Mikhail Lyubansky

Bio

I'm a member of the teaching faculty in the Department of Psychology at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, where I teach Psychology of Race and Ethnicity and Theories of Psychotherapy.

My research and writing interests focus on race relations and conditions associated with changes in social identity and beliefs about race, ethnicity, and nationalism, especially in immigrant and minority populations. I've also become very interested in restorative practices and am beginning to shift my research to reflect this new focus.

In addition to my academic work, I'm a managing editor at the progressive OpEdNews.com, where I also contribute semi-regular articles analyzing racial issues in the news and popular culture. My writing has also appeared in several edited volumes on popular culture, including Harry Potter, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and Twilight, published by BenBella and I recently co-authored a book on the Russian-Jewish diaspora: Building a diaspora: Russian Jews in Israel, Germany, and the United States.

I'm currently a student of a restorative practice developed in Brazil (by Dominic Barter and colleagues) called Restorative Circles (RC). To a lesser degree, I also consider myself a student of nonviolent communication (NVC).

If by some chance you've read this far and still want to know more, you can find my autobiographical essay of my interests in race relations and basketball here.