American University of Central Asia - AUCA - University Directory

Christopher Baker, Ph.D.

Assistant Professor

Non-departmental General Education Faculty

Division of Arts, Humanities and Communication

 

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Dr. Christopher Baker is the Director of the Central Asian Studies Institute and an Assistant Professor in the Core Humanities. He is also part of the Master of Arts in Central Asian Studies program, in which he works as an Assistant Professor and the Coordinator of the Literature and History concentration in the Liberal Arts and Sciences department. He holds a Ph.D. in Central Eurasian Studies (2019, USA) and a Master of Arts degree in the same field from Indiana University (2006, USA). Dr. Baker earned a Master’s degree in European History from the University of Toronto (1993, Canada) and did work toward a Ph.D. in European Intellectual History at the same institution. He did his undergraduate work at the University of California at Davis, earning a Bachelor of Arts in European History (magna cum laude) in 1992.

Dr. Baker joined AUCA in 2013, and was the Head of MACAS Program from 2019-2023. He is currently serving his fifth term as Chair of the Academic Senate Research Committee, a body tasked with managing research awards to AUCA faculty. This is in addition to coordinating various grants at AUCA, including a multi-year award from the Experimental Humanities Collaborative Network (EHCN), and managing its research exchange with Indiana University.

Dr. Baker is the chair and organizer of the “Literature and History in Central Asia Workshop,” a forum for scholars committed to illuminating the literary art of the region, and recently received an OSUN research grant to coordinate network expertise on “Global Borderlands.” 

  • Summer Research Lab Fellowship, University of Illinois, 2012
  • AAS/SSRC Dissertation Workshop Fellowship, 2012
  • Nazarbayev University grant for Kazakh-English dictionary, 2012
  • U.S. Embassy grant for Kazakh-English dictionary, 2011
  • Fulbright Hays Dissertation Award for dissertation research in Kazakhstan, 2010
  • IREX Individual Advanced Research Opportunities Grant for dissertation research in Kazakhstan, 2007-2008
  • Title VI FLAS for Azeri, Summer 2007
  • Title VI FLAS for Advanced Directed Language Study in Kazakh, 2006-2007
  • SSRC Grant for Azeri, summer 2006
  • [Contributor] Oxford Qazaq Dictionary (2023. Astana: National Translation Bureau) Ethnic Words and Soviet Things: Soviet Civilization and the Literature of Soviet Kazakhstan (2019. Indiana University: PhD Thesis).
  • “The power and significance of the ethnic past,” History Making in Central and Northern Eurasia, ed. Svetlana Jacquesson, (Wiesbaden: Reichert Verlag, 2016). 
  • [Supervising Editor of], Kazakh-English Dictionary. (March 2015. Knowledge Partners Kazakhstan: Almaty) (this was an online publication). 
  • [Eng. language editor of] Nurat, Kanat. Pravovaia ėkonomicheskaia  modernizaùsiia tradiùsionnoi struktury Kazakhstana (xix-xx vv.) [The Legal and Economic Modernization of the Traditional Structure of Kazakhstan (19th to 20th centuries)]. (c. April 2011. Brooke Swafford, trans. Vox Populi: Almaty, Kazakhstan).
  • [Eng. language editor of] Almaty Today. (2010. Vox Populi: Almaty, Kazakhstan).  
  • [Eng. language editor, translator of] Muminov, Ashirbek. Mavzoleǐ Khodzha Akhmeta Iasavi [The Mausoleum of Khoja Ahmed Yasawi], 2nd edition. (2010. Poligrafkombinat:  Almaty, Kazakhstan). 
  • Unsettling the Imperial Imagination: Olzhas Suleimenov’s Az I Ya. (2006. Indiana University: M.A. Thesis).
  • First Year Seminar
  • Second Year Seminar: the Culture Industry
  • Second Year Seminar: the Apocalyptic Imagination
  • Literature at the Edes of Empire

American University of Central Asia
7/6 Aaly Tokombaev Street
Bishkek, Kyrgyz Republic 720060

Tel.: +996 (312) 915000 + Еxt.
Fax: +996 (312) 915 028
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