1. How Has the Ukraine War Changed the Russia-China Relationship?

On April 2, the Harriman Institute and the Weatherhead East Asian Institute revived the tradition of the Borton-Mosley Distinguished Lecture Series. Leading experts Yun Sun (Senior Fellow and Co-Director of the East Asia Program and Director of the China Program, Stimson Center) and Sergey Radchenko (Wilson E. Schmidt Distinguished Professor, Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies) reflected upon critical geopolitical developments between Russia and China in conversation with Professors Andrew Nathan (Class of 1919 Professor of Political Science) and former Harriman Director Alexander Cooley (Claire Tow Professor of Political Science, Barnard College).

“As the war in Ukraine grinds into its third year, China and Russia continue unsteadily towards an ever closer alignment even while pragmatically looking out for their own interests in an evolving world.” —Event description

Learn more here.

2. The Witch’s Triumph: A Tribute to Dubravka Ugrešić

The Institute for Ideas and Imagination, the Harriman Institute, and the Center for Writers and Translators at the American University in Paris hosted an event on June 6 celebrating the late Dubravka Ugrešić (1949–2017)—an award-winning Croatian novelist and essayist who was the Harriman Institute’s 2015 Writer in Residence. At the Harriman, Ugrešić taught the graduate seminar “National vs. Transnational Literature,” and a two-day conference was held in her honor in 2016. The same year, Ugrešić was awarded the Neustadt International Prize for Literature, often referred to as the “Little Nobel.”

“This beautiful tribute celebrated Ugrešić’s legacy with writers, publishers, translators and scholars from around the world. A real literary feast, it showcased the value of our partnership with the Institute for Ideas and Imagination and raised the international profile of the Harriman’s Writer-in-Residence program.” ­—Valentina Izmirlieva, Harriman Director and moderator

Learn more here.

3. Celebrating the Legacies of Two Former Harriman Directors

On September 19 and September 20, Harriman celebrated the legacies of two former Harriman directors. First, a group of scholars discussed Catharine Theimer Nepomnyashchy’s (1951–2015), posthumous volume of essays, From Pushkin to Popular Culture (Academic Studies Press, 2024). Nepomnyashchy, described by the publisher as “one of the most original scholars of Russian culture of her generation,” wrote about topics ranging from Alexander Pushkin’s Blackness to Vladimir Nabokov’s connection to Sigmund Freud.

Learn more here.

The following day, Harriman held a tribute to Mark von Hagen’s contribution to Ukrainian studies. As director of the Harriman Institute and professor in the Department of History, von Hagen contributed greatly to the development of Ukrainian Studies at Columbia and internationally. In July 2024, in what would have been the year he turned 70, the Ukrainian Free University in Munich, where he served as professor and dean, published volume one of his collected works in Ukrainian translation. The 35 works in this volume illustrate how greatly Professor von Hagen contributed through his study of Ukraine to a rethinking of the history of the Russian Empire and the Soviet Union.

Learn more here.

4. M.I. Pupin Pulitzer Prize Conference

On Friday, October 4, the Njegoš Endowment for Serbian Language and Culture at the Harriman Institute and the Department of Physics hosted a fundraising event to commemorate the centennial of the Pulitzer Prize awarded to the celebrated Serbian-American scientist, Michael (Mihajlo) Idvorsky Pupin (Columbia College, 1883)—a physicist, inventor, and educator who made significant contributions to the fields of telecommunications and electrical engineering. Pupin received the Pulitzer for his autobiography From Immigrant to Inventor. The event launched the fundraising initiative for a Visiting Professorship in Serbian and South Slavic Studies.

“I hope the conference reaffirms the Njegoš Endowment’s commitment to promoting Serbian culture and literature globally, and sparks deeper collaboration between Serbian and American institutions.” —Aleksandar Bošković, Lecturer in Bosnian, Croatian and Serbian and conference organizer.

Learn more here. ◆

Featured image: Mark von Hagen (right) with students in a classroom