The Faculty of Music is delighted to welcome Dr Olha Kushniruk, who has joined us as a holder of the ‘Researchers At Risk’ British Academy Fellowship. Dr Kushniruk is a musicologist from Kyiv specialising in Ukrainian music of the 20th and 21st centuries, and she is the author of several books (in Ukrainian). At present, her particular research interest is the music of Alexander Jacobchuk, a composer who wrote a number of postcolonial works subverting Soviet narratives of Ukrainian history. Prof. Marina Frolova-Walker, who is Dr Kushniruk’s academic sponsor, said: “Olha came to Western Europe as a refugee, together with her two teenage sons, and we are very grateful to Darwin College for offering them accommodation. I first met Olha several years ago, and we had a very productive exchange of views on various musicological topics. It will be a pleasure and a privilege for me to work with her, and through her, I can hope to acquire a deeper understanding of contemporary Ukrainian culture. Every day we watch the news from Ukraine with horror, and I treasure the opportunity to do something positive by enabling more Ukrainian voices to be heard”.
