I teach Russian at all levels, as well as the history of Russian literature and the history of Russian culture and ideas, the history of Ukrainian literature, literary analysis and literary theory, and academic writing for students of Ukrainian and Russian. Within the framework of the Faculty of Humanities Graduate School, I have developed the course “Translation and Power.” I also co-developed the postgraduate course “Controlling Literature – Perspectives on Censorship”.

I supervise theses with a focus on literary and cultural studies at the Bachelor’s, Magister’s and Master’s levels, and I am the principal supervisor for two doctoral students: Lisa Mendoza Åsberg (dissertation project: “The Dual Voice: Represented Speech in Translation Between Swedish and Polish”) and Julia Gerdner (dissertation project: “Resurrecting through Language: Linguistic Conversion in Contemporary Ukrainian Poetry”).

I am currently leading the research project “De/colonizing Ukraine: Practices of Russification and Modes of Resistance, 1922–1991,” funded by the Baltic Sea Foundation for the period 2025–2027. The project deals with the prerequisites for cultural production under conditions of coercive cultural change. It focuses on Russification policies pursued by Soviet authorities in Ukraine up to the 1991 collapse of the USSR. The purpose of the project is to address Russification in Soviet Ukraine as a multilayered, multidimensional, and dynamic phenomenonwhich brought about cultural processes still active. Transcending the boundaries of earlier sociolinguistic research on Russification, the project targets contexts of cultural production. Building on prior research by the project participants, the investigation focuses on: the making of dictionaries; the translation of foreign literature; and the publishing process. These areas were instrumental in shaping a “topography of the possible” in the Soviet era. The project approaches them as open to both Russification and actions directed at negotiating and countering it, thus forming “spaces of de/colonization.” Adopting an interdisciplinary approach and drawing on both print and archival sources, the project aims at throwing new light on the cultural dynamics of Russification in Soviet Ukraine. The ultimate goal is to uncover cumulative workings and synergy effects of Russification policies on culture as a whole. Thereby, it contributes new perspectives on current issues of de/colonization, national culture and national identity in Ukraine and adds to the groundwork for comparative studies of Russification in (post-)Soviet space.

My previous research has focused on Russian modernist poetry and prose and, above all, on literary translation as a multifaceted cultural phenomenon in the Soviet context. The latter has been conducted within two externally funded projects:

The research project “Totalitarianism and Translation: Control and Conflict in Soviet Translation Practices, 1932–1953” (funded by the Riksbankens Jubileumsfond, 2009–2011) aimed to establish literary translation as a subject of research within the field of Stalin-era culture. I employed recent perspectives from translation studies to analyze a large body of historical source material that I had collected during archival research in Moscow. Analysis of the translation discourse of the period was combined with a study of several key practices. In particular, I examined the widespread use of indirect practices, especially the so-called “podstrochnik” translation, as an institutionalized “creative space” between the source and target texts. The results of this project included, among other things, a microhistory of the use of podstrochnik among Russian translators and a microhistory of the first All-Union Translators’ Conference held in 1936; the latter focused on the “ideologization of norms” that came to leave a lasting mark on Soviet translation culture.

The research project “The Interface with the Foreign: The Soviet School of Translation, the Cold War, and World Literature, 1945–1985” (funded by the Swedish Research Council 2015–2018) built in part on the conceptual and material foundation established by the previous project but focused on extra-Union translation and the creation of a Russian canon of world literature. The project viewed translation as Russian culture’s “interface with the foreign.” This metaphor emphasizes that a translation determines how the foreign work is presented to readers and, thereby, its possible meanings in the target culture. During the period in question, this interface was largely defined by the “Soviet school of translation.” The project examined how the “Soviet school of translation” was established as a concept and what cultural significance it acquired. At the same time, the project analyzed the translations produced by several key figures, with a particular focus on the intertextuality of the works. By combining translation studies and Slavic studies, the project offered new perspectives on the history of translation during this period and created new opportunities for reflection on Russia’s cultural interaction with the West.

2026. ”Minnet av Babyn Jar,” 20TAL #16–17, 13–15.

2025. “From the Editor,” Scando–Slavica 71:1, 1–2.

2025. “From the Editor,” Scando–Slavica 70:2, 173–174.

2024. “From the Editor,” Scando–Slavica 70:1, 1–3.

2023. “From the Editor,” Scando–Slavica 69:2, 141–142.

2023. “From the Editor,” Scando–Slavica 69:1, 1–2.

2022. “From the Editor,” Scando–Slavica 68:2, 201–202.

2022. “Translating Inferno: Mikhail Lozinskii, Dante and the Soviet Myth of the Translator” in Translation under Communism, red. Christopher Rundle, Anna Lange, Daniele Monticelli. London Borough of Camden: Palgrave Macmillan, 111–141.

2021. “Perevodčik kak trikster: Mark Tarlovskij i južnaja sub’’ektivnost’” [article and archival publication] in Tolkovanija pravdy v russkoj kul’ture (Studia Russica Helsingiensia et Tartuensia XVII), red. Gennadij Obatnin & Tomi Huttunen (Slavica helsingiensia 54). Helsinki: Dep. of Languages, University of Helsinki, 261–276.

2021. “Mėtr i metr: pjatistopnyj variant perevoda ‘Don Žuana’ G.A. Šengeli” [A maître and his meter: a pentameter variant of G.A. Shengeli’s Don Juan translation] [article, 24 pp. and archival publication 81 pp.] in Chudožestvenno-filologičeskij perevod 1920–1930-ch godov [Literary-philological translation during the 1920s–1930s], red. M.E. Baskina, V.V. Filičeva. St. Petersburg: Nestor-Istorija, 342–448.

2020. “Made under pressure: literary translation in the Soviet Union, 1960–1991” [review article], The Translator, DOI: 10.1080/13556509.2020.1808392

2019. “The Translator as Trickster: Mark Tarlovskii and Southern Subjectivity” in Words, Bodies, Memory. A Festschrift in honor of Irina Sandomirskaja, eds. Lars Kleberg, Tora Lane, Marcia Sa Cavalcante Schuback (Södertörn Philosophical Studies 23). Huddinge: Södertörns högskola, 191–209.

2019. “En maître reviderar sin meter: Georgij Šengelis femfotade experiment med Byrons Don Juan” in Slavica antiqua et hodierna. En hyllningsskrift till Per Ambrosiani (Stockholm Slavic Papers 28), eds. Elisabeth Löfstrand, Alexander Pereswetoff-Morath, Ewa Teodorowicz-Hellman. Stockholm: Institutionen för slaviska och baltiska språk, finska, nederändska och tyska, 167–177.

2019. “Institutionalized Intermediates: Conceptualizing Soviet Practices of Indirect Translation” in Indirect Translation: Theoretical, Methodological and Terminological Issues, red. Alexandra Assis Rosa, Hanna Pieta & Rita Bueno Maia. New York and London: Routledge [Book edition of the eponymous special issue of Translation Studies, 2017].

2018. “Koncept ‘sovetskoj školy perevoda’ — dit’ja pozdnego stalinizma” [The concept of the ‘Soviet school of translation’ — a child of late Stalinism] in Vtoroj vsesojuznyj s’’ezd sovetskich pisatelej (1954). Ideologija istoričeskogo perechoda i transformacija sovetskoj literatury [The Second all-union congress of Soviet writers (1954). The ideology of historical transition and the transformation of Soviet literature], red. K.A. Bogdanov & V.Iu. Viugin. S:t. Petersburg: Aleteia, 309–346.

2018. “Introduction: The Double Context of Translation” i Translation in Russian Contexts: Culture, Politics, Identity, eds. Brian James Baer & Susanna Witt, (Routledge Advances in Translation and Interpreting Studies). New York and London: Routledge, 1–16.

2017. “‘Sovetskaja škola perevoda’ — k probleme istorii koncepta” [‘The Soviet school of translation — to the history of the concept’] in Perevodčeskie strategii i gosudarstvennyj kontrol’/Translation Strategies and State Control, ed. Lea Pild. Acta Slavica Estonica IX. Tartu: Tartu University Press, 36–51.

2017. “Institutionalized Intermediates: Conceptualizing Soviet Practices of Indirect Translation”, Translation Studies (special issue: Indirect Translation: Theoretical, Methodological and Terminological Issues). 10:2, 166–182.

2016. “Socialist Realism in Translation: The Theory of a Practice”, Baltic Worlds IX:4, 52–58.

2016. “Translation and Intertextuality in the Soviet-Russian Context: The Case of Georgii Shengeli’s Don Juan”, Slavic and East European Journal. 60:1, 22–48.

2016. “Byron’s Don Juan in Russian and the ‘Soviet School of Translation’”, Translation and Interpreting Studies (Special Issue: Contexts of Russian Literary Translation. eds. Susanna Witt & Julie Hansen). 11:1, 23–43.

2016. “Introduction” (with Julie Hansen), Translation and Interpreting Studies (Special Issue: Contexts of Russian Literary Translation. eds. Susanna Witt & Julie Hansen). 11:1, 1–3.

2015. “Pasternak, Łysohorsky and the Significance of ‘Unheroic’ Translation”, Russian Literature 78, 755–773 <http://authors.elsevier.com/sd/article/S0304347915001052>.

2014. “Det främmande ordet i andra potens: Byrons Don Juan på ryska” in Med blicken österut. Hyllningsskrift till Per-Arne Bodin (Stockholm Slavic Papers 23), eds. Per Ambrosiani, Elisabeth Löfstrand, Ewa Teodorowicz-Hellman. Stockholm & Skellefteå: Artos & Norma, 383–399.

2013. “The Shorthand of Empire: Podstrochnik Practices and the Making of Soviet Literature”, Ab Imperio: Studies of New Imperial History and Nationalism in the Post-Soviet Space 3, 155–190.

2013. “Arts of Accommodation: The First All-Union Conference of Translators, Moscow, 1936, and the Ideologization of Norms” in The Art of Accommodation: Literary Translation in Russia, eds. Leon Burnett & Emily Lygo. Oxford: Peter Lang, 141–184.

2013. “Totalitarizm i perevod: kontekst Džambula” in Džambul Džabaev. Priključenija kazachskogo akyna v sovetskoj strane, eds. Konstantin Bogdanov, Riccardo Nicolosi, Jurii Murašov. Moskva: NLO, 267–286.

2011. “Between the Lines: Totalitarianism and Translation in the USSR” in Contexts, Subtexts and Pretexts: Literary Translation in Eastern Europe and Russia, ed. Brian James Baer. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins, 149–170.

2011. “Translatio imperii: aspekter på nationalitetsöversättning under Stalintiden” in Litteratur i gränszonen: transnationella litteraturer ur ett nordiskt perspektiv, eds. Christina Kullberg & Elisabeth Bladh. Falun: Högskolan i Dalarna, 35–52.

2009. “‘Nature’ in Doctor Zhivago” in The Life of Boris Pasternak’s Doctor Zhivago (Stanford Slavic Studies 37), ed. Lazar Fleishman. Stanford: Dept. of Slavic Languages and Literatures, 156–172.

2009. “Pasternaks begynnelser: till autofiktionens poetik” in The Arts in Dialogue. Essays in honour of Fiona Björling, eds. Johanna Lindbladh et al. Lund: Lund University, 323–336.

2009. “Pasternak’s Iskaženie and the Practice of Creative Evolution” in From Poets to Padonki: Linguistic Authority and Norm Negotiation in Modern Russian Culture, eds. Ingunn Lunde & Martin Paulsen (Slavica Bergensia 9), Bergen: University of Bergen, 212–227.

2009. “Ėpistemologija poėtiki (Neskol’ko nabljudenij nad ‘Ochrannoj gramotoj’ Pasternaka)” in Jazyk kak mediator meždu znaniem i iskusstvom. Problemy meždistsiplinarnych issledovanij chudožestvennogo teksta, ed. Natal’ja Fateeva, Institut russkogo jazyka im. V.V. Vinogradova RAN. Moskva: Azbukovnik, 161–166.

2008. “Tala tvåstämmigt: totalitarism och översättning” i Terminal Øst: Totalitære og posttotalitære diskurser, eds. Ingunn Lunde & Susanna Witt. Bergen: Spartacus, 215–233.

2008. “O prostranstve lesa v poėtike Pasternaka” in Ljubov’ prostranstva… Poėtika mesta v tvorčestve Borisa Pasternaka, ed. V. Abašev. Moskva: Jazyki slavjanskoj kul’tury, 175–187.

2008.“Portfölj med dubbla bottnar: litterär översättning i Sovjetunionen” in Konsten att översätta. Föreläsningar vid Södertörns högskolas Litterära översättarseminarium 1998–2008, ed. Lars Kleberg. Huddinge: Södertörns högskola, 203–216.

2007. ”Översättningsportföljen” in Jostein 70: post festum-skrift, ed. Ingunn Lunde. Bergen: Universitetet i Bergen, 66–68.

2004. “Drama v Drame: strašnaja mest’ Čechova?” (with Lars Kleberg) in Telling Forms. 30 Essays in Honour of Peter Alberg Jensen (Stockholm Studies in Russian Literature 37), eds. Karin Grelz & Susanna Witt. Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell International, 183–196.

2004. “Plötsligt!” [On Dostoevskij’s The Idiot] in Idioten, Program. Göteborgs stadsteater, 3–6.

2003. “Showing and Hiding: the Paradoxical Modernism of Boris Pasternak” in Swedish-Polish Modernism. Literature-Language-Culture. Conference held in Cracow, Poland, April 20–21 2001 (Konferenser 56. Kungl. Vitterhets Historie och Antikvitets Akademien), eds. Małgorzata Anna Packalén & Sven Gustavsson. Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell International, 139–146.

2003. “Perevod kak mimikrija: Gamlet Pasternaka” in Swedish Contributions to the Thirteenth International Congress of Slavists, Ljubljana, 15–21 August 2003 (Slavica Lundensia Supplementa 2), eds. Birgitta Englund Dimitrova & Alexander Pereswetoff-Morath. Lund, 145–156.

2003. “Pusjkins ‘Spader dam’ – och Tjajkovskijs” in Spader dam. Opera av Pjotr Iljitj Tjajkovskij, Program. Göteborgsoperan, 11–12.

2002. "Om livet i Sovjet – inte en kackerlacka nämns” [review of Maria Zennström, Katarinas sovjetiska upplevelser, Bonniers 2001], Bulletin no. 1/02, april 2002, Sällskapet för studier av Ryssland, Central- och Östeuropa samt Centralasien, 11–12.

2001. “Skapandet under lupp” in Forskardagarna 2001. Stockholm: Stockholms universitet, 2 pp.

2001. “‘... almaznyj chmel´ s duši’: K interpretacii stichotvorenija Pasternaka ‘Naša groza’”. Studia Russica XIX (Budapest), 279–283.

2000. Creating Creation: Readings of Pasternak’s Doktor Živago, Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell International.

2000. “Gastronomičeskaja metafizika Pasternaka” in Severnyj sbornik: Proceedings of the NorFA Network in Russian Literature 1995–2000, eds. Peter Alberg Jensen & Ingunn Lunde (Stockholm Studies in Russian Literature 34). Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell International, 267–276.

2000. “Mimikrija v Doktore Živago” i V krugu Živago. Pasternakovskij sbornik (Stanford Slavic Studies 22), ed. Lazar Fleishman. Stanford: Dept. of Slavic Languages and Literature, 87–122 (reprinted: Pasternakovskij sbornik 1: Stat’i i publikacii, red. A.L. Oborina, E.V. Pasternak. Moskva: RGGU, 2011, 188–221).

1998. “Master i Margarita – teatral’nyj roman?,” Semiotika, Sign Systems Studies, vol. 26, 299–318.

1997. “‘Poėty’ Mariny Cvetaevoj: Popytka analiza i istorija odnogo posvjaščenija” in Den’ poėzii Mariny Cvetaevoj: Sbornik statej (Russica Aboensia 2), eds. Barbara Lönnqvist & Larisa Mokroborodova. Åbo/Turku, 24–48.

1994. “‘Doktor Živopis’: O ‘romanach’ Borisa Pasternaka Doktor Živago” in Klassicizm i modernizm: sbornik statei, eds. I. Avramec, P. Alberg Jensen, L. Kiseleva et al. Tartu: Tartu Ülikooli kirjastus, 140-167 (reprinted: Toronto Slavic Quarterly, 15, Winter 2006.

Translations

2026. Iryna Shuvalova, Slutsånger [Endsongs], 20TAL Bok (i tryck).

2026. Sex dikter av Marianna Kiyanovska ur samlingen Babyn Jar. Röster, 20TAL #16/17, 16–21.

2025. Julia Iljucha, Mina kvinnor: Fyrtio ukrainska ögonblick, Romanus & Selling.

2024. Julia Musakovska, Stenar och spik (med Mikael Nydahl), Ariel & Ellerströms.

2024. Dikter av Serhij Zjadan, Oksana Zabuzjko, Maksym Kryvtsov, Vasyl Stus, Halyna Kruk, Kateryna Kalytko, Viktoria Amelina, Iryna Sjuvalova, Julia Musakovska i tidskriften 20TAL #10/11 2024 (specialnummer: Ukraina blickar framåt)

2024. Prosastycken av Julia Iljucha och Ostap Slyvynskyj i tidskriften 20TAL #10/11 2024 (specialnummer: Ukraina blickar framåt)

2024. Essäer av Sofia Andruchovytj, Olena Haleta, Andrij Ljubka, Artem Tjech i tidskriften 20TAL #10/11 2024 (specialnummer: Ukraina blickar framåt)

2022. Dikter av Serhij Zjadan, Halyna Kruk, Ostap Slyvynskyj, Iryna Tsilyk, Oksana Lutsysjyna, Kateryna Kalytko, 20TAL # 6, 21–41.

2022. ”Grå”, novell av Julija Iljucha, 20TAL # 7, 19–25.

2014. [från ukrainska] Kotsarev, Oleh, “Den samtida ukrainska poesin: melodi, magi, revolution”, 10TAL, #17/18, 44–50.

2014. [från ukrainska] Jakymtjuk, Ljubov, “Kriget talar”, 10TAL, # 17/18, 8–12.

2014. [från ukrainska] Zjadan, Serhij, “Varför jag inte finns på sociala medier” [diktcykel], 10TAL. # 17/18, 72–77.

2014. [från ukrainska] Zjadan, Serhij, “Sju texter om kriget”, 10TAL, # 17/18, 17–23.

2014. [från ukrainska] Dikter av Ljubov Jakymtjuk, Halyna Kruk, Marianna Kyjanovska, 10TAL, # 17/18, 13–15; 51–53; 68–71.

2006. [från ukrainska] dikter av Jurii Andruchovytj, Halyna Kruk och Serhij Zjadan för Stockholm Poetry Festival (programpublikationen) och Svenska institutet.

2005. [från ryska] Sandomirskaja, Irina, “Ridikylen” i Handväskan i samtidskonsten / The Handbag in Contemporary Art, 12 november 2005–26 februari 2006, Galleri 3 [utställningskatalog], Stockholm: Kulturhuset, 7–9.

2001. [från engelska] Sandomirskaja, Irina, “Konsten på spaning innanför nödvändighetens murar” i Konst på SÖS. Essäer om konst på sjukhus och i annan institutionsmiljö, red. Ann Magnusson. Stockholm: Stockholms läns landsting, 63–87.

2000. [från ukrainska] dikter av Jurij Andruchovytj, Natalka Bilotserkivets’, Jaroslav Dovhan, Oleksandr Irvanets’, Ariel, # 3, 24–25, 54–66.

1999. [från ukrainska] Dikter av Oksana Zabuzjko, Ariel, # 4, 14–24.

1998. [från ryska] Sandomirskaja, Irina, “Landskap med vandringsman” [recension av Boris Gasparovs bok Jazyk, pamiat’, obraz], Dialoger # 46, 37–39.

1997. [från ryska] Dmitrevskaja, Marina, “Huset som Sonnenschein byggde”, Teatertidningen # 3, 16–19.

1995. [från ryska] Ur tsarpalatsets garderob: Eremitaget i S:t Petersburg gästar Livrustkammaren [utställningskatalog]. Stockholm, 50 s.

1991. [från ryska] Oksana Korneva, Gennadij Demin, “Ängelns lärling: En intervju med Moisej Solomonovitj Belenkij om Solomon Michoels teater”, Teatertidningen, 54:4, 17–21.

1991. [från ryska] Vasiljev, Anatolij, “Teatern som inte känner några gränser”, Teatertidningen, 53:2, 16–18.

1991. [från ryska] Lebedeva, L. “Emigranternas migration”: Ett samtal mellan regissörerna Roman Kozak och Michail Mokejev, Teatertidningen, 53:2, 19–22.

1991. [från ryska] Ignatieva, Maria, “Jurij Pogrebnitjko”, Teatertidningen, 53:2, 23–24.

1991. [från ryska] Svobodin, A. “Nikolaj Erdman”, Teatertidningen. 53:2, 25–30.

1985. [från ryska] Surkova, Olga / Tarkovskii, Andrej, “För skådespelaren ska filmen vara som livet: gåta, hemlighet, mysterium”, Expressen 20.1.1985.