Faculty

Görkem Atsungur has been working at the American University of Central Asia (AUCA) since 2012. He received his B.A in International Relations from Cyprus International University, his M.A in European Studies from Istanbul Bilgi University, and his Mgr. in Political Science – European Politics from Masaryk University in Czechia. In 2020, Görkem earned his doctorate in the Political Science program, majoring in International Relations and minoring in Nationalism Studies at Central European University (CEU). His research interests include diaspora politics, migration, transnationalism, and international relations. He is currently an associated professor at the Department of International and Comparative Politics and is teaching MACAS’s “Central Asia in Global Politics” course.

Christopher Baker is the Director of the Central Asian Studies Institute at AUCA. A graduate of IU’s Department of Central Eurasian Studies, his research focuses on the literary imagination of classification and on the efforts of Kazakh artists to categorize complex historicities in imperial and Soviet Eurasia, themes he addressed in his dissertation, “Ethnic Words and Soviet Things.” His accomplishments as CASI Director include shifting the orientation of the Institute to the humanities and chairing and organizing its Literature and History in Central Asia Workshop, a gathering of scholars first convened in 2014 to shape and define the field of literary studies in Central Asia. Before coming to AUCA, he supervised the compilation and editing of a 1700-page Kazakh-English dictionary with the aid of grants from the US Diplomatic Mission in Kazakhstan and Nazarbayev University.

Louis-Philippe Campeau is an alumnus of the MA in Central Asian Studies at the American University of Central Asia, where he has been teaching since 2020. During his undergraduate studies in history at Ottawa University in Canada, he became fascinated by Central Asia. This passion led him to cycle from Kiev to Bishkek and onwards to Tbilisi over the course of two years, perfecting his Russian and understanding of the region and its peoples along the way. His main research interests cover late-Soviet history and urbanism, with a particular focus on the way green spaces were used and appropriated to foster new Soviet identities. His master’s thesis was turned into an article published by Central Asian Survey under the title ‘’Of squirrels and men: Being Soviet in Frunze’ green spaces.’’ He is currently teaching courses on development, urbanism and environmental challenges in Central Asia.

Svetlana Jacquesson was trained in ethnology and Turkic studies at the Institute of Oriental Languages and Cultures and the High School for Advanced Studies (Paris, France.) She is a former senior research fellow at the French Institute for Central Asian Studies (IFEAC, Tashkent, Uzbekistan), Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology (Halle, Germany), the Volkswagen Foundation (Halle, Germany) and Sinofon (Palacky University, Olomouc, Czechia). Her recent research focuses on “history making”, or popular ways of re-emplotting history to support old and new identity claims, and on folklore and heritage as re-discovered cultural resources in the 21st century. She has extensively published on these topics as well as on the legacy of nomadic cultures and its renegotiation in Kyrgyzstan and beyond. Svetlana acts as the director of the MA program in Central Asian Studies. She is teaching CA 571 Power and Knowledge and leading the MA Thesis Seminar for MACAS students.