Participant Info

First Name
Maria
Last Name
Fedorova
Country
United States
State
MN
Affiliation
Macalester College
Website URL
https://www.macalester.edu/history/facultystaff/maria-fedorova/
Keywords
Russian and Soviet History, U.S.-Russian/Soviet relations, Agriculture, Food, Science and Technology, Transnational Exchanges and Circulation of Knowledge
Availability
1
Additional Contact Information
PhD
PhD

Personal Info

Photo
About Me

My research focuses on the transnational circulation of knowledge and technologies between Russia/Soviet Union and the world during the twentieth century.

My first book Seeds of Exchange: Soviets, Americans, and Cooperation in Agriculture, 1921-1935 (forthcoming in August 2025 with the Northern Illinois University Press) focuses on the American and Soviet exchange of agricultural knowledge and technology during the interwar period. Amid the post–World War I food insecurity, Soviet and American agricultural experts relied on transnational networks, bridging ideological differences. As Soviets traveled across the US agricultural regions and Americans plowed steppes in the southern Urals and the lower Volga, both groups believed that innovative solutions could be found beyond their own national borders.

I teach courses on Russian and Soviet history, the transnational history of food and agriculture, and the history of science and technology.

Recent Publications
  • Seeds of Exchange: Soviets, Americans, and Cooperation in Agriculture, 1921-1935 (Northern Illinois University Press,
    forthcoming in August 2025).
  • “Mapping Food – Teaching Global Connections,” Agricultural
    History 97    , no. 4 (November 2023): 673-676.
  • “Bread or Iron? Competing Visions of American Aid to Soviet
    Russia, 1921-1923,” Agricultural History 97, no. 2 (May 2023):
    245-272.
  • “The Untold Story of “Radical Relief” to Soviet Russia,” NYU
    Jordan Center Blog, March 28, 2023.
  • “American Tractors, Soviet Soil: Agricultural Reconstruction
    and U.S.-Soviet Technology Transfer, 1921-23,” in Anthony J.
    Heywood, Scott W. Palmer, and Julia A. Lajus, eds., Science,
    Technology, Environment, and Medicine in Russia’s Great War
    and Revolution, 1914-1922 (Bloomington, IN: Slavica, 2022):
    203-228.
  • Translation: Evgenii O. Naumov, “The Red Army and
    Epidemic Disease in the Russian Civil War,” trans. by Maria
    Fedorova in Anthony J. Heywood, Scott W. Palmer, and Julia
    A. Lajus, eds., Science, Technology, Environment, and
    Medicine in Russia’s Great War and Revolution, 1914-1922
    (Bloomington, IN: Slavica, 2022): 471-494.
  • “Seeds as Technology: The Russian Agricultural Bureau in New
    York and Soviet Agricultural Modernization, 1921-26,” Russian
    Review 80, no. 2 (April 2021): 209-228.
Media Coverage
Country Focus
Russia, United States
Expertise by Geography
Russia, United States
Expertise by Chronology
19th century, Modern, 20th century
Expertise by Topic
Food History, Rural & Agrarian History, Science, Technology, World War I