Boris Falikov – Associate Professor, Russian State University for the Humanities

Boris Falikov graduated from the Faculty of Foreign Languages of Saratov Pedagogical Institute.  He joined the teaching staff of the Institute of USA and Canada with the Russian Academy of Sciences. There, in 1985, he defended a historical sciences PhD candidate’s thesis,Socio-political aspects of some religious movements in the US (Hinduism and Buddhism). He has worked in the Orientalist Institute with the Russian Academy of Sciences, in the Department of Comparative Cultural Studies, where he’s been studying the phenomenon of spreading of Hinduism and Buddhism in the Western culture. During the early 1990s, he has been lecturing at Lewis & Clark College, University of Georgetown and the University of Kansas. In 1997 – 1998, he was the OSCE expert on issues of freedom of religion. Since 1999, he is an assistant professor at Russian State University for the Humanities (RSUH). He teaches at the RSUH Centre of Religion Studies and is Head of the International Department of Culture newspaper. Boris Falikov is the author of 4 monographs: Religion as part of political life in the US (1985), Neo-Hinduism and the Western culture (1994), Christianity and other religions (1999), Cults and culture: from Helena Blavatsky to Ron Hubbard (2007). In 2000-2002, he was the Chief Editor of the internet portal World of Religions.