Petko Ivanov

Petko Ivanov serves as Associate Teaching Professor of Slavic Studies and Chair of the Slavic Studies Department at Connecticut College, where he has been a faculty member since 2011. He oversees the department's curriculum, faculty, and student programs while maintaining an active teaching schedule across multiple Slavic language and cultural courses.

His educational background includes a B.A. from the University of Sofia in Bulgaria, followed by dual M.A. degrees in Anthropology and Slavic Studies from the University of Chicago, where he also completed A.B.D. (All But Dissertation) work in Slavic Studies. His nearly completed dissertation titled 'What Makes the Slavs Slavic' examines the 'Cyrillo-Methodian question' as a site for negotiating Slavic identities over the past two centuries.

Ivanov's research focuses on comparative cultural history of the Slavs with particular emphasis on nationalist and linguistic ideologies. His interdisciplinary approach spans ethnography of religion (including studies of folk saint cults in Bulgaria), analysis of identity construction at world fairs and museums, examination of intolerance metaphors in media, and theoretical work on alterity and identity in his ongoing project 'The Value of Difference.' He has published scholarly articles across multiple languages on ethnography of religion, language engineering, and Slavic literary canons, plus co-authored a book on folk Christianity in Bulgarian.

As an educator, Ivanov teaches Russian language at all levels and specialized courses including Nationalism, Introduction to Slavic Studies, Linguistic Anthropology, and senior seminars on Russian culture. He pioneered the 'Klassnaya Gazeta' student newspaper project written entirely in Russian, serving as both pedagogical tool and digital archive in Connecticut College's Digital Commons. His advising has led students to prestigious fellowships including Fulbright Teaching Fellowships and Critical Language Scholarships, with many pursuing graduate studies at top institutions like Princeton, Yale, and Harvard.

Departmental leadership includes organizing course-based trips to Russia, establishing telepresence collaborations with international institutions (Higher School of Economics in St. Petersburg, Collegium Civitas in Warsaw, New Bulgarian University in Sofia), and fostering community engagement through programs like teaching Russian to New London elementary students. The department under his chairmanship maintains active student-faculty relationships, cultural programming, and research opportunities culminating in senior theses on diverse topics from Russian banya culture to post-Soviet human trafficking.