine can be found here.

Recent Events:

REEES Speaker Series: "What Makes Ukraine Resilient in an Asymmetric War? A Survey of Local Governments’ Emergency Responses.”
May 3, 2023
Oleksandra Keudel, Assistant Professor at the Department of Public Policy and Governance at Kyiv School of Economics, focuses her research on local democracy, social movements and civic engagement as well as business-political arrangements at the local level in Ukraine.

REEES Speaker Series: "A panel discussion: Russian Migration into the Caucasus and Central Asia"
March 16, 2023
The four panelists included: Diana Kudaibergenova, Assistant Professor of Political Sociology at the University of Cambridge, Anton Vacharadze, Memory and Disinformation Studies Direction Head at the Institute for Development of Freedom of Information (IDFI), as well as a Lecturer at the University of Georgia in Tbilisi, Ibrat Safo, a BBC journalist, and Alima Bissenova, Associate Professor of Anthropology at Nazarbayev University.  The discussion was moderated by Jeff Eden, Assistant Professor of History at Northwestern University.

REEES Speaker Series:  "A Matter of Faith: Religious Arguments and Political Goals Behind the Russian-Ukrainian War"
May 25, 2022
Co-sponsored by the Global Religion and Politics Research Group and the Buffett Institute for Global Affairs
Professor Dmytro Vovk is the Director of the Center for the Rule of Law and Religion Studies at the Yaroslav Mudryi National Law University in Ukraine.

REEES Speaker Series: "Chekhov's Seagull at Steppenwolf: A Conversation with the NU Faculty and Student Artists" 
May 19, 2022
Co-Sponsored by Critical Studies in Theatre and Performance Cluster, the Departments of Theatre and Slavic Languages and Literatures

The discussion of Chekhov’s Seagull featured Marcus Doshi (lighting designer), Ana Kuzmanic (costume designer), Sandra Marquez (actor: Polina), Dassia N. Posner (dramaturg), Todd Rosenthal (scenic designer), and Linnea Valdivia and Coco Huang (assistant dramaturgs)

REEES Speaker Series: "A Struggle for Home: The Crimean Tatars" A documentary screening and Q&A with the filmmaker and journalism professor Christina Paschyn (NU-Qatar)
May 18, 2022
Co-sponsored by  the Medill School of Journalism, Media, Integrated Marketing Communications and the Buffett Institute for Global Affairs 
Assistant Professor of Journalism (NU-Qatar), Christina Paschyn showed her film that tells the little-known story of the Crimean Tatars,featuring interviews with Crimean residents, historians, survivors of the 1944 deportation, Russian nationalists, and Tatar activists.  It was followed by a Q&A discussion with Zarema Bariieva, co-founder of the Crimean Tatar Resource Center.

REEES Speaker Series: "The Demand for Elections: How Voters React to the Cancellation of Elections in Russia"
March 4, 2022
Co-sponsored by the Comparative Politics Workshop
Professor Ora John Reuter, Department of Political Science at the University of Wisconsin - Milwaukee, presented his research on the demand for elections in Russia.

REEES Speaker Series: "The Latest on Putin's Invasion: Voices from Kyiv"
March 2, 2022
A discussion with two scholars from the Kyiv School of Economics and three REEES faculty: Tymofiy Mylovanov, President of KSE and Tymofii Brik, Head of Sociology Department, KSE talk with Ambassador (ret.) in Residence Ian Kelly, Yohanan Petrovsky-Shtern, Crown Family Professor of Jewish Studies and Professor of History, moderated by Jordan Gans-Morse, Associate Professor of Political Science.  View the recording here

REEES Speaker Series: "KGB Archives in Ukraine: Collections, Features and Access"
February 23, 2022
Co-sponsored by the Department of History, Department of Slavic Languages & Literature, Crown Family Jewish Studies Center, and Chabraja Center for Historical Studies
Dr. Andrii Kohut, Director of the SBU Archive in Kyiv and a visiting Fulbright Scholar at Stanford, discussed the unique collections of KGB archives that he oversees in Ukraine.

REEES Speaker Series: "Thirty Years After the Soviet Collapse: Firsthand Recollections and Reflections"
December 10, 2021
A discussion with four distinguished panelists: Ann Cooper is a professor emerita at Columbia University's Graduate School of Journalism and has more than 25 years of radio and print reporting experience. As National Public Radio's first Moscow bureau chief, Cooper covered the tumultuous events of the final five years of Soviet communism.  John Katzka is a retired Senior Foreign Service Officer and his 38-year career in the Foreign Service included two tours to the Soviet Union.  Andrey Kortunov is the Director General of the Russian International Affairs Council and a member of expert committees and boards of trustees for multiple Russian and international organizations. Maria Lipman is a Senior Associate for the PONARS program of the Institute of European, Russian and Eurasian Studies at George Washington University and an accomplished journalist.

REEES Speaker Series with Celia Donert: "The Legacies of the Romani Genocide in Europe"
October 11, 2021
Celia Donert, Associate Professor in Central European History at the University of Cambridge, discussed how the Holocaust affected Romani survivors and their families in post-war Europe.

REEES Speaker Series with Maria Shevtsova and Stefan Aquilina: "Russia’s Theatrical Past in Today’s World" 
February 10, 2021
Maria Shevtsova, Professor of Drama and Theatre Arts, Goldsmiths, University of London, and Stefan Aquilina, Director of the School of Performing Arts of the University of Malta and Co-Director of the Stanislavsky Research Centre, discussed their recent books Rediscovering Stanislavsky and Modern Theatre in Russia. Dassia Posner, Associate Professor of Theatre at Northwestern University, moderated a conversation with the two authors about the broader relevance of Russian theatre scholarship in today's world. 

REEES Speaker Series with Natalia Forrat: "The Civic and the Political: the Social Roots of Authoritarian Power in Russia"
January 11, 2021
Natalia Forrat, Post-Doctoral Fellow at the Weiser Center for Emerging Democracies at the University of Michigan,  discussed her current book project on the role of regional political machines and the nature of political power in “statist” societies.

REEES Speaker Series with Jesse Driscoll: "Ukraine's Civil War."
June 5, 2020
Co-sponsored by the Comparative Politics Workshop
Jesse Driscoll, Associate Professor of Political Science at UC San Diego's SD School of Global Policy & Strategy, discussed research from his forthcoming book manuscript on the civil war in Ukraine.

REEES Speaker Series with Eliot Borenstein: "Plots Against Russia: Conspiracy and Fantasy After Socialism."
May 29, 2020
Co-sponsored by the Department of Slavic Languages and Literatures
Eliot Borenstein, Professor of Russian and Slavic Studies, Collegiate Professor at New York University presented on his recently published book Plots Against Russia: Conspiracy and Fantasy After Socialism.

REEES Speaker Series with Volha Charnysh: "The Fiscal Logic of Outgroup Bias: No Salvation without Taxation."
May 22, 2020
Co-sponsored by the Comparative Politics Workshop
Volha Charnysh, Assistant Professor of Political Science at MIT,  discussed her paper "The Fiscal Logic of Outgroup Bias: No Salvation without Taxation," based on historical data from pre-revolutionary Russia.

REEES Speaker Series with Keely Stauter-Halsted: "Borders and Bordering in the Polish Second Republic: Refugees and the Shaping of Modern Citizenship."
February 14, 2020
Co-sponsored by the Department of History and the Colloquium on Refugees, Migrants and Statelessness as part of the WCCIAS Global Lunchbox Series
Keely Stauter-Halsted, Professor of History and Hejna Family Chair in the History of Poland at the University of Illinois in Chicago, discussed her paper "Borders and Bordering in the Polish Second Republic: Refugees and the Shaping of Modern Citizenship."

REEES Speaker Series with Stefan Ionescu: "Restitution of Jewish Property in Post-Holocaust Bucharest, 1944-1950."
November 15, 2019 
Co-sponsored by the NU Holocaust Educational Foundation and Chabraja Center for Historical Studies
Stefan Ionescu, the Theodore Zev and Alice R. Weiss-Holocaust Educational Foundation Visiting Associate Professor in Holocaust Studies at Northwestern University, discussed his current research, "Restitution of Jewish Property in Post-Holocaust Bucharest, 1944-1950."

REEES Faculty & Graduate Student Research Tips Colloquium
October 9, 2019 
Faculty and graduate students who recently have conducted research in Eurasia and Eastern Europe shared research tips and other observations from their travels.