Tina Ghudushauri

Tinatin Ghudushauri obtained her BA in History and MA in Ethnology and Foreign Languages, special subject German language from Tbilisi State University. In 2001 she defended her PhD in Ethnology at the same university.  She participated in various scientific projects at the University of Vienna (1991), at the Independent University of Berlin (1996) and the University of Zaarbruken (2002 & 2004). In 1980 she joined  the faculty of Ethnology at Tbilisi  State University and is presently  Senior Researcher (Associate Professor). Since 2005 she is  Dean of the School of Humanities at the University of Georgia and Director of Centre for the Study of Caucasus and Black Sea Region. Tinatin has published numerous important scientific works and articles such as Forms and Characteristics of Interpretation of Cultures in American Anthropology (2007): Dynamics of Syncretization of Religious Thinking of Georgian Highlander According to XIX century German Ethnologists (2004). Fireplace: the symbol of sacred centers in the religious thinking of Highlanders (2003).

Tamta Khalvashi

Tamta Khalvashi is an Executive Director of the Centre for the Study of Caucasus and Black Sea Region. She is a PhD candidate in Cultural Anthropology at the University of Georgia. Her research is concerned with cultural transmission, borderland imagination and citizenship in north-eastern border region in Turkey.  In 2008, she was a Visiting Study Fellow at International Gender Studies Centre, Department of International Development, University of Oxford.  Recent publications include ‘Ideal Scheme’ or ‘Passing over the Rainbow’: Transmission of Georgian Cultural Identity among the Fereydani Gorjis in the peer reviewed Journal Iran and the Caucasus, Volume 12, 2008. She gave her paper, “Being Between Two Waters”: Transmission of Georgian Ethnic Identity, State Official Narrative and Imagination at  the Conference on Caucasus Studies, University of Malmo, Sweden.

Contact: t.khalvashi@ug.edu.ge