Dr Tamar Koplatadze

Research

Dr Koplatadze’s specialism covers the literature and culture of Russian and the former Soviet world, with particular expertise in 19th century Russian literature and post-Soviet Russophone literature and film. She is currently completing a monograph on contemporary literature from Central Asia and the Caucasus, the first major study of its kind. Dr Koplatadze has traveled for fieldwork and cultural engagements in post-Soviet countries including Georgia, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan, and made ongoing connections with local writers, academics and creative artists. She has shared her research findings at various international conferences (Cambridge, Oxford, New York, Berlin, Lisbon) as well as public engagement platforms, among them The Calvert Journal and the BBC.

Dr Koplatadze’s research interests lie more broadly in postcolonial literature and theory, areas which she often connects to her research and teaching in Russian Studies and Comparative Literature, such as in her award-winning article ‘Theorising Russian Postcolonial Studies’. She especially welcomes interests of research supervision of projects exploring post-Soviet literature and culture from Russia and the former Soviet world; the interplay of empire, culture and gender; ecocriticism, and the representation of adolescence in literature and film.

Teaching

Russian and Russophone literature from the 19th C. to the present; Unseen (Russian-English translation).

Publications

Postcolonial Idenitities in Central Asian and Caucasian Literataure (OUP) in progress

‘NGOs and Neocolonialism in Postcolonial Central Asian Literature: The Case of Central Asia’, Interventions: International Journal of Postcolonial Studies (2021) https://doi.org/10.1080/1369801X.2021.1972820

‘Theorising Russian postcolonial studies’, Postcolonial Studies, 22.4 (2019), 469-489, https://doi.org/10.1080/13688790.2019.1690762

‘Salon de Variété’ (1881), English translation of Anton Chekhov’s short story, ACF Early Chekhov Translation Project. Forthcoming.

‘Mother Country: Meet the Women at The Forefront of New Georgian Cinema’, The Calvert Journal (March 2018) https://www.calvertjournal.com/articles/show/9579/women-in-georgian-film

Awards and Distinctions

BASEES (British Association of Slavonic and Eastern European Studies) prize for best postgraduate article, 2021, for ‘Theorising Russian Postcolonial Studies’, Postcolonial Studies, 22.4(2019), 469-489 https://doi.org/10.1080/13688790.2019.1690762

Media

BBC Art and Ideas, ‘Russia and Fear’ (2019) From 24:42, on whether the Soviet Union was a colonial empire, from the perspective of post-Soviet authors from the Caucasus and Central Asia

BBC Free Thinking, ‘Sesame Stree and Soviet Culture’ (2023) From 17:20, on how literature from across the former republics of the USSR is processing the Soviet past.