Evgeniya Pyatovskaya
Assistant Professor of Communication Studies Loyola Marymount University
- Los Angeles CA
Biography
Education
University of South Florida
Ph.D.
Organizational Communication
2025
University of South Florida
Graduate Certificate
Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies
2025
Tomsk State University
Postgraduate Diploma
Organizational Development Management
2018
Tomsk State University
Specialist
International Relations
2009
Tomsk State University
B.A.
International Relations
2008
Areas of Expertise
Industry Expertise
Languages
- Russian
- English
Media Appearances
Russia’s Ruthless Renaissance
Wilson Center online
2024-01-31
Two years into the war with Ukraine, today’s Russia can best be understood through the lens of a slogan that once appeared in a Solovki special prison, part of the extended gulag system: “With an iron fist, we will drive humanity to happiness!” (Железной рукой загоним человечество к счастью!). As the war drags on, those who anticipated a collapse of Putin’s regime and Russia’s economy find themselves disappointed. Despite the draconian sanctions and cultural isolation, Russia is experiencing what looks like a bloody, ruthless Renaissance. Economically, socially, and culturally, Russia is reforging itself.
"Soviet book syndrome": Why Russian propaganda works
Euronews online
2023-05-10
The article explores the so-called "Soviet Book Syndrome." Specifically, how the Kremlin is playing on the past to exploit citizens' fears and sell its justification for the invasion of Ukraine.
Censure et propagande: la culture comme champ de bataille en Russie postsoviétique
Le Devoir online
2023-01-22
The article explores questions of Russia's propaganda in connection with the ongoing conflict in Ukraine.
The banality of World War ‘Z’
EuropeNow online
2022-01-11
The piece analyzes Russia's aggression in Ukraine.
Giorgia Meloni – the political provocateur set to become Italy's first far-right leader since Mussolini
The Conversation online
2022-09-18
This short article offers a view of Meloni as Italy's next leader.
Putin’s propaganda is rooted in Russian history - and that’s why it works
The Conversation online
2022-06-28
This piece offers an explanation for why Russia's propaganda works and how it is connected to the ongoing conflict with Ukraine.
Many young French voters are approaching the presidential runoff with a shrug and vow to ‘vote blank’
The Conversation online
2022-04-20
The piece considers the prospects of various candidates during France's presidential elections in 2022.
Austria at the crossroads of history: choosing between comfort and conscience during the war in Ukraine
EuropeNow online
2022-04-12
Austria-Russia relations in connection with the war in Ukraine.
The West thinks that Russians, suffering from sanctions, will end up abandoning Putin – but history indicates they won’t.
The Conversation online
2022-03-21
The piece explains how common Russians might react to Western sanctions in the light of the conflict in Ukraine.
Research Grants
Waterhouse Family Institute for the Study of Communication and Society
Waterhouse Family Institute $5450
2022-05-01
The grant supported my research project “Disruption, Resilience, and Change: Lessons of Asian American Nonprofit Organizing During COVID-19 Pandemic” devoted to understanding how non-profit organizations cultivate resilience before, amidst, and after crises.
Articles
To Russia with(out) love: Ukrainian war refugees migrating to the land of the aggressor
Communication and Critical/Cultural StudiesPyatovskaya, E., & Khrebtan-Hörhager, J.
2025-07-04
Russia’s full-scale war on Ukraine has caused the largest refugee crisis of the twenty-first century, with many Ukrainians fleeing to Russia, the very country waging war against them. Drawing on critical cultural and post-colonial theories, we contrast Russia’s portrayal of wartime forced migration with the personal accounts of Ukrainian refugees. We demonstrate how Russia’s ideological opposition to the West, rooted in the Soviet Union era, its exploitation of the shared history and cultural ties with Ukraine, and its manipulation of refugee and temporary asylum statuses impact current refugee flows and the lived experiences of Ukrainians seeking refuge in Russia.
Integrating tenacious hope and feminism: Global necessity.
The Journal of Dialogic Ethics: Interfaith and Interhuman PerspectivesPyatovskaya, E., & Buzzanell, P.M.
2023-10-01
Two scholars coming from different parts of the world, namely, Russia and the United States, enter into a conversation about feminist ethical dilemmas in communication scholarship and ways to address them in light of current crises unfolding around the world. In examining problems or tensions associated with gender justice, we integrate the concept of tenacious hope, developed by Arnett (2014, 2015, 2020, 2022), with processes associated with feminist theorizing to illuminate how dilemmas unfold in different locations impacted by persistent and emergent threats to human rights and gender autonomy. Tenacious hope seems to be an integral yet unrecognized quality of feminisms, which, as movements, center action and refuse to accept simpliciter that the change will suddenly materialize or just happen. Tenacious hope offers an ethical stance that, when integrated within feminisms, allows for countering the disintegration and disregard for the Other ubiquitous in today’s discourse. The concept of tenacious hope becomes a lens through which feminist ethical dilemmas and feminist activist practices can be analyzed to understand intersections, overlaps, and differences that inform communication scholarship today.
Russian Women, Ukraine War, and (neglected) writing on the wall: From the (im)possibility of word traveling to fail(ing) feminist alliances.
Journal of International and Intercultural CommunicationKhrebtan-Hörhager, J., & Pyatovskaya, E.
2023-12-10
We argue that the Russian feminist and resistance groups, Pussy Riot, Feminist Antiwar Resistance, and Les Pleureuses, operate and should be acknowledged as agents of social change, and leaders of cultural opposition during the current Russia-Ukraine war. We establish Second World Feminism and Russian feminism as its cultural product in this essay. We argue how, in the years preceding the war, Pussy Riot repeatedly protested the totalitarian grip of the Russian state, its corruption, and the concretion of the Russian Orthodox Church and the state in creating conditions of female obedience and oppression. Further, we analyze the emergence and the ongoing activism of the anti-war resistance movement, FAR and its branch Les Pleureuses, in their fight against war, patriarchy, authoritarianism, and militarism. We illustrate how and why Russian feminists/resistance groups became agents of dissent, and can become torchbearers of peace. We examine the collectives’ potential contribution to and compatibility with transnational feminist alliances and make a case for including both Russian and Second World Feminisms as meaningful and impactful perspectives within the framework of transnational feminism.
