The Melikian Center serves as a meeting point for dialogue and learning among different communities.
Beyond its core staff, The Center has over a hundred affiliates engaged in teaching and research on the region, including current ASU faculty and staff as well as emeriti and graduate student affiliates.
The Critical Languages Institute is made possible by the commitment and expertise of the CLI faculty, many of whom hold appointments at other institutions. As well as financial support, the Center’s Advisory Board provides expertise and ideas on strategic planning, board development, and communications.
Staff
Affiliates
CLI Faculty
Graduate Affiliates
Hovig Artinian in Evolutionary Anthropology at the School of Human Evolution and Social Change; research interests in the role of social norms and identity in relation to cooperation and cultural evolution.
Gaukhar Baltabayeva in Political Science at the School of Politics and Global Studies; research interests in comparative politics and international relations, with a specific focus on migration and brain drain issues from Eurasian countries to the West.
Kelly Baur in Applied Linguistics at the Department of English; research interests in language policy and planning as it relates to marginalized and underrepresented languages.
Elira Canga in Journalism/Strategic Communication at the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication; research interests in misinformation and disinformation, media trends and development, gender-based disinformation, and transparency and media literacy.
Ashley Coogan in Linguistics and Applied Linguistics at the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences; research interests in the sociolinguistic experiences of migrant communities, European identities and belonging with a specific in the sociolinguistic situation of Catalonia (Spain).
Yonca Cubuk Uzundag in Religious Studies at the School of Historical, Philosophical, and Religious Studies; research interests in alcohol consumption in relation to memory, place, identity, gender, class, and politics.
Ahmet Dikyurt in Socio-Cultural Anthropology at the School of Human Evolution and Social Change; research interests in transgenerational trauma, conflict, identity formation, and migration.
Ljubomir Filipovic in Political Science at the School of Politics and Global Studies; research interests at the intersection between international relations and comparative politics, specifically in in the relationship between democratic backsliding and foreign influence.
Sona Gevorgyan in Investigative Journalism at the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication; research interests in oral history, media literacy, and conflict studies.
Ryan Grieser in Musicology at the School of Music, Dance and Theatre; research interests focus on the digital preservation of Balkan folk music and cultural heritage, primarily the Western region of Bulgaria.
Djurdja Jovanovic Padejski in Comparative Culture and Language at the School of International Languages and Cultures; research interests in quantitative sociolinguistics, and political and environmental discourse analysis, with a focus on the Western Balkans, Russia, and Eastern Europe.
Jadie Minhas in Political Science at the School of Politics and Global Studies; research interests in regime transitions and authoritarianism in the post-Soviet sphere, comparative politics and international relations between Russia and the U.S., and the U.S. and Western Europe's foreign policy in Eastern Europe.
Masha Monakhova in Environmental Social Science at the School of Human Evolution and Social Change; research interests in international economics, international law, and geography, and the geographic area of the Arctic region.
Nathanael Pierce in Philosophy at the School of Historical, Philosophical, and Religious Studies; research interests in political philosophy, philosophy of economics, well-being, bioethics, and health-care ethics; assistant at the Central European Cultural Collaborative at ASU.
Scott Prada in Linguistics and Applied Linguistics at the English Department; research interests in Vocabulary and Reading Comprehension in Second Language Acquisition, learning and preservation of the Languages of Russia, and Ecolinguistics.
Matthew Putz in History at the School of Historical, Philosophical and Religious Studies; research interests in Holocaust and genocide studies, and the history of populism, with a focus on the Balkans.
Liudmila Sharaya in History at the School of Historical, Philosophical, and Religious Studies; research interests in migration studies, Russian and Modern European history, history of empires, and memory studies.
Rebecca Stuch in Innovation in Global Development at the College of Global Futures; research interests focus on helping others to understand the past and future implications of technology on communities and the economic, political, and social development of those communities, as well as to continue to support the usage of technology to assist social-entrepreneurship and organizational development.
Catherine White in Secondary Education at the Mary Lou Fulton Teachers College; research interests in refugee rights in Post-Soviet satellite states, higher education in EU relations in Central and Eastern Europe, and specifically the accession efforts of Ukraine into NATO and the EU.
Shirvin Zeinalzadeh in Political Science at the School of Politics and Global Studies; research interests in how media can galvanize public mobilization by examining pivotal movements, the European Union, and intelligence and nation security and authoritarian regimes.
Justin Michael Zyla in Political Science at the School of Politics and Global Studies; research interests in political psychology, evolutionary theory, and transnational justice; with a specific focus on comparing the U.S. and the Balkans to examine how people respond to, and reconcile after, episodes of political violence or mass atrocities.