An Engaged Community

The Davis Center community includes nearly three hundred individuals—Harvard faculty, graduate students, fellows, visiting scholars, Boston-area scholars, and staff—who share a passion for Russia and Eurasia.

Thirty-seven members of the Harvard faculty who conduct research or teach courses related to Russia and Eurasia keep abreast of the latest research on the region as faculty associates of the Davis Center. They orchestrate seminar series and conferences, and are the primary organizing force at the Center. They serve on the Center’s Executive Committee and on review committees for grants, fellowships, admissions, and prizes, directing intellectual and financial resources.

The Davis Center supports the research of 80 graduate student associates. The master’s and Ph.D. students participate in workshops, seminars, and social events where they connect to the thriving peer support system at the Center. They advise one another about travel and research in the region, and they share office space in a building with experienced faculty and scholars.

Each year, a new group of fellows and visitors joins the Center, bringing new perspectives, research skills, and subject knowledge. Postdoctoral fellows generally work toward publishing their dissertations and beginning new projects. Visiting scholars, typically more senior, bring valuable voices, new and familiar, to our discussions of the region. All of our visitors make contributions to the field, bring their knowledge back to their home institutions, and draw attention to major issues in scholarship in their various disciplines.

Some 115 Boston-area scholars (Center associates) actively participate in seminars, courses, and workshops side by side with Harvard faculty and students. They conduct research independently at the Harvard libraries and contribute their publications to the Davis Center’s library collections. They constitute one of the main audiences for the work produced at the Davis Center and frequently teach material collected at the Center in their courses at area universities such as MIT, Northeastern, Tufts, Wellesley, and Dartmouth.

At all levels of the organization, the Davis Center staff—many of whom have extensive experience in the region—support the Center’s mission with enthusiastic dedication.

Together, these individuals comprise one of the leading institutions in the field of Russian and Eurasian studies. This energetic community provides the productive setting, both scholarly and social, in which individual scholarship thrives.