My research deals with Mediterranean, Slavic and Eastern Orthodox studies, in particular, Russia’s interest in the Near East in the post-Byzantine period. Currently, I am working on projects related to Russian-Greek relations and a study of Count Grigorii A. Stroganov (1770-1857), the Russian ambassador to Spain, Sweden, and the Ottoman Empire. I offer courses on imperial and modern Russia, the Balkans and the Ottoman Empire, Greece (ancient and modern), modern Europe, and the history of socialism. I regularly teach courses on the era of World War II and Nazi Germany, and online courses.
Courses Taught at Rider
- Imperial Russia
- Modern Russia
- The Ottoman Empire and the Balkans
- The Era of World War II
- Nazi Germany and Hitler’s Europe
- Ancient Greece
- History of Socialism
- 20th-Century Europe
- Europe since 1715
- World History
Publications
Major projects
- (guest-edited journal issue) 1821 - A New Dawn for Greece. Greek Struggle for Independence, special issue of Open Military Studies 2 (2022)
- (editor) Thresholds into the Orthodox Commonwealth: Essays in Honor of Theofanis G. Stavrou (Bloomington, IN: Slavica Publishers, 2017)
- Russia and the Making of Modern Greek Identity, 1821-1844 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015)
- (co-editor with Mara Kozelsky) Russian-Ottoman Borderlands: The Eastern Question Reconsidered (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 2014)
Recent articles, book chapters and reference entries
- “1821 – A New Dawn for Greece: The Greek Struggle for Independence,” Open Military Studies 2 (2022): 144-47.
- “The Greek Revolution and Russian Historiography: Trends and Interpretations (1821-2021),” in Yianni Cartledge and Varnava Andrekos, eds., New Perspectives on the Greek War of Independence: Myths, Realities, Legacies and Reflections (London: Palgrave, 2022), 271-96.
- “The Churchwarden’s Quarrel and the Reality of Religion,” in Candan Badem, ed., The Routledge Handbook of the Crimean War (London: Routledge, 2021), 273-86.
- “Greece and the Crimean War,” in Candan Badem, ed., The Routledge Handbook of the Crimean War (London: Routledge, 2021), 190-202.
- “La gran crisis de Oriente.” Desperta Ferro Historia Moderna 54 (October 2021): 6-12.
- “El tratado de Berlín: Le mecha que prendería la Primera Guerra Mundial.” Desperta Ferro Historia Moderna 54 (October 2021): 52-56.
- “The Orthodox Church,” in Paschalis Kitromilides and Constantine Tsakoufas, eds., The Greek Revolution: A Critical Dictionary (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2021), 122-43.
- “P.A. Tolstoi,” in David Thomas and John Chesworth, eds., Christian-Muslim Relations: A Bibliographical History 1500-1900, vol. 14. Central and Eastern Europe (1700-1800). (Leiden: Brill, 2020), 596-91.
- “Nikita Zotov,” in David Thomas and John Chesworth, eds., Christian-Muslim Relations: A Bibliographical History 1500-1900, vol. 14. Central and Eastern Europe (1700-1800) (Leiden: Brill, 2020), 562-66.
- “V.M. Dolgorukov,” in David Thomas and John Chesworth, eds., Christian-Muslim Relations: A Bibliographical History 1500-1900, vol. 14. Central and Eastern Europe (1700-1800) (Leiden: Brill, 2020), 659-61.
- “Matvei Mironov,” in David Thomas and John Chesworth, eds., Christian-Muslim Relations: A Bibliographical History 1500-1900, vol. 14. Central and Eastern Europe (1700-1800) (Leiden: Brill, 2020), 632-35
- “Bulgaria during World War II: A Review of Recent Historiography,” Balkanistica 33 (2020): 273-86.
- “Pilgrims and Profits: The Russian Company of Steam Navigation and Trade, 1856-1914,” Canadian-American Slavic Studies 53.3 (2019): 286-305.
- “La Cuestión Oriental y los orígenes de la Guerra de Crimea,” Desperta Ferro Historia Moderna 38 (2019): 6-13.
- “The Russian Consulate in the Morea and the Coming of the Greek War of Independence (1816-1821),” in Mika Suonpää and Owain Wright, eds., Diplomacy and Intelligence in the Nineteenth-Century Mediterranean World (London: Bloomsbury Academic Publishing, 2019), 57-77.
- “Russian Foreign Policy and the Change of Dynasty in Greece, 1862-1864,” in David Goldfrank, Valeria Z. Nollan, and Jennifer Spock, eds., Iosif Volotskii and Eastern Orthodoxy: Essays across Seventeen Centuries (Washington, DC: New Academia Publishing, 2017), 307-32.
- “Europe’s Bellicose Periphery: Russia and the Cretan Insurrection of 1841,” in Thresholds into the Orthodox Commonwealth: Essays in Honor of Theofanis G. Stavrou, 403-16.
Recent Reviews
- Alexa von Winning, Intimate Empire: The Mansurov Family in Russia and the Orthodox East, 1855-1936 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2022) Russian Review 82.1 (2023): 158-59.
- Paschalis M. Kitromilides, ed., The Greek Revolution in the Age of Revolutions (1776-1848), Reappraisals and Comparisons (New York: Routledge, 2021. Journal of Modern Greek Studies 40.2 (October 2022): 460-65.
- Mark Mazower, The Greek Revolution: 1821 and the Making of Modern Europe (New York: Penguin Press, 2021) Journal of Modern Greek Studies 40.2 (October 2022): 460-65.
- Darin N. Stephanov, Ruler Visibility and Popular Belonging in the Ottoman Empire, 1808–1908 (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2020) Ab Imperio 2/2022: 317-20.
- Marie-Janine Calic, The Great Cauldron: A History of Southeastern Europe (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2019) Balkanistica 35 (2022): 306-8.
- Athina Kakouri, 1821 Η αρχή που δεν ολοκληρώθηκε. Πότε και πώς δημιουργήθηκε το κράτος όπου ζούμε σήμερα (Athens: Pataki, 2020) Journal of Modern Greek Studies 40.1 (2022): 231-33.
- Vladimír Dzuro, The Investigator: Demons of the Balkan War. Forward by Carla Del Ponte. (Lincoln, NE: Potomac Books, 2019) Terrorism and Political Violence 34.1 (2022): 195-96.
- Matthew P. Romaniello, Enterprising Empires: Russia and Britain at Eighteenth-Century Eurasia (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2019) Jahrbücher für Geschichte Osteuropas jgo.e-reviews 69.1 (2021): 144-46.
- “The South Slavs, Russia, Germany, and the Coming of the First World War,” Jahrbücher für Geschichte Osteuropas jgo.e-reviews 3 (2020): 24-28.
- Mariya Y. Omelicheva and Lawrence P. Markowitz, Webs of Corruption: Trafficking and Terrorism in Central Asia (New York: Columbia University Press, 2019) Terrorism and Political Violence 33.8 (2021): 1810-11.
- Eugene Miakinkov, War and Enlightenment in Russia. Military Culture in the Age of Catherine II (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2020) Journal of Military History 85.2 (2021): 497-99.
- Benny Morris and Dror Ze’evi, The Thirty Year Genocide: Turkey’s Destruction of Its Christian Minorities (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2019) Terrorism and Political Violence 33.2 (2021): 409-10.
- Mila Dragojević, Amoral Communities: Collective Crimes in Times of War (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2019) Balkanistica 34 (2021): 220-22.
- Raz Segal, Genocide in the Carpathians: War, Social Breakdown and Mass Violence 1914-1945 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2016) Terrorism and Political Violence 33.1 (2021): 215-16.
- Vasile Rotaru, Russia, the EU, and the Eastern Partnership: Building Bridges or Digging Trenches? (Stuttgart: ibidem-Verlag, 2018) Balkanistica 34 (2021): 217-19.
- Scott Jasper, Russian Cyber Operations: Coding the Boundaries of Conflict (Washington DC: Georgetown University Press, 2020) Terrorism and Political Violence 33.5 (2021): 1122-23.
- Ilya Yablokov, Fortress Russia: Conspiracy Theories in Post-Soviet Russia (New York: Polity, 2018) Terrorism and Political Violence 33.4 (2021): 886-87.
- Leslie Chamberlain, Ministry of Darkness: How Sergei Uvarov Created Conservative Modern Russia (London: Bloomsbury Press, 2020) Ab Imperio 3 (2020): 410-13.
- Boris Volodarsky, Assassins: The KGB’s Poison Factory 10 Years On (Yorkshire and Philadelphia: Frontline Books, 2020) Terrorism and Political Violence 32.7 (2020): 1607-8.
- Will Smiley, From Slaves to Prisoners of War: The Ottoman Empire, Russia, and International Law (New York: Oxford University Press, 2018) American Historical Review 125.2 (April 2020): 616-18.
- Anna Ohanyan, ed., Russia Abroad: Driving Regional Fracture in Post-Communist Eurasia and Beyond (Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press, 2018) Terrorism and Political Violence 32.2 (2020): 416-17.
- Michael Fredholm, Transnational Organized Crime and Jihadist Terrorism: Russian Speaking Networks in Western Europe (New York: Routledge, 2018) Terrorism and Political Violence 32.1 (2020): 194-95.
- Angela Jianu and Violeta Barbu eds., Earthly Delights: Economies and Cultures of Food in Ottoman and Danubian Europe, c. 1500-1900 (Leiden: Brill, 2018) Balkanistica 33 (2020): 165-67.
- Constanţa Vintilă-Ghiţulescu, ed., Women, Consumption, and the Circulation of Ideas in South-Eastern Europe, 17th-19th Centuries (Leiden: Brill, 2017) Balkanistica 33 (2020): 168-70.
- Andrei Cusco, A Contested Borderland: Competing Russian and Romanian Visions of Bessarabia in the Late Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Century (Bucharest: CEU Press, 2017) Ab Imperio 4 (2019): 197-201.
- Anna M. Mirkova, Muslim Land, Christian Labor Transforming Ottoman Imperial Subjects into Bulgarian National Citizens, 1878-1939 (Budapest: Central European University Press, 2017) Jahrbücher für Geschichte Osteuropas/jgo.e-reviews 9.3 (2019): 61-63.
- Andrew Robarts, Migration and Disease in the Black Sea Region: Ottoman-Russian Relations in the Late Eighteenth and Early Nineteenth Centuries (London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2016) H-Russia, H-Net Reviews (March, 2019).
- Charles Clover, Black Wind, White Snow: The Rise of Russia’s New Nationalism (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2016) Terrorism and Political Violence 31.4 (2019): 894-95.
- Liviu Pilat and Ovidiu Cristea, The Ottoman Threat and Crusading on the Eastern Border of Christendom during the 15th Century (Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2017) Jahrbücher für Geschichte Osteuropas/jgo.e-reviews 8.4 (2018): 61-62.
- Michael Provence, The Last Ottoman Generation and the Making of the Modern Middle East (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2017) H-War, H-Net Reviews (August, 2018).
- Yiĝit Akin, When the War Came Home: The Ottomans’ Great War and the Devastation of an Empire (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2018) Journal of Military History 82.3 (2018): 976-78.
- Oliver Jens Schmitt, ed., The Ottoman Conquest of the Balkans: Interpretations and Research Debates (Vienna: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 2016) Jahrbücher für Geschichte Osteuropas/jgo.e-reviews 3 (2018): 85-87.
- Evrydiki Sifneos, Imperial Odessa: Peoples, Spaces, Identities (Boston, Leiden: Brill, 2018) Ab Imperio 3 (2018): 448-52.
- R. P. Grišina, et al, Balkany v evropejskich političeskich proektach XIX‒XXI vv. Sbornik statej. (Moscow: RAN, 2014) Jahrbücher für Geschichte Osteuropas/jgo.e-reviews 2 (2018): 35-37.
- Olga Katsiardi-Hering and Maria A. Stassinopoulou, eds., Across the Danube Southeastern Europeans and Their Travelling Identities (17th–19th c.) (Leiden: Brill, 2017.) Jahrbücher für Geschichte Osteuropas/jgo.e-reviews 2 (2018) 46-48.
- Denis Vovchenko, Containing Balkan Nationalism: Imperial Russia and Ottoman Christians, 1856–1914 (New York: Oxford University Press. 2016) American Historical Review 122.4 (2017): 1344-45.
- Andreas Schönle, Andrei Zorin, and Alexei Evstratov, eds., The Europeanized Elite in Russia, 1762-1825: Public Role and Subjective Self (Dekalb, IL: Northern Illinois Press, 2016) Ab Imperio 3 (2017): 471-72.
- Michail V. Škarovskij, Konstantinopolʼskij patriarchat i Russkaja Pravoslavnaja Cerkov’ v pervoj polovine XX veka (Moscow: Indrik, 2014) Jahrbücher für Geschichte Osteuropas/jgo.e-reviews 1 (2018): 30-31.
- Brian L. Davies. The Russo-Turkish War, 1768-1774: Catherine II and the Ottoman Empire (London: Bloomsbury, 2016) Journal of Military History 81.2 (2017): 554-56.
- Richard Stites. The Four Horsemen: Riding to Liberty in Post-Napoleonic Europe (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014) Modern Greek Studies Yearbook 32/33 (2016/2017): 420-23.
Current Projects
- “Foreign Policy and Aristocratic Culture in Imperial Russia: Count Grigorii A. Stroganov (1770-1857)” (current book project)
- “Russia’s Byzantine Heritage: Sixteenth-century Realities and Nineteenth-century Dreams”
- “The Myth and Reality of Russian Expectation and the Greek War of Independence”
- “Russian Philhellenes and Ionian Russophiles: Tsarist Interventions, Political Experimentation, and Military Traditions in the Ionian Islands (1768-1807)”
Fellowships and Awards
- Faculty Research Fellowship, Fall 2012
- Summer Faculty Research Fellowship, Rider University, 2016, 2014, 2013, 2010, 2008, 2007, 2006, 2005.
Professional Service
- Executive Board, Northeast Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies Conference (NSEEES), 2019-22
- Editorial board, The Library of Modern Russia, I. B. Tauris, 2017-21
- Treasurer, Association for the Study of Eastern Christian History and Culture (ASEC), 2006-13, 2015-17
- Fellowships Evaluator of Research Projects, Rustaveli Foundation, Republic of Georgia, 2009-19
- Board member-at-large Northeast Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies Conference (NSEEES), 2013
- Project Thalis, Greek Ministry of Education and European Union: The Black Sea and Its Port Cities, 1774-1914. Development, Convergence and Linkages with the Global Economy, 2011-13
- Executive Board, Mid-Atlantic Slavic Conference (MASC), 2009-12
- Faculty-in-Residence, First-Year Experience Program, Rider University, 2004-7