College:
Queens College
Contact details:
Research:
As a former television and Internet journalist, United Nations Development Programme communication professional, and a media scholar, I am deeply intrigued by the changing relationship between the state and the civil society in the digital era. As a Ukrainian studies scholar, I am fascinated by unfolding opportunities for development of democracy in Ukraine with the rise of new media.
My current research focuses on grassroots digital start-ups and social media campaigns, which provide new mechanisms for what I call public ‘self-service’ in Ukraine. I explore how digital infrastructure facilitates the co-production of public services between citizens and state institutions, enabling civic activists to participate in welfare state-building. Ultimately I show that a motivation for volunteering and extensive social mutual self-help networks of cooperation and trust, coupled with the availability of the unpoliced and highly accessible digital media, have led to the development of a robust ‘digital civil society’ in Ukraine. Digital media affordances allow grassroots civic initiatives to gain scale and institutionalise themselves, retaining the horizontal ethos of co-production. The case of Ukraine thus contributes to a growing body of evidence of the strength of informal digital civic activism in post-Soviet and post-colonial societies, inviting us to revisit the presuppositions of the liberal paradigm in civil society studies, which have dominated the scholarly debate in Western Europe and Northern America since the early 2000s.
Publications:
- ‘Book Review: Karl Schlögel: Ukraine: A Nation on the Borderland’, Journal of European Studies, volume 49, issue: 1: 87-88.
- 'Where Broadcast and Digital Cultures Collide: A Case Study of Public Service Media in Ukraine', Digital Icons: Studies in Russian, Eurasian and Central European New Media (digitalicons.org), No 17: 73-92. Available online: https://www.digitalicons.org/issue17/where-broadcast-and-digital-cultures-collide-a-case-study/
- 'Attention Please!: Exploring Attention Management on Wikipedia in the Context of the Ukrainian Crisis' in Ciampaglia Giovanni Luca et al. (eds.) Social Informatics, 9th International Conference, SocInfo 2017, Oxford, UK, September 13-15, 2017, Proceedings, Part II (with Jon Roozenbeek).
- 'Ukrainian Television in the Context of Current Global Media Trends.' Journalism 14 (39): 139-149. Available online.
- 'The Global Media Trends in the Content of the TV-Channel STB.' Scientific Research of the Ukrainian Media Content: Social Dimention 1 (4): 15-22. Available online.
- 'Russian Television in the Information Warfare between Ukraine and Russia in 2014.' Obraz 2 (17): 44-54. Available online.
Selected Conference Papers:
- ‘The Right to Self-Defense: Exploring the Role of Nationalist Volunteer Battalions in the Military Conflict in Ukraine’s Donbas’, 50th Annual ASEEES Convention, Boston, USA, 6-9 December 2018.
- ‘Internet as Public Self-Service Media: Exploring Digital Civil Society in Post-Maidan Ukraine’, Internet, Policy & Politics Conference 2018, University of Oxford, UK, 20-21 September 2018.
- ‘Ukraine's Digital Civil Society Against Russian Propaganda: Whose Story Will Make History?’, Forum Transregionale Studien, Prisma Ukraïna, Research Network Eastern Europe, Berlin, Germany, 19 June 2018.
- ‘The Conflict in Ukraine and (Anti-)Russian Intervention: The Case Study of Ukrainian Grassroots Fact-Checking Projects’, 2018 World Convention of the Association for the Study of Nationalities (ASN), Harriman Institute, Columbia University in the City of New York, USA, 3-5 May 2018.
- ‘Net Non-Profit: How Internet Mediates the Rise of Philanthropic Engagement in Post-Maidan Ukraine’, British Association for Slavonic and East European Studies (BASEES) Annual Conference, Fitzwilliam College, University of Cambridge, 13-15 April 2018.
- ‘Unexpected Digital Nation: Exploring the Networked Forms of Civil Society in Post-Maidan Ukraine’, Ukraine: Hope for the future, or land of lost opportunity? Reform, politics and protest, foreign relations and conflict, St. Antony’s College, University of Oxford, 7-8 March 2018.
- 'Attention Please!: Exploring Attention Management on Wikipedia in the Context of the Ukrainian Crisis' (with Jon Rozenbeek), Social Informatics, 9th International Conference, SocInfo 2017, Oxford Internet Institute, University of Oxford, 13-15 September 2017.
- ‘Where Broadcast and Digital Cultures Collide: A Case Study of Public Service Media in Ukraine’, 2017 Annual International Communication Association Conference ‘Interventions: Communication Research and Practice’, San Diego, USA, 25-29 May 2017.
- ‘Yes Web Can: The Role of the Internet in Establishment of Public Service Media in Ukraine’, Graduate Conference on Screen Media and Cultures, Corpus Christi College, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK, 27 April 2016.
- ‘The Tabloidization of Social Issues as a Challenge for the Journalism of Tolerance (Based on Example of the Talk-Show ‘One For All’, STB)’, the International Scientific Conference of Postgraduate Students and Young Researchers “Modern Challenges for Socially Significant Media Practice”, the Institute of Journalism, Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv, Kyiv, Ukraine, 26-27 March 2015.
- ‘Global Modern Media Trends and Ukrainian Television’, the XIII International International Scientific Conference of Postgraduate Students and Young Researchers “Shevchenkivska Vesna – 2015: Social Communications”, the Institute of Journalism, Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv, Kyiv, Ukraine, 2 April 2015.
Awards and Scholarships:
- Erasmus+ Scholarship, CamPo, University of Cambridge, 2020.
- The First Prize in PhD Thesis Presentation Contest of the Ukrainian Academic International Network, 2018.
- Senkowsky Prize for Outstanding Achievements in Ukrainian Studies, Harvard University, 2017.
- Harvard Ukrainian Research Institute Studentship, Harvard University, 2017.
- PhD Studentship (CEELBAS Affiliate Award), University of Cambridge, 2016.
- Perry Fund Award, Queens’ College, University of Cambridge, 2016, 2018.
Teaching Experience:
- Ukrainian Language Teaching Fellow (Elementary A and Elementary B), Cambridge University, 2017-2019.
- Grammar Supervision, ab initio Russian (Part IA), Cambridge University, 2019.
- Guest lecturer, ‘Television journalism’, Institute of Journalism, Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv.
- Course instructor, ‘Television presenting’, Institute of Journalism, Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv.
Languages (in addition to English)
Ukrainian (native), Russian (native), advanced French (DALF C1), basic Spanish and German
