Anastasiia Strakhova

Anastasiia Strakhova is Associate Director of the Program in Jewish Culture and Society. She specializes in Modern Jewish history with a concentration on Eastern Europe, particularly Ukraine, and migration. Before joining the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, Anastasiia held postdocs at Duke and Harvard.

In addition to administering the Program and promoting public engagement, Anastasiia serves as the Director of the Undergraduate Program. She oversees the Jewish Studies major and minor, teaches undergraduate and graduate courses, and supports students’ academic and professional development.

Anastasiia’s current book project, Agents of Mobility: Jews, Border Control, and Unauthorized Border Crossing in the Russian Empire, 1880s-1917, is a social history of Jewish migration from the Russian Empire that analyzes a paradoxical situation. While the imperial government supported Jewish emigration, unlike the departure of most other ethnic groups, at least seventy-five percent of Jewish emigrants crossed the imperial border illegally. Although both the Russian authorities and ordinary Jews shared the same goal—the Jewish abandonment of imperial lands—their envisioned means of achieving it differed significantly. Rejecting restrictions imposed from above, Jews learned to manipulate imperial policies and committed to freedom of movement.