Trevor is a specialist in early twentieth century Russian philosophy, particular within the émigré communities in interwar Paris and Berlin. He is writing his dissertation on the French-Russian philosopher Alexandre Kojève and his connection to the history of Russian Hegelianism. He regularly works with various Russian diaspora archives in Paris, sponsored by several university dissertation research grants. Other research interests include Russian modernism in a global context, debates and exchanges between Western and Soviet Marxism, and theories of sexuality in command and post-command economies. For the 2017-2018 academic year, Trevor will conduct research at the Higher School of Economics in Moscow on a Fulbright research grant.
Education & Training
- PhD, Slavic Languages and Literatures, University of Pittsburgh, 2019
- MA, Slavic Languages and Literatures, University of Pittsburgh, 2014
- BA, Russian & French, University of Pittsburgh, 2012
Courses Taught
- Masterpieces of Nineteenth Century Russian Literature
- Masterpieces of Twentieth Century Russian Literature
- Beginning, Advanced, and Fourth-year Russian
- Early Russian Culture
- Modern Russian Culture
- The Russian Short Story in Context
Representative Publications
“Kojève’s Gift: How a Russian Philosopher Brought an ‘Other’ Love to the West,” forthcoming in Slavic and East European Journal, Winter 63.3 (2020).
“Contending Alterities: Drag Show, Roma Camp…,” in Cinemasaurus: Russian Film in Contemporary Context, eds. Nancy Condee, Alexander Prokhorov, and Elena Prokhorova (Brighton, MA: Academic Studies Press, 2019).
“Nothing but Mammals: Post-Soviet Sexuality after the End of History,” in The Human Reimagined: Posthumanism in Late Soviet and Post-Soviet Russia, eds. Colleen McQuillen and Julia Vaingurt (Brighton, MA: Academic Studies Press, 2018).
Research Interests
- Russian émigré culture (Paris, Prague, US)
- History of Russo-Soviet philosophy (1900-present)
- Queer theory and socialism/post-socialism
- Russian and Czechoslovak intellectual history
- Russian literary theory in diaspora
- Contemporary Russian cinema
Representative Conference Presentations
“Rethinking ‘Western Marxism’: Hegelian Marxism Between Soviet and Émigré Russia,” ASEEES, San Francisco, November 2019.
Roundtable: “The Boundaries of Russian Philosophy,” with Alyssa DeBlasio, Mikhail Epstein, Vladimir Marchenkov, Kåre Johan Mjør, and Andrea Oppo, ASEEES, Boston, December 2018.
“Whose End of History?: Alexandre Kojève and/or Vladimir Solovʹev,” ASEEES, Boston, December 2018.
“Works of Wisdom: Humans after History, Art after Labor?” The Aesthetics of Social Equality: Avant-Garde, Populisms and the People, National Research University Higher School of Economics, Moscow, Russian Federation, May 2018.
“Is Orthodoxy pre-Oedipal?: Contact and Crises Between Freud and Modern Russian Orthodox Thought,” Roundtable: “Fort/da: Contested Legacies of Psychoanalysis in Russia,” with Anna Fishzon, Emma Lieber, and Cate Reilly. MLA, Austin, January 2016.
“The Orthodox and the Orgasm: Nikolai Berdiaev and Psychoanalysis,” ASEEES, Philadelphia, November 2015.
“On the Origin of Homo Sovieticus: Collectivization on Film and the Idea of the Soviet Human-Animal,” ASEEES, San Antonio, November 2015.
“The Poetic Is/And the Political: Reading Osip Mandel'shtam Post-May ’68,” graduate conference Russia, in Theory, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, April 2014.