29th Annual Undergraduate Colloquium on Russian and Eurasian Studies

The Davis Center has hosted the annual Undergraduate Colloquium on Russian and Eurasian Studies since 1996, when Kathryn W. Davis first committed her support to showcase work in the field by students from Harvard, Wellesley, and Wheaton colleges. Undergraduate speakers will present their research findings and engage in lively Q&A sessions with an audience of fellow students, faculty, family, and friends. We invite you to join us in celebrating undergraduate research and engagement in the region.

Chair: Francoise Rosset, Associate Professor of Russian, Wheaton College

Margo Smith, Harvard College (2025): "Allies Across Borders: Lithuanian-Americans and the Quest for Lithuanian Independence from 1990-1991"
Sofia Melnychuck, Harvard College (2026): "From Dialects to Data: Identifying How Large Language Models Distinguish Lithuanian Dialects"Dominykas Navickas, Harvard College (2026): "From Emigration to Immigration: How Do The Common Market Migration Patterns Influence Lithuania’s Economic Growth?"Tarmo Tari, Wheaton College (2025): "A Study Of Women Leaders In A Post-Soviet Era"

Chair: Jonathan Bolton, Professor of Slavic Languages and Literatures, Harvard University

Phoebe Zilliax Blodget, Wellesley College (2026): "'All This Now Shone in Those Radiant Eyes': The Power of Princess Marya's 'Luchistyi' Eyes in Tolstoy's 'War and Peace'”Anya Tseitlin, Wellesley College (2025): "Beyond War and Peace: Tolstoy's Theory of Nonviolence"Asher Chamoy, Harvard College (2025): "Family or Fantasy: How 19th-Century Western Influences Encourage the Abandonment of Family in Tolstoy’s 'War and Peace' and 'Anna Karenina'"Ricards Umbrasko, Harvard College (2023): "Between Public and Private: Rethinking the Diary in Olena Stiazhkina’s 'Ukraine, War, Love: A Donetsk Diary' (2024)”

Chair: Jules Riegal, Lecturer on History and Literature, Harvard University

Miles Herszenhorn, Harvard College (2025): "Staging Dissent: Teatr.doc as an Alternative Public Sphere in Putin’s Russia"
Mae Nephew, Wellesley College (2027): "Latvia’s World War II Myth and Memory"
Sofie Schoch, Wheaton College (2027): "Russian Propaganda and Fear Mongering in NATO states and China"
Theo Harper, Harvard College (2025): "And The Veil Was Rent; A Re-Evaluation of Nicholas' Ottoman Strategy (1828-54)"

Chair: Nina Tumarkin, Kathryn Wasserman Davis Professor of Slavic Studies, Professor of History and Director of Russian Area Studies, Wellesley College

William Bazin, Wheaton College (2026): "The Chechen Deportations: Tragedy and Legacy"
Anna Mytko, Wellesley College (2025): "Ukraine’s 'Holocaust by Bullets': Selective Remembrance & Countermemory of the Babyn Yar Massacre"
Ella McHugh, Wellesley College (2025): "Victory Day and the Battle of Memory: State Myths and Personal Legacies of the Great Patriotic War in Russia"
Anna Gamburd, Harvard College (2027): "Patterns in the Adjudication of Counterrevolutionary Crime in the Soviet Union During the Interregnum Between Stalin and Khrushchev"

Host or Publisher Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies