Bard-AUCA Study Abroad Program Spring 2026

Applications are open for the Spring 2026 Bard-AUCA Study Abroad Program in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan! Hosted by the American University of Central Asia (AUCA), a Bard College dual-degree partner since 2009, the program invites undergraduate students to spend a semester studying in an international liberal arts setting at one of Central Asia’s leading institutions.

Please find the program details below. Also, please feel free to share with students who may be interested. Questions are welcome at torlova@bard.edu.

Spring 2026 Bard-AUCA Study Abroad Program

January 5 - May 23, 2026

Deadline: November 1, 2025.

For more information and to apply visit the website.

The Bard-AUCA study abroad program provides students a chance to engage deeply with the languages, cultures, and politics of Central Asia while living and studying in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan. With coursework in fields such as Anthropology, Central Asian Studies, Political Science, and regional languages, the program is especially fitting for students interested in the post-Soviet space. Russian language development is supported across all levels, and students can choose one of three academic tracks based on their academic goals and language proficiency:

• Beginning Russian Language Track

• Intermediate/Advanced Russian Language Track*

• Liberal Arts Track

*Students with at least one year of college level Russian can apply for the Intermediate and Advanced Russian Language Track.

Key aspects of the program include:

• One-week Russian Intensive

• Russian Language Courses

• Russian-speaking Home-Stays

• Enrollment in 2-5 academic courses

Additional program highlights:

• Cultural program 

• Support from peer tutors

• Student clubs, extracurricular activities, and civic engagement projects

• Volunteering and internship opportunities

CFA: Yad Vashem/USHMM Workshop: Everyday Life of Jews in the USSR during the Holocaust and its Early Aftermath

Deadline: April 20, 2020


Dates: Monday-Friday, August 30–September 3, 2020, Jerusalem

The Moshe Mirilashvili Center for Research on the Holocaust in the Soviet Union of the International Institute for Holocaust Research at Yad Vashem and the Jack, Joseph and Morton Mandel Center for Advanced Holocaust Studies of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum (USHMM) are pleased to invite applications for a research workshop entitled, "Everyday Life of Jews in the USSR during the Holocaust and its Early Aftermath." The workshop is scheduled for August 30–September 3, 2020 at Yad Vashem in Jerusalem. This is the third research workshop co-organized by Yad Vashem and USHMM with a focus on the former Soviet Union.

The workshop will focus on the Holocaust and everyday Jewish life during World War II and early years after the war in the countries of the former Soviet Union. Topics might include, but are not limited to the following themes: antisemitism, evacuation and Jewish life in the Soviet rear, ghettoization, collaboration, hiding, resistance, gender, violence, Jewish children and families during the Holocaust, survival in camps and ghettos, Jews in the Red Army, trauma, art and literature.  

Participants will be expected to submit a paper (no more than 15 pages) a month prior to the beginning of the workshop for circulation among the participants. Daily sessions will include 30-minute presentations followed by a discussion (up to 30 min), as well as an opportunity for participants to do research at Yad Vashem’s library and archives.

Applications will be accepted from doctoral candidates (aspirants) and scholars who obtained their Ph.D. (or candidate of science degree) within the last five years. Applications are welcome from scholars working in all relevant academic disciplines, including anthropology, archaeology, art history, geography, film studies, history, Jewish studies, law, literature, material culture, philosophy, political science, religion, sociology, and other fields.

All application materials must be received by 20 April 2020. Incomplete applications will not be considered after this date. Late applications will not be accepted. The selected participants will be notified by 20 May 2020. 

Please send all application materials via email to

shlomit.shulchani@yadvashem.org.il:

1. A current Curriculum Vitae outlining the applicant’s qualifications (including previous coursework, research projects, presentations, and publications).
2. An abstract of no more than 1000 words for your proposed paper (including title and discussion of methodological and theoretical issues).
3. A letter of recommendation (for students only) addressing the applicant’s scholarly potential. To preserve the confidentiality of recommendation letters, faculty recommenders must email their signed letters (on institutional letterhead) directly to shlomit.shulchani@yadvashem.org.il.

The workshop organizers are Dr. Arkadi Zeltser, Director of the Moshe Mirilashvili Center for Research on the Holocaust in the Soviet Union at Yad Vashem (arkadi.zeltser@yadvashem.org.il) and Dr. Daniel Newman, Program Manager of the Initiative for the Study of the Holocaust in the Soviet Union, USHMM (danewman@ushmm.org).

The organizers will cover the cost of economy class flights to and from the workshop, lodging for the seminar’s duration and meals. Participants must obtain their own health insurance.

The workshop will be conducted in English.

CFP: Migration as a Narrative: Russian-Speaking Identities and Communities in Space and Time

Deadline: February 18, 2020

The University of Edinburgh, 18-19 June 2020

Migration is a constant feature of the current age of ‘liquid modernity’, transforming societies into a collection of diasporas (Bauman). Research in Russian speaking mobility offers a valuable contribution to both the theoretical and empirical aspects of migration and mobility studies. While Russian speakers have crossed state boundaries for centuries, the collapse of the Soviet Union has created an unprecedented environment for mobility and diasporic processes of Russophones, destabilising hegemonic relations between the centre and the periphery and producing emerging conditions including ‘beached diasporas’, ‘Global Russians’, ‘virtual Russophonia’, and ‘transnational Russian cultures’, to name but a few. Currently, the geography of Russian-speaking communities outside Russia is wider than ever with the overall population comparable in size to that of the Russian Federation.

Discourse perspectives have recently marked a theoretical shift in migration research. Mobility is intrinsically discursive as space, communities, identities and belonging are constructed in narratives - those produced by migrants and those about migrants. What do these stories – written and oral, visual and multimodal, fictional and real – tell us about Russian-speaking movers across the world? As the Russian speakers populate the ‘third space’ (Bhabha) of diasporic sites, and as these sites turn to the ‘zones of intense cutting-edge creativity’ (Karim), what are the discursive manifestations and articulations of this condition? And how do the current migration narratives of Russophones compare with those produced in other ‘waves’ of migration from Russia and the Soviet Union?

We invite proposals for individual papers from colleagues who use discourse-based approaches to Russophone communities outside the Russian Federation from a variety of disciplines in humanities and social sciences: sociolinguistics, (linguistic) anthropology, discourse studies, narrative studies, conversational analysis, literary and film studies, communication and media studies, socio-political disciplines and other areas. Proposals including paper abstracts of 250 words accompanied by a short CV are to be submitted by no later than Tuesday 18 February 2020 to Professor Lara Ryazanova-Clarke Lara.Ryazanova-Clarke@ed.ac.uk

Timeline:

• Abstracts by 18 February 2020
• Responses to proposals by 28 February
• Dates of the Conference 18-19 June 2020

There is no conference fee. Paper presenters will be offered free tea and coffee, lunch and a conference dinner.

Non-paper giving participants will be asked to contribute to coffee breaks and dinner.

We will be able to offer a modest contribution towards travel for three graduate students on a competitive basis.

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CFA: Fieldwork and Scholarship Opportunities in Slavic Studies, Folklore, Ethnomusicology and Cultural Anthropology

Deadline: January 31, 2020

Scholarship and Internship Deadline Approaching

Students and scholars in Slavic studies, folklore, ethnomusicology and cultural anthropology have until January 31, 2020 to apply for scholarships and internships for PREEEF programs in Russia, Siberia and Kazakhstan.

The scholarship amount of $2000 supports participation in a folklore-collecting expedition led by a qualified Russian or Kazakh scholar. These expeditions are opportunities to establish international scholarly ties, improve language skills, and learn fieldwork techniques while conducting interviews, making video and audio recordings, serving as audiences and processing collected field materials.  Expedition teams are immersed in local customs, language and food. Fluency in the local language is helpful, but not required.

The unpaid internship offers inexpensive housing in Moscow in exchange for 4-6 weeks with the Gorky Institute of World Literature, editing rough English translations of articles by Institute scholars. Interns acquire practical experience in scholarly publishing and receive guidance from IMLI staff for any personal research they wish to carry out in Moscow. Internships are offered only to PREEEF folklore expedition participants.

Participation in expeditions is also open to volunteers.  Volunteers pay a fee which covers their accommodations, food and transportation during the expedition, plus a share of the team expenses.

Upcoming 2020 Folklore Expeditions:

The Funeral of Stroma (rain-making ritual).  Nizhnii-Novgorod oblast.

June 8-20           Dr. Yelena Minyonok, Gorky Institute of World Literature

Okunevo – place of power (new-age spirituality in a traditional village).  Omsk oblast.

July 1-10           Dr. Tatiana Saveljeva, Chelyabinsk State University 

Legends, songs and holy springs (Russian folklore).  Altai Republic.

July 10-23          Dr. Alevtina Tsvetkova,  Pavlodar State University (Kazakhstan)

Where cultures meet  (Russian and Altain folklore).   Altai Republic.

July 1-12           Dr. Yelena Minyonok, Gorky Institute of World Literature

Manpupuner – Mountain of Idols (ancient site, contemporary beliefs), Sverdlovsk oblast.

August 1-8         Dr. Tatiana Saveljeva, Chelyabinsk State University

Russian Old Believer folklore, Honey Savior festival.  East Kazakhstan.

August 9-19       Dr. Alevtina Tsvetkova,  Pavlodar State University (Kazakhstan)

Settling Siberia - folklore of Ukrainian and Belarusian settlers of Siberia.  Irkutsk oblast.

Aug 21–Sep 4     Dr. Yelena Minyonok, Gorky Institute of World Literature

For further information, click here or contact info@preeef.org

CFA: Residence Grant 2020-2021 at the Center for Urban History (Lviv, Ukraine)

Deadline: January 15, 2020

The Center for Urban History invites researchers of various fields in the humanities from different countries to apply for the 2020-2021 Residence Grant.

We welcome applications for research that offer broad interpretations of urban history as a discipline at the intersection of various approaches of humanities and social sciences. The chronological and geographical frames of the proposed research are limited to the 19th and 20th-century history of East and Central Europe. 

We especially encourage historians, culture studies scholars, and anthropologists. 

The program includes:

• five one-month residence grants for young researchers, working on their PhD thesis or preparing them for publishing,
• five two-week residence grants for advanced researchers,
• three residencies on digital urban history in cooperation with the Lviv Interactive project, an online encyclopedia representing the history of Lviv through places and spaces
• one residency in digital urban history, jointly with the Urban Media Archive

The Center offers

• accommodation in the guest rooms of the Centre
• a place for research at the office
• shares access to its library resources, urban media arсhive, research works, scholarly contacts
• provides an opportunity to present and discuss the preliminary results of the grantee’s project at the Center’s Urban seminar or public lectures.

Applications have to include:

• Project Description (1000-2000 words)
• Curriculum vitae
• List of publications
• Letter of recommendation for non-holders of PhD or relevant degree

Please submit the application to the email grants@lvivcenter.org. For further details on the application, please click here. 

CFA: Postdoc in Social Anthropology of Post-Socialism, HSE St Petersburg

Deadline: February 9, 2020


The Centre for Historical Research, HSE St Petersburg, Russia, invites applications for postdoctoral research fellowship in social anthropology. Successful candidates will have a recent PhD from an internationally recognized university awarded before start date of the fellowship tenure or within the last 5 years, and a demonstrable research potential in the anthropology of global post-socialism.

Regional and topical specialization is open, including, but not limited to, the anthropology of the political, economy, religion, science, the digital and the Anthropocene. Knowledge of Russian is not required.

The position involves pursuing candidate’s own research in a vibrant and growing anthropological community of HSE St Petersburg, with some teaching encouraged, though not required.

Appointments are normally made for one year but renewable for additional two years.

The Higher School of Economics is a young, dynamic and fast-growing Russian research university which offers postdoctoral fellows a competitive salary and standard medical insurance. The Center of Historical Research is a stimulating international hub for history and anthropology which anthropological events include forthcoming “Sovereignty” Symposium of the Soyuz, the post-socialist cultural studies interest group of the American Anthropological Association.

Apply online to this postdoctoral fellowship by providing a CV, a statement of research interest and a recent research paper. At least two letters of recommendation should be sent directly to the International Faculty Recruitment Office at fellowship@hse.ru before the application deadline of 9 February 2020.

Further particulars here. For inquiries contact Nikolai Ssorin-Chaikov (nssorinchaikov@hse.ru). 

CFP: Central Asian Migrants in Western Europe

Deadline: October 20, 2019


Dates: January 10/11, 2020
Venue: Auditório da Biblioteca Municipal, Lagoa - Algarve (Portugal)
Convenor: António Eduardo Mendonça – antonioeduardo@campus.ul.pt (IGOT - UL)

We have the pleasure to announce the International Conference Central Asian Migrants in Western Europe, dedicated to the study of Post-soviet Central Asian migrant communities in Western European countries since 1991. This event was made possible by the generous support of the Municipality of Lagoa – Algarve (Portugal).

We invite contributions from anthropologists, sociologists, geographers, historians, demographers and others; we welcome papers both from senior researchers and from scholars who are completing their dissertation or have just received their PhD. There is a limited number of places.

Abstracts of up to 300 words and a short bio (50 words) should be sent to antonioeduardo@campus.ul.pt by October 20. Decisions will be made by October 31. We expect all speakers to submit their revised papers for publication in an edited collection or special journal issue by July 2020.

The language of the conference is English.

Accommodation: the organization has a limited number of places to offer (two nights in a twin room); priority will be given to PhD students, post-docs, and scholars and researchers from the region - one per accepted paper. Unfortunately, we are not able to provide any support with travel expenses.