ABI KARAS
ABOUT
I am an anthro-historian of the built environment, with a particular interest in (post-)Soviet cityscapes. I hold a DPhil in Russian from the University of Oxford and an MA in Material and Visual Culture from University College London. My work is cross-disciplinary, drawing predominantly from anthropology, urban history, heritage and cultural studies.
My research looks at the interaction between urban space and local identity in Russia and Moldova, the legacies of centralised urban planning and the marketisation of the post-socialist city. I am also interested in interdisciplinarity and the use of alternative methodological approaches to the study and critique of history, culture and society.
My teaching interests are quite broad covering a range of topics in 20th- and 21st-century Soviet and post-Soviet society and culture. I currently teach at the University of Nottingham and have previously taught at Liverpool John Moores University, the School of Slavonic and East European Studies, University College London and have worked on module development for the University of Plymouth.
My research has been funded by AHRC-CEELBAS, a Scatcherd European Scholarship and a University College Oxford Senior Scholarship. I was awarded the 2022 Society of Historians of Eastern European, Eurasian, and Russian Art and Architecture (SHERA) Emerging Scholar Prize for my research on the St Petersburg built environment and the phenomenon of mansardisation.. In their report, the jury praised both my 'methodological scope' and my 'historical range'.
Outside of my academic work, I am interested in analogue photography. All the photos on this site are original works.
Recent Publications
Peer-Reviewed Article ‘Rooftop Exploration and the Creation of Alternative Spaces in St Petersburg’ | Problems of Post-Communism. pp.1-13 | DOI 10.1080/10758216.2024.2345349 Review of Juraj Buzalka & Agnieszka Pasieka (eds.), ‘Anthropology of Transformation. From Europe to Asia and Back’ | Europe-Asia Studies. December 2023. № 75.10 | DOI10.1080/09668136.2023.2282322 Book Chapter ‘“Hanging Out” with the Boys: The Female Participant Observer in a Male-Dominated Group’ in Researching in the Former Soviet Union: Stories from the Field, published as part of the BASEES/ Routledge Series | December 2022 | ISBN 9780367699932 | DOI: 10.4324/9781003144168-7 Border Support in Przemyśl Article on my time at the Poland-Ukraine border for Hot Potato Magazine 2022. № 4. | November 2022 Peer-Reviewed Article ‘Mansardisation: Attic Space, Urban Development, and the Politics of Preservation in St Petersburg’, Slavonic and East European Review. January 2022. № 100.1. pp.127-156 | DOI: 10.1353/see.2022.0004 Written Roundtable ‘Forum 52: sotsial’nye nauki i COVID-19: pro et contra’ [Forum 52: The Humanities and Social Sciences and Covid-19: Pros and Cons], Antropologicheskii Forum. 2022. № 52. pp.11–82 | DOI 10.31250/1815-8870-2022-18-52-11-82 Review of Radzhana Buyantueva & Maryna Shevtsova (eds.), ‘LGBTQ+ Activism in Central and Eastern Europe. Resistance, Representation and Identity’, Europe-Asia Studies. March 2021. № 73.3. pp.590-592 | DOI 10.1080/09668136.2021.1893535 Yav: the street art collective running out of patience in the fight for social change Profile on St Petersburg-based street art collective Yav' for The Calvert Journal | February 2021
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