Samuel Driver

Background

About Samuel Driver

I am a Fulbright-Hays DDRA Fellow, a Stanford U.S- Russia Forum Arts & Culture Fellow, a Visiting Scholar at Charles University in Prague, a Research Fellow at OSA - Central European University, and a Member of the Younger Generation Leaders Network on Euro-Atlantic Security (YGLN). My academic research is centered around photography and reality formation in the USSR, with a particular focus on the intersection of photography and truth during the Stalinist era and Nonconformist photography, as well as contemporary art activism. Beyond this, I work to understand the role that Eastern European youth cultural production can impact policy approaches. Outside of academia, I have held lecturing and research positions in contemporary art museums both in the United States and Russia, while also working as a Russian-English translator for Manege Central Exhibition Hall in St. Petersburg, Russia and Russian Oppositional Arts Review (ROAR). I am currently finishing a collected works poetry translation manuscript and have several upcoming publications. Beyond this, I have worked as a professional musician since 2013 and continue to work with musicians and artists from around the U.S. and Russia. Education PhD, Slavic Studies, Brown University, 2016-present M.A, Russian, Middlebury College, 2021-present A.M, Slavic Studies, Brown University, 2016-2018 B.A, Russian Language and Literature & Interdisciplinary Philosophy with a Concentration in the Great Books, Boston College, 2009-2013 Areas of Interest Photography and photographic theory in the Soviet and Post-Soviet space Ontology and epistemology of photography and its interrelation with state power Eastern European youth cultural production and its impact on public policy and security issues Theory of memory and the image in visual art and literature Art and activism in the context of contemporary Russian culture Questions of objectivity and subjectivity in literature, visual art, and film Technology and philosophy of music of the Russian and Soviet avant-garde Postmodernist Soviet and Post-Soviet literature Influence of Soviet avant-garde film on the French New Wave