Merle Fainsod Prize

We offer the Merle Fainsod Prize to encourage students with a research interest in Russian or Eurasian studies to accept admission at Harvard. It is a one-time cash award of $2000 over and above any financial aid offer. Departmental admissions committees nominate candidates for the prize.

Fainsod Prizes were awarded to six incoming students for fall 2009:

• Gregory Avinogenov, Ph.D. Candidate in History: Russian history and the intellectual and cultural history of early modern Europe.
• Anna Aizman, Ph.D. Candidate in Comparative Literature: Modern Russian and Czech literatures; poststructuralist theories; poetry and theater.
• Thomas Hooker, Ph.D. Candidate in History: Friendship and the dialectic between individual and collective in Russian and Soviet history.
• Irina Ikonsky, Ph.D. Candidate in Slavic Languages and Literatures: The rise of the literary canon in 19th-century Russian and American literature.
• Joseph Livesey, A.M. Candidate in Regional Studies—Russia, Eastern Europe, and Central Asia: Comparative study of Ukraine and other post-Soviet republics.
• Andrei Roman, Ph.D. Candidate in Government: Leftist ideology and democratic consolidation in Eastern Europe; the impact of EU integration on corruption and clientelism.