Past Events

Are you a high school or community college educator who is interested in deepening your understanding of the history, culture and current events of Russia and Eurasia? Consider applying for the Engaging Eurasia Teacher Fellowship! Applications for the 2024-2025 fellowship year, which is devoted to the theme Explorations of Identity in Russian & Eurasian Studies, are now open. The application deadline is May 15, 2024. 2024-2025 Fellowship Details This year-long study will take a multidisciplinary approach to understanding identity in Eurasia. The fellowship will allow participants to take a deep dive into the complex nature of identity, how it is created and perceived, how it changes, and how it can be politicized and polarized. The monthly webinars will help contextualize historically the many aspects that contribute to identity, ranging from topics like nationality, ethnicity, gender, sexuality, and race. Fellows will consider novels, poetry, art, film, and other media that both shape perspective and cultural identity as well as how identity is viewed and interpreted globally. They will also be asked to challenge their own assumptions and commonly held beliefs about identity and culture in Eurasia. Over the 9-month fellowship, fellows will participate in 8 content webinars, hearing from scholars with expertise on the fellowship topic. Each fellow is expected to complete a final project–either curriculum development or a literature review on a question that develops during the course of the fellowship. DEADLINE: May 15, 2024
FINALISTS NOTIFIED: End of May 2024

The University Center for International Studies cordially invites students graduating in Spring and Summer 2024 to celebrate their academic achievements and receive their credentials at the University Center for International Studies’ Graduation Ceremony in the Charity Randall Theater followed by a reception in the Cathedral Commons Room. Graduating students should look for their personal email invitations from the University Center for International Studies to RSVP and contact their UCIS academic advisor with any questions about the event. For additional details, please contact Laura Daversa at Laura.Daversa@pitt.edu Reception to follow the ceremony in the Cathedral Commons Room.

To celebrate the end-of-the-year, join the Pitt and CMU Russian programs for a talent show!

Join Global Experiences Office Peer Advisors for this weekly roundtable in the Global Hub! Bring your questions about study abroad programs!

Join Till Mostowlansky, Research Professor and Eccellenza Professorial Fellow in the Department of Anthropology and Sociology at The Graduate Institute Geneva, present his latest work: Transforming Landscapes of Aid: How Gulf Business, the War in Ukraine, and Equestrian Sports Change Small-Town Kyrgyzstan. Over the last decade, international development in Kyrgyzstan has undergone significant transformations. Despite the ongoing presence of diverse foreign organizations, notable shifts have occurred with the emergence of new contributors to aid, such as entities from the Gulf states, alongside increased trade revenues from China. This talk centers on a small town in southern Kyrgyzstan, delving into the concrete materialization of these influences within its social and political landscape. Drawing upon continuous ethnographic research conducted since 2022, the talk explores the intersection of Islamic charity with the state, the influence of excess on ideas of the good, and how equestrian sports serve as a catalyst for redistribution. Till Mostowlansky is a Research Professor in the Department of Anthropology and Sociology at the Geneva Graduate Institute. He is the author of Azan on the Moon: Entangling Modernity along Tajikistan’s Pamir Highway (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2017) as well as co-editor of Infrastructure and the Remaking of Asia (University of Hawai’i Press, 2023) and Humanitarianism from Below: The Alternative Politics of Universalism (UCL Press, under contract). The talk is part of the Future of Development Assistance project at the Center for Governance and Markets.

David Greene, award-winning journalist and former co-host of NPR’s Morning Edition, Shannon Reed, author and frequent contributor for The New Yorker, and Sean Guillory, host of The Eurasian Knot weekly podcast and producer of the award nominated Teddy Goes to the USSR podcast, will co-teach this hands-on course where students will work as a team to research, write, and produce a broadcast-quality audio narrative telling the stories of people around the world who have come to the University of Pittsburgh with the support of the Pittsburgh Network for Threatened Scholars. The focus of the course will be production of an audio narrative, but along the way, students will gain meaningful experience in collaboration and communication, archival research, interviewing and oral histories, script writing, sound editing, and other skills. Course enrollment is limited. No previous experience with interviewing or podcasting required, but students with demonstrated interest in the topic (Threatened scholars/human rights) or who participated in the Fall 2023 Art of the Interview Masterclass are particularly encouraged to sign up for the course.