Graduate Faculty
Bożena Karwowska
Bożena Karwowska
Professor
emailbozena@mail.ubc.ca
phone604 822 5956
location_onBuchanan Tower 920
Department Program
Slavic and Eastern European StudiesDepartment Program
Slavic and Eastern European Studies
Caroline Rieger
Caroline Rieger
Associate Professor
emailcarolin@mail.ubc.ca
phone604 822 5156
location_onBuchanan Tower 923
Department Program
German StudiesCuriosity might have killed the cat, but it made Caroline Rieger a researcher and teacher. Born and raised in Luxembourg – a trilingual country – Caroline was curious about anything and everything related to languages from a very early age. This inquisitive fascination was a fruitful companion t...Read more
Department Program
German Studies
David Gramling
David Gramling (they+) is author, editor, or translator of eight books in print: Literature in Late Monolingualism (Bloomsbury 2024); The Invention of Multilingualism (Cambridge University Press, 2021); The Invention of Monolingualism (Bloomsbury 2016, American Association for Applied Linguist...Read more
Department Program
German Studies
Ervin Malakaj
Ervin Malakaj
Associate Professor | Department Head
emailervin.malakaj@ubc.ca
phone604 822 2798
location_onBuchanan Tower 917B
Department Program
German StudiesDr. Malakaj specializes in late-18th- to 21st-century German media and cultural history. His research focuses on 19th-century literary cultures, film studies, queer studies, and humanities as well as language learning advocacy.
Dr. Malakaj’s first book, Anders als die Andern (McGill-Queen’s...Read more
Department Program
German Studies
Gaby Pailer
Gaby Pailer
Professor
emailpailer@mail.ubc.ca
phone604 822 4042
location_onBuchanan Tower 907
Department Program
German StudiesGaby Pailer joined UBC as Associate Professor of German Literature in 2001 leaving a grant-tenure position of Assistant Professor equivalent at the University of Karlsruhe (TH), Germany. She was promoted to Professor in 2010, served as Head of the Department of Central, Eastern and Northern Europea...Read more
Department Program
German Studies
ON LEAVE
July 1, 2026 - Dec 31, 2026
Geoffrey Winthrop-Young
After graduating from UBC in 1991, Geoffrey Winthrop-Young taught at the Universities of Manitoba and Waterloo before returning to UBC in 1995, where he teaches in the German and Nordic sections of CENES.
1999/2000: Visiting Fellow, Institute for German Cultural Studies, Cornell University
F...Read more
Ilinca Iuraşcu
emailiurascu@mail.ubc.ca
phone604 822 6489
location_onBuchanan Tower 926
Department Program
German StudiesAffiliated Faculty, Bachelor of Media Studies.
Ilinca Iuraşcu holds graduate degrees in Gender Studies from the Central European University and Comparative Literature from the University of Pennsylvania. After completing her PhD at UPenn, she joined the Graduiertenkolleg Mediale Historiographien at the Bauhaus-University Weimar, where she had the chance to work on two of her favourite subjects: letters and early cinema....Read more
Department Program
German Studies
Katherine Bowers
Katherine Bowers
Associate Professor | Associate Head | Director, Centre for European Studies
phone604 822 6431
Department Program
Slavic and Eastern European StudiesKatherine Bowers is Associate Professor of Slavic and Eastern European Studies and an expert in russophone literature and culture. Her research interests include genre, narrative, environmental humanities, imagined geography, and digital humanities. At UBC Dr Bowers directs the Centre for European S...Read more
Department Program
Slavic and Eastern European Studies
Kyle Frackman
Kyle Frackman
Associate Professor
emailkyle.frackman@ubc.ca
phone604 822 5118
location_onBuchanan Tower 925
Kyle Frackman is a 2023 recipient of the Killam Teaching Prize and a 2024 recipient of the Killam Accelerator Research Fellowship. Before joining the faculty at UBC in July 2012, Dr. Kyle Frackman (he/him) taught at institutions in the United States: the University of Massachusetts Amherst, Smith College, and Amherst College. Originally from Anchorage, Alaska, Dr. Frackman attended Hamline University, graduating with a major in German Studies. For 2001–2002, Dr. Frackman was awarded a Fulbright Fellowship to study in Hamburg, Germany....Read more
Markus Hallensleben
Markus Hallensleben
Associate Professor
emailmhallen@mail.ubc.ca
phone604 822 5140
location_onBuchanan Tower 922
Department Program
German StudiesAssociate Faculty Member, UBC Centre for Migration Studies | Affiliated Faculty, Center for European Studies and Institute for Gender, Race, Sexuality & Social Justice
Although I was granted Canadian citizenship, I consider myself an uninvited visitor to the traditional territories and unced...Read more
Department Program
German Studies
Thomas Kemple
Thomas Kemple
Professor | Director of Graduate Studies
emailkemple@mail.ubc.ca
phone604 827 2307
location_onBuchanan Tower 603
Department Program
German StudiesThomas Kemple is Professor of Classical Social Science and European Sociology in Central, Eastern & Northern European Studies (CENES). His recent books include Intellectual Work and the Spirit of Capitalism: Weber’s Calling (Palgrave, 2014), Simmel (Polity, 2020), and Marx’s Wager: Das Kapit...Read more
Department Program
German Studies
Tim Frandy
Tim Frandy
Assistant Professor of Nordic Studies
emailtim.frandy@ubc.ca
phone604 822 2169
location_onBuchanan Tower 901
Department Program
Nordic StudiesTim Frandy is a Sámi- and Finnish-American born and raised on Anishinaabe Aki in northernmost Wisconsin on the south shore of Gitchi-Gami, Lake Superior, amidst the region’s thousands of lakes and deep forests of pine, birch, maple, and balsam. Growing up in close relation with the woods and wate...Read more
Department Program
Nordic StudiesFaculty
Adelheid O'Brien
Adelheid O'Brien
Lecturer | Contact Person, German Reading Program
emailaob25r@mail.ubc.ca
phone604 822 5457
location_onBuchanan Tower 908
Department Program
German StudiesAdelheid O’Brien has been a member of the CENES Department since 1995, initially as a sessional lecturer (1995–2009) and, since 2009, as a lecturer. From 1986 to 2000, she was also part of the teaching staff at the Goethe-Institute Vancouver and, during the summer semesters from 1989 to 2000, at...Read more
Department Program
German Studies
Ann-Kathrine Havemose
Ann-Kathrine Havemose
Danish Lecturer
phone604 827 6394
location_onBuchanan Tower 905
Department Program
Nordic StudiesAnn-Kathrine Havemose is the lecturer of Danish and Scandinavian studies. She is a native Danish speaker, and has an MA in comparative literature and general linguistics from Aarhus University, Denmark, while also having studied Celtic Civilization and Irish folklore at University College Cork, Irel...Read more
Department Program
Nordic Studies
Biz Nijdam
Biz Nijdam
Assistant Professor of Teaching
emailbiz.nijdam@ubc.ca
phone604 822 5158
location_onBuchanan Tower 927
Department Program
German StudiesElizabeth “Biz” Nijdam is an Assistant Professor of Teaching in the Department of Central, Eastern, and Northern European Studies at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, Canada, where she is Director of Undergraduate Studies in the German Program.
Before joining the faculty at UBC...Read more
Department Program
German Studies
Bożena Karwowska
Bożena Karwowska
Professor
emailbozena@mail.ubc.ca
phone604 822 5956
location_onBuchanan Tower 920
Department Program
Slavic and Eastern European StudiesDepartment Program
Slavic and Eastern European Studies
Caroline Rieger
Caroline Rieger
Associate Professor
emailcarolin@mail.ubc.ca
phone604 822 5156
location_onBuchanan Tower 923
Department Program
German StudiesCuriosity might have killed the cat, but it made Caroline Rieger a researcher and teacher. Born and raised in Luxembourg – a trilingual country – Caroline was curious about anything and everything related to languages from a very early age. This inquisitive fascination was a fruitful companion t...Read more
Department Program
German Studies
Daniela Hempen
Daniela Hempen
Lecturer
emailhempen@mail.ubc.ca
phone604 822 5133
location_onBuchanan Tower 904
Department Program
German StudiesAfter completing an M.A. in German and Scandinavian Languages and Literatures at Eberhard-Karls-Universität Tübingen, Germany, Daniela Hempen moved to Vancouver to pursue doctoral studies at the University of British Columbia. She earned her Ph.D. in Medieval German Literature and Culture in 1998 ...Read more
Department Program
German Studies
Dariya McEwen (formerly Prykhodko)
Dariya McEwen (formerly Prykhodko)
Lecturer of Slavic and Eastern European Studies
emaildariyap@mail.ubc.ca
phone604 822 6604
location_onBuchanan Tower 902
Department Program
Slavic and Eastern European StudiesDariya (Dasha) McEwen has been part of CENES since 2005, where she teaches courses in Russian language and in Slavic and Eastern European literature and culture.
Her research spans folklore, literature, and cultural memory, with particular attention to the interplay between official narratives an...Read more
Department Program
Slavic and Eastern European Studies
David Gramling
David Gramling (they+) is author, editor, or translator of eight books in print: Literature in Late Monolingualism (Bloomsbury 2024); The Invention of Multilingualism (Cambridge University Press, 2021); The Invention of Monolingualism (Bloomsbury 2016, American Association for Applied Linguist...Read more
Department Program
German Studies
Ervin Malakaj
Ervin Malakaj
Associate Professor | Department Head
emailervin.malakaj@ubc.ca
phone604 822 2798
location_onBuchanan Tower 917B
Department Program
German StudiesDr. Malakaj specializes in late-18th- to 21st-century German media and cultural history. His research focuses on 19th-century literary cultures, film studies, queer studies, and humanities as well as language learning advocacy.
Dr. Malakaj’s first book, Anders als die Andern (McGill-Queen’s...Read more
Department Program
German Studies
Florian Gassner
Florian Gassner
Associate Professor of Teaching
phone604 822 5165
location_onBuchanan Tower 918
Department Program
German StudiesFlorian is a Fellow of the New Europe College in Bucharest and he has represented the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) at the Donetsk National University. He has also taught at Mount Allison University, and he joined the University of Kassel as a guest professor in 2016/17. His areas of speci...Read more
Department Program
German Studies
Gaby Pailer
Gaby Pailer
Professor
emailpailer@mail.ubc.ca
phone604 822 4042
location_onBuchanan Tower 907
Department Program
German StudiesGaby Pailer joined UBC as Associate Professor of German Literature in 2001 leaving a grant-tenure position of Assistant Professor equivalent at the University of Karlsruhe (TH), Germany. She was promoted to Professor in 2010, served as Head of the Department of Central, Eastern and Northern Europea...Read more
Department Program
German Studies
ON LEAVE
July 1, 2026 - Dec 31, 2026
Geoffrey Winthrop-Young
After graduating from UBC in 1991, Geoffrey Winthrop-Young taught at the Universities of Manitoba and Waterloo before returning to UBC in 1995, where he teaches in the German and Nordic sections of CENES.
1999/2000: Visiting Fellow, Institute for German Cultural Studies, Cornell University
F...Read more
Ilinca Iuraşcu
emailiurascu@mail.ubc.ca
phone604 822 6489
location_onBuchanan Tower 926
Department Program
German StudiesAffiliated Faculty, Bachelor of Media Studies.
Ilinca Iuraşcu holds graduate degrees in Gender Studies from the Central European University and Comparative Literature from the University of Pennsylvania. After completing her PhD at UPenn, she joined the Graduiertenkolleg Mediale Historiographien at the Bauhaus-University Weimar, where she had the chance to work on two of her favourite subjects: letters and early cinema....Read more
Department Program
German Studies
Jason Lieblang
Jason Lieblang
Associate Professor of Teaching | Director of Undergraduate Studies - Modern European, Nordic, & Slavic and Eastern European Studies
phone604 822 5154
location_onBuchanan Tower 906
Department Program
German StudiesDr. Jason Lieblang holds a PhD in Germanic Languages and Literatures from the University of Toronto and teaches across the German Studies undergraduate curriculum in CENES. His interests include curriculum design; emerging technologies in foreign language learning; translation; teaching with and abo...Read more
Department Program
German Studies
Karin Filipsson
location_onBuTo 905
Department Program
Nordic StudiesDr. Karin Filipsson is lecturer of Swedish and Nordic studies. She received her PhD from the University of Washington for her doctoral thesis “Jonas Hassen Khemiri and the Swedish Novel: Autofiction, Intertextuality, and Postmigrant Melancholy”
A native Swedish speaker, she has taught extensi...Read more
Department Program
Nordic Studies
Katherine Bowers
Katherine Bowers
Associate Professor | Associate Head | Director, Centre for European Studies
phone604 822 6431
Department Program
Slavic and Eastern European StudiesKatherine Bowers is Associate Professor of Slavic and Eastern European Studies and an expert in russophone literature and culture. Her research interests include genre, narrative, environmental humanities, imagined geography, and digital humanities. At UBC Dr Bowers directs the Centre for European S...Read more
Department Program
Slavic and Eastern European Studies
Kyle Frackman
Kyle Frackman
Associate Professor
emailkyle.frackman@ubc.ca
phone604 822 5118
location_onBuchanan Tower 925
Kyle Frackman is a 2023 recipient of the Killam Teaching Prize and a 2024 recipient of the Killam Accelerator Research Fellowship. Before joining the faculty at UBC in July 2012, Dr. Kyle Frackman (he/him) taught at institutions in the United States: the University of Massachusetts Amherst, Smith College, and Amherst College. Originally from Anchorage, Alaska, Dr. Frackman attended Hamline University, graduating with a major in German Studies. For 2001–2002, Dr. Frackman was awarded a Fulbright Fellowship to study in Hamburg, Germany....Read more
Markus Hallensleben
Markus Hallensleben
Associate Professor
emailmhallen@mail.ubc.ca
phone604 822 5140
location_onBuchanan Tower 922
Department Program
German StudiesAssociate Faculty Member, UBC Centre for Migration Studies | Affiliated Faculty, Center for European Studies and Institute for Gender, Race, Sexuality & Social Justice
Although I was granted Canadian citizenship, I consider myself an uninvited visitor to the traditional territories and unced...Read more
Department Program
German Studies
Olena Morozova
Olena Morozova
Lecturer in Ukrainian Studies
phone604 827 3546
location_onBuchanan Tower 928
Department Program
Slavic and Eastern European StudiesDr. Olena Morozova is a linguist and scholar of Ukrainian Studies whose teaching and research explore the relationships among language, culture, identity, and social change. Drawing on insights from linguistics, literary and film studies, psychology, sociology, and cognitive science, she examines how people make sense of themselves, their histories, and the world around them....Read more
Department Program
Slavic and Eastern European Studies
Thomas Kemple
Thomas Kemple
Professor | Director of Graduate Studies
emailkemple@mail.ubc.ca
phone604 827 2307
location_onBuchanan Tower 603
Department Program
German StudiesThomas Kemple is Professor of Classical Social Science and European Sociology in Central, Eastern & Northern European Studies (CENES). His recent books include Intellectual Work and the Spirit of Capitalism: Weber’s Calling (Palgrave, 2014), Simmel (Polity, 2020), and Marx’s Wager: Das Kapit...Read more
Department Program
German Studies
Tim Frandy
Tim Frandy
Assistant Professor of Nordic Studies
emailtim.frandy@ubc.ca
phone604 822 2169
location_onBuchanan Tower 901
Department Program
Nordic StudiesTim Frandy is a Sámi- and Finnish-American born and raised on Anishinaabe Aki in northernmost Wisconsin on the south shore of Gitchi-Gami, Lake Superior, amidst the region’s thousands of lakes and deep forests of pine, birch, maple, and balsam. Growing up in close relation with the woods and wate...Read more
Department Program
Nordic Studies
Uma Kumar
Uma Kumar
Lecturer
emailuma.kumar@ubc.ca
phone604 822 6329
location_onBuchanan Tower 928
Department Program
German StudiesUma Kumar moved to Vancouver from India in 2003 and has been teaching with CENES since 2007. She holds a PhD in German Studies, a Master's in German Studies and a Master's in English Literature from the University of Bombay, India. Uma spent six years at the University of Vienna, doing research on A...Read more
Department Program
German Studies
Veta Chitnev
Veta Chitnev
Lecturer of Russian
emailvchitnev@mail.ubc.ca
phone604 827 5541
location_onBuchanan Tower 903
Department Program
Slavic and Eastern European StudiesDr. Veta Chitnev has been teaching with CENES since 2008.
She teaches Russian language and culture courses and coordinates all sections of Russian language courses. Veta is also responsible for student placement tests and Russian proficiency examinations.
Her areas of specialization are teachi...Read more
Department Program
Slavic and Eastern European StudiesAdvisors
Biz Nijdam
Biz Nijdam
Assistant Professor of Teaching
emailbiz.nijdam@ubc.ca
phone604 822 5158
location_onBuchanan Tower 927
Department Program
German StudiesElizabeth “Biz” Nijdam is an Assistant Professor of Teaching in the Department of Central, Eastern, and Northern European Studies at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, Canada, where she is Director of Undergraduate Studies in the German Program.
Before joining the faculty at UBC...Read more
Department Program
German Studies
Thomas Kemple
Thomas Kemple
Professor | Director of Graduate Studies
emailkemple@mail.ubc.ca
phone604 827 2307
location_onBuchanan Tower 603
Department Program
German StudiesThomas Kemple is Professor of Classical Social Science and European Sociology in Central, Eastern & Northern European Studies (CENES). His recent books include Intellectual Work and the Spirit of Capitalism: Weber’s Calling (Palgrave, 2014), Simmel (Polity, 2020), and Marx’s Wager: Das Kapit...Read more
Department Program
German Studies
Tim Frandy
Tim Frandy
Assistant Professor of Nordic Studies
emailtim.frandy@ubc.ca
phone604 822 2169
location_onBuchanan Tower 901
Department Program
Nordic StudiesTim Frandy is a Sámi- and Finnish-American born and raised on Anishinaabe Aki in northernmost Wisconsin on the south shore of Gitchi-Gami, Lake Superior, amidst the region’s thousands of lakes and deep forests of pine, birch, maple, and balsam. Growing up in close relation with the woods and wate...Read more
Department Program
Nordic Studies