Olive Coles graduated summa cum laude from the University of Pennsylvania in 2023 with degrees in Russian and East European studies and political science. Originally from London, U.K., she researches the intersection of aesthetics, collective memory, and power, concentrating on disinformation, cultural warfare, and resilience, as well as the application of emerging technologies in this space.
As an undergraduate, Olive spent time in the renewable energy sector, working with developing U.S. carbon sequestration technologies, and researching civil society at the NGO level in Kyrgyzstan. She was also an undergraduate research fellow at the Wolf Center for Humanities and a research assistant at the Penn Identity and Conflict Lab. Upon graduating from UPenn, she received the Luba Zinkowsky Friedman Fund Prize for Excellence in Russian Studies.
At Harvard, she has been the Imperiia Project innovation fellow and an R.A. for the Department of Slavic Languages & Literatures.
Last updated May 2026.
