Home
SubscribeUS Scholar Opportunities
Short-Term Travel Grants (STG)
2009-2010 Fellows
IREX is pleased to announce the 2009-2010 Short-Term Travel Grant recipients.
Name: Agron Alibali
Research Topic: Legal Aspects of the Jewish Presence in Albania
Research Countries: Albania
Description of Research: Applicant will research legal aspects of the Jewish presence in Albania. Albania is among few countries in Europe where the number of Jews at the end of WWII was higher than at the beginning. Jewish presence in Albania dates back to the beginning of the first Millennium. In the XV Century, the Jewish community of Vlora consisted of more than half of the city’s population. Legal aspects of the Jewish presence will be researched in terms of positive law and customary law. The influence of positive law will be reviewed in light of laws, rules and regulations that were in effect during various periods of the Jewish presence in the country. Customary law was applied during the Holocaust, where Albanian families saved all Jews by applying the ancient unwritten Code of Honor or “besa” considering the guest and his/her protection as a sacred duty. The project may provide lessons to improve Jewish-Moslem relations in other regions of the world.
Name: John Ashbrook
Institutional Affiliation: Sweet Briar College
Research Topic: A Question of Consistency: Shifting EU Accession Criteria for Eastern Europe and Croatia
Research Countries: Croatia
Description of Research: Criteria for membership into the EC and the EU changed over all five enlargements. This study will examine how and why these changes occurred and who determined the changes for the most recent enlargement into Central and Eastern Europe. For Croatia, the criteria are more stringent than for the other Eastern European and Balkan candidates. Many Croats believe that the EU purposefully and knowingly created the unique benchmarking system to slow the negotiation process for Croatian accession. To these individuals this is a direct manifestation of Western European prejudice. Though there is abundant anecdotal evidence to support these perceptions, much of it from Western Europeans themselves, there is little recorded evidence to support these claims. Part of the research in Croatia will locate such evidence, if any exists, and if not will illustrate the functional utility these perceptions had on Croatian opinions on the EU and their affects on the country’s political arena.
Name: Mark Baker
Institutional Affiliation: California State University, Bakersfield
Research Topic: The Bolsheviks' Muslim: Mirsaid Sultan-Galiev's Islamic Communism and Revolution in the Soviet East
Research Countries: Russia
Description of Research: In fall 2009 the scholar will travel to Kazan, Tatarstan, Russia to begin research on a historical biography of Mirsaid Sultan-Galiev, the leading Bolshevik Muslim of the early Soviet period. Sultan-Galiev was the first to blend Communism and Islam, and to propose that the Bolsheviks’ revolutionary hopes lay in the Soviet East. On this trip, Dr. Baker will begin archival research and make contacts with other historians working on similar topics in Kazan.
Research Topic: Religiosity and the International Presence in the Kyrgyz Republic
Research Countries: Kyrgyzstan
Description of Research: In the past seventeen years we have witnessed an astonishing expansion of religious choice in the former Soviet republics. Missionaries of all persuasions have flooded to the region, bringing new faiths and giving local citizens much-needed choice in their spiritual lives. Meanwhile, “secular” international organizations pursue their own faith agendas, working to establish religious tolerance and curb Islamic extremism. The scholar does not contest the idea that the region is host to a vibrant, new spiritual “marketplace.” Dr. Borbieva argues, instead, that while spiritual choice is clearly expanding, increased international involvement contributes to a decrease in the diversity and vitality of indigenous religious traditions. Overlooked by international groups in their rush to support religious minorities and curb extremist Islam is the impact of these efforts, especially in cooperation with local regimes, on indigenous practices.
Name: Luba Botcheva
Institutional Affiliation: The Children's Health Council
Research Topic: Developing Tolerance towards Diverse Religious Beliefs and Practices among Bulgarian Youth
Research Countries: Bulgaria
Description of Research: The project will address a critical issue in the increasingly diverse contemporary world – developing tolerance towards dissenting religious beliefs. Tolerance is not the absence of prejudice, but rather a separate construct that emphasizes forbearance, or “putting up with” without interference. It is a central value of democracy and just society and key prerequisite for inter-ethnic and interfaith coexistence. Religious tolerance is very important for newly evolving democracies, such as Bulgaria, where traditions of democratic values and religious pluralism are relatively fragile. The goals of the fieldwork will be: 1) to examine existing documents that will inform the development of multidisciplinary indicators for studying religious tolerance among youth, and 2) to conduct empirical study about the reasoning and judgment of dissenting religious beliefs among Bulgarian Christian and Bulgarian Muslim youth in Smolyan region.
Name: Kate Brown
Institutional Affiliation: UMBC University of Maryland Baltimore County
Research Topic: Enriched by Plutonium: The Tandem History of the Secret Cities that Plutonium Built
Research Countries: Russia
Description of Research: This project is a history of two particular cities and landscapes transformed by plutonium. The study will focus on the two American and Soviet cities created in the mid to late forties exclusively for operators of the new plutonium plants. The cities were prize-winning model communities, and have charted new paths in creating security regimes to secure nuclear secrets from enemies and knowledge of radioactive emissions from residents. The legacies of radioactive contamination caused by the two plutonium plants, though relatively unknown, far exceeded the Chernobyl disaster. Brown argues that the scientific and technocratic competence and consumer opulence of Richland and Cheliabinsk-40 enabled engineers to quietly produce two of the most radiated territories on the planet.
Name: Maria Bucur
Institutional Affiliation: Indiana University, Bloomington
Research Topic: The Everyday Experience of Women's Emancipation in the U.S. and Romania in the Twentieth Century and Beyond: a Transnational Study
Research Countries: Romania
Description of Research: The project will seek to build an archive that will provide a transnational comparative basis for thinking about gender empowerment and, in particular, women’s rights and women’s lives over the last three generations in the United States and Romania. What interests Bucur is how big questions, such as “what does political gender equality mean,” connect with the lived experience of women who come from different walks of life in various culturally relevant ways. If political concepts such as “enfranchisement” come to have specific value at the local level, the significance of this project is to offer foreign policy makers and NGO’s focusing on women’s issues new tools for thinking qualitatively about the relationship between macro-politics and micro-realities.
Name: Melissa Caldwell
Institutional Affiliation: University of California, Santa Cruz
Research Topic: An Examination of Social Services Programs for Russia's African Communities
Research Countries: Russia
Description of Research: This ethnographic project will examine social services programs for Africans living in Moscow by focusing on church-based charitable programs that provide food, medical care, shelter, and human rights advocacy for Moscow’s African population. The purpose is to understand how these programs fit into Russia’s social welfare sphere, particularly the ways in which they challenge or complement local and international attitudes about foreign assistance in Russia, and the ways in which they are reconfiguring human rights debates and policies for non-Russians in Russia. This research will shed light on the experiences and needs of Russia’s African communities, the role of religious institutions in Russian human rights work, and the place of Africans in debates about rights and entitlements in Russia.
Name: Vitaly Chernetsky
Institutional Affiliation: Miami University
Research Topic: The Politics of Film Production and Film Distribution in Ukraine: Questions of Identity, Language and Cross-Cultural Influence
Research Countries: Ukraine
Description of Research: The recurring political tensions between Russia and Ukraine to a significant extent are a product of the widening cultural rift between these two successors of the USSR. One of the clearest examples of Russia’s continuing attempts at influencing and controlling Ukraine’s cultural sphere can be observed in the film industry, including both the production and the distribution of films. This project will investigate the forces at play within Ukraine’s film industry, spotlighting the legacies of Soviet-era policies and the impact produced by the economic and social forces of globalization during the post-communist era, including the politics of dubbing/subtitling foreign films, the co-productions between Ukrainian and other national film industries, and representation of Ukrainian cinema abroad.
Name: William Fierman
Institutional Affiliation: Indiana University, Bloomington
Research Topic: Post-Soviet Language Planning in Turkmenistan and the Kyrgyz Republic
Research Countries: Turkmenistan, Kyrgyzstan
Description of Research: This research is part of a broader project exploring language planning since 1991 in those countries of the Central Asian region where a Turkic language is the state language. It will explore formulation and execution of policies as well as policy outcomes. The research will include both language status and language corpus issues. Among the latter are script and alphabet reform, development of terminology and other vocabulary, toponyms, and personal names. Research under this grant will focus on the Kyrgyz Republic and Turkmenistan.
Name: Erin Koch
Institutional Affiliation: University of Kentucky
Research Topic: Health Effects of Displacement in Post-War Georgia
Research Countries: Georgia
Description of Research: This pilot research is an anthropological study of the health effects of displacement in Georgia, after the August 2008 war. The project will also investigate the design and implementation of health-related humanitarian and aid programs among internally displaced persons (IDPs). Ethnographic research will take place among aid organization and NGO workers, health care practitioners, and IDPs in collective centers, housing settlements and clinics where IDPs seek care. The anthropological approach grounded in everyday experiences and local forms of knowledge provides unique insights about cultural meanings and practices. These insights are significant in creating culturally relevant health intervention programs, and in bridging academic and policy work related to Georgia and the Caucasus region.
Name: Oksana Malanchuk
Institutional Affiliation: University of Michigan
Research Topic: Impact of Regional Divide on the 2010 Presidential Elections in Ukraine
Description of Research: The purpose of the trip is to prepare for research to be undertaken during the 2010 presidential elections in Ukraine. Three prior surveys have taken place in Lviv and Donetsk during the 1999 parliamentary elections and the 1999 and 2004 presidential elections, culminating in a book published in Ukraine which covers various aspects of the regional divide made so evident during the Orange Revolution. Dr. Malanchuk will expand her research in 2010 to additional regions and add a qualitative component in a mixed-methods research design in order to get an in-depth understanding of the complex issues that underline Ukraine’s regional differences.
Name: Jeffrey Mankoff
Institutional Affiliation: Yale University
Research Topic: Central Asia after the War on Terror
Research Countries: Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan
Description of Research: Following the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, post-Soviet Central Asia became the focus of intensive U.S. diplomatic and military engagement in the context of the unfolding “war on terror.” As the U.S. stepped up its involvement in Central Asia, other major powers (especially the EU, Russia, and China) did as well. Initially, the major powers’ relationship was largely cooperative, as all aimed at defeating the Taliban and its regional allies. As the war on terror has gradually given way to other concerns, Washington and its onetime partners have maintained their engagement with Central Asia. This project will look at how the major powers – especially the U.S. and Russia (but also Europe and China) – defined their interests in Central Asia since 9/11, examine how the Central Asian leaders have maneuvered between the outside powers, and assess the prospects for the future as the memory of 9/11 fades.
Name: Lawrence Markowitz
Institutional Affiliation: Oberlin College
Research Topic: Anti-Immigration Mobilization and Labor Migrant Identity in Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan
Research Countries: Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan
Description of Research: This study will examine the impact of anti-immigrant mobilization and ethnic violence in Russia on its victims: labor migrants from Central Asia and the Caucasus. Focusing on labor migrants from Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan – two of the largest suppliers of migrants to Russia – the project will specify two questions. First, why has labor migration from former Soviet republics to Russia not shifted as a result of abuses by government authorities and the dramatic rise in ethnic violence (now exceeding 500 attacks per year)? Second, what have been the effects of being targeted by the state and targeted in acts of social violence in Russia on the identity of labor migrants?
Name: Mehrangiz Najafizadeh
Institutional Affiliation: University of Kansas
Research Topic: Azeri Women's Voices: Narratives of Refugees and IDPs from the Nagorno-Karabakh War and Implications for Humanitarian Social Policy
Research Countries: Azerbaijan
Description of Research: The research will give Azeri women refugees/IDPs a “voice” and will capture, through their own thoughts and words, the essence of refugee life, the essence of the difficult and troublesome life experiences that they have confronted and continue to confront on a daily basis and the ways in which they cope with their status of displacement through the social constructions of “hope.” Through her emphasis on “listening to the people” to gain knowledge of the everyday experiences of such women, the scholar will provide more thorough insights into important gender-related policy issues and human rights policy issues. Dr. Najafizadeh will accomplish this through continuing to conduct face-to-face dialogues and compiling digitally-recorded narratives from women refugees/IDPs with diverse backgrounds.
Name: Matthew Pauly
Institutional Affiliation: Michigan State University
Research Topic: Breaking the Tongue: Language, Education, and Power in Soviet Ukraine, 1920 - 1934
Research Countries: Ukraine
Description of Research: This study will examine the early Soviet campaign for Ukrainian-language schooling and pedagogical innovation at the local level and explore in detail the rationale for this mandate, teacher and student response, and the consequences of this effort. What emerges from the documentary record is not only an account of the development of Ukrainian-language instruction, but the re-imagining of the entire school curriculum through the adaptation of progressive pedagogical methods. The party intended schools to be the training ground for a new generation of skilled, politically conscious, and economically informed Soviet citizens, and Ukrainization was seen as the primary means to this end. This historical examination of the relationship between nationalities and educational policy will provide new insight into current debates in Eurasia regarding the language of instruction in primary schools.
Name: John Schiemann
Institutional Affiliation: Farleigh Dickinson University
Research Topic: Bizarre Beliefs and Rational Choices: Fear, Memory, and Ethnic Mobilization by Croatian Serbs, 1991-1995
Research Countries: Croatia, Serbia
Description of Research: The goal of this project is to explain variation in time and space of ethnic mobilization by Croatian Serbs in the early nineties. Dr. Schiemann argues that some – but not all – Serbs mobilized for war because historical and collective memories of WWII atrocities by the Croatian fascist Ustaša biased their interpretations of the policies newly independent Croatian regime and caused them to believe they were under threat. The scholar will test this argument in a comparative and historical study of Croatian Serb villages and municipalities across two time periods, 1941-1945 and 1987-1995. Dr. Schiemann will conduct most of the research at Columbia University during his sabbatical in 2009-2010 which will prepare him for a short trip to two archives in Zagreb and the national library in Belgrade in May and June 2010 to digitally record specific materials unavailable in the United States.
Name: Boyka Stefanova
Institutional Affiliation: University of Texas at San Antonio
Research Topic: Minority Empowerment: the Movement for Rights and Freedoms in the 2009 EU Elections in Bulgaria
Research Countries: Bulgaria
Description of Research: This research will examine the electoral performance of the Movement for Rights and Freedoms, the principal ethnic minority party in Bulgaria, in the 2009 elections for Members of the European Parliament. Dr. Stefanova will gain insight into the effects that electoral processes in the European Union have on the political representation of minorities. Her research strategy is an actor-centered approach focused on the ways in which the ethnic minority party applies the normative and policy resources of European integration to advance minority rights. The principal method of data collection will combine archival research and elite interviewing. Additionally, a series of semi-structured interviews will be conducted with party leaders, activists, district-level elected officials, and representatives of civil society in Sofia, Vidin, Turgovishte, Razgrad, Silistra, and Kurdjali.
Name: Nancy Wingfield (Dosanjh)
Institutional Affiliation: Northern Illinois University
Research Topic: From Lemberg to Alexandria and Constantinople: Jews, Gentiles, and White- Slaving in Imperial Austria
Research Countries: Ukraine
Description of Research: The “white slaving” component of the project on prostitution in late imperial Austria will provide historic background on the topic for Western Ukraine, which has been a point of origin—and of transit—in the trafficking of women and girls since the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991. While the national/ethnic identity of traffickers may have changed, contemporary discourse on sex trafficking addresses many of the same issues it did a century ago, including the economic circumstances of those trafficked, their innocence and/or agency, the possible complicity of their families. Dr. Wingfield’s archival research will provide context for modern patterns of international trafficking. It is thus useful for officials enforcing the William Wilberforce Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act of 2008.
Short-Term Travel Grants (STG) Program is an IREX program funded by the US Department of State. STG supports in-depth field research by US scholars and experts in policy-relevant subject areas related to Eastern Europe and Eurasia, as well as disseminates knowledge about these regions to a wide network of constituents in the United States and abroad. The STG Program plays a vital role in supporting the emergence of a dedicated and knowledgeable cadre of US scholars and experts who can enrich the US understanding of developments in Eastern Europe and Eurasia.
For more information please visit our website or email us at stg@irex.org.
