Service
This section provides a brief overview of my service work.
Academic Publishing
Platypus, the CASTAC blog
After working for two years as a contributing editor at Platypus, I became Platypus’s managing editor.
Platypus is the official blog of the American Anthropological Association’s Committee for the Anthropology of Science, Technology, and Computing. It aims to promote dialogue on theories, tools, and social interactions that explore questions at the intersection of anthropology and science and technology studies. All of its content is open access.
As a managing editor, I seek to cultivate a supportive, inclusive, and diverse environment, whereby authors and contributing editors from a wide variety of backgrounds feel welcome and well-equipped to express their voices.
Pieces I contributed:
International Day of Persons with Disabilities: What Happens the Day After?, December 3, 2020
Elements of Disability Inclusion in Soviet Disability Pedagogy, October 26, 2020
Does ‘Going Sighted’ Make Life Better? Undoing the Desire to Cure Blindness in Russia, March 27, 2018
American Ethnologist
Beginning July 2022, I will be working as a member of American Ethnologist’s book reviews editorial team.
For the Public
Public Lectures
With the support of the Harriman Institute, I organized two series of public lectures by anthropologists and historians: in 2020-2021 and 2021-2022. Both lecture series featured public talks of anthropologists and historians of the post/socialist world on such issues as exclusion, inclusion, care, violence, minority resilience, and disenfranchisement.
The Minority Inclusion and Exclusion in Post-Communist Societies Speaker Series (2020-2021):
As we continue to struggle with issues of discrimination and systemic racism in our own country, it’s important to broaden our perspectives and examine the often-overlooked experiences of minorities and vulnerable communities living in Russia, Eurasia, and Eastern Europe. This academic speaker series considers some of the latest academic research on issues of discrimination, representation, identity, and inequality in the USSR and post-socialist societies.
Jeff Sahadeo on “Voices from the Soviet Edge”
Kathryn E. Graber on “Mixed Messages: Mediating Native Belonging in Asian Russia”
Jennifer J. Carroll on “Narkomania: Drugs, HIV, and Citizenship in Ukraine”
Kateřina Kolářová on “Post-Socialist Rehabilitations”
The Work of Care Lecture Series (2021-2022):
This 2021–2022 speaker series will explore how Soviet and post-Soviet Russian care workers have been sustaining lives, and why sometimes their efforts hurt rather than heal. Our speakers include historians and anthropologists who will discuss the global and domestic pressures and victories of post/socialist care work in Russia. We invite you to learn about the controversial work of Soviet defectologists, the operations of the notorious system of institutionalized care for disabled people in contemporary Russia, the labors of traditional Buryat healers, the mental health care industry, and the addiction treatment sector of Russian health care.
Anna Klepikova on “Residential Institutions for Disabled People in Russia: Two Models of Care”
Tomas Matza on “Care in the Gap”
Eugene Raikhel on “Governing Habits: Treating Alcoholism in the Post-Soviet Clinic”
All talks are available on the Harriman Institute’s Youtube Channel.
Student and Peer Support
Mentorship
I am committed to sharing my knowledge about US academia with students interested in developing their careers in anthropology, medical humanities, STS, and post/socialist studies. Part of this commitment is providing mentorship opportunities to undergraduate and graduate students. So far, I have mentored pre-medical undergraduate students, undergraduate students majoring in anthropology, and graduate anthropology and medical humanities students.
Leadership
I serve as a co-chair of the Early Career Disability Anthropology Community, running it together with Austin Duncan (University of Arizona).
Svetlana Borodina
sb4468@columbia.edu
Svetlana Borodina, Anthropologist 