Elena is a doctoral candidate in Politics under the supervision of Professor Stathis Kalyvas. Her research focuses on linguistic minorities, linguistic human rights, and the role of language grievances in intrastate conflict. In her doctoral dissertation, Elena seeks to understand how states build peace, stability, and effective governance in linguistically-divided societies.
Elena completed her MSc in Global Governance and Diplomacy at the Oxford Department of International Development in 2023. Her thesis explored international norm concordance to principles of linguistic rights, analysing UN responses to the ongoing Anglophone crisis in Cameroon.
Her graduate study at Oxford is supported by the Rhodes Scholarship. Before joining Oxford, Elena completed a BA in Politics and French from Mount Holyoke College. At Mount Holyoke College, Elena’s interest in international governance was developed through an internship with the United States State Department funded by the Pamela Harriman Foreign Service Fellowship. Her commitment to developing methods to provide effective governance grew out of years of work in local and state politics in Massachusetts.
During her undergraduate education, Elena served as a research assistant to Professor Jon Western (Mount Holyoke College) in his study of the institutional resilience of democracies in the aftermath of the 2020 US Election and subsequent legal cases. Additionally, she assisted Professor Western and Professor Katja Seidel (University of Westminster) in archival research to contribute to biography projects on notable women in the field of international relations.
