Dr Olga Petri

Olga Petri is an urban historical geographer, concerned with understanding the relationship between the administrative state, social communities or milieus and the modernisation of urban space.

Academic interests

Olga Petri's academic interests include: 

• Historical queer studies
• More-than-human geography
• Environmental history.

Degrees obtained

• PhD Geography, University of Cambridge.
• MSc Urban Studies, University College London.
• MA in Geography, Saint-Petersburg State University.
• BA in Geography, Saint-Petersburg State University.

Awards and prizes

Olga was shortlisted for a Student-Led Teaching Award in the category Supporting Students (Academic) in 2020.

Biography

Olga is an urban historical geographer and a Leverhulme Trust Early Career Research Fellow in the Department of Geography. Her work draws from and contributes to inter-related discussions in historical and cultural urban geography, historical queer studies, and the history of late imperial Russia.

Born in St Petersburg, Olga received a Bachelor and Master degree in Geography from St. Petersburg State University, Russia. Subsequently to leaving Russia for Serbia, where she lived and worked for three years, Olga graduated from the MSc Urban Studies program at University College London, working under the supervision of Professor Richard Dennis. In 2017, Olga completed her doctoral research under the supervision of Dr Philip Howell at the Geography Department in the University of Cambridge.

She is currently undertaking postdoctoral research funded by the Leverhulme Trust and the Isaac Newton Trust, and working on the project entitled Beastly St Petersburg: humans and other animals in Imperial Russia. 

Other interests

Music (playing piano).