New Fellows selected to the Helsinki Collegium for Advanced Studies

Out of the 592 applications received in the fall 2025 Core Fellowship call, twelve researchers, as listed below, were selected to  for terms ranging from one to three years. The HCAS Core Fellowship Program offers researchers the opportunity to concentrate on their research projects without administrative duties and encourages interdisciplinary collaboration across different fields of study. 

Anne McCants, Professor of History and Margaret MacVicar Faculty Fellow at MIT, will join the HCAS as the new  for the 2026–27 academic year.

Dr. Carl Johan Berglund will join the Collegium as the new HCAS-RJ Fellow for the academic year 2026–27. The aims at facilitating and strengthening academic collaboration between Swedish and Finnish research communities.

Dr. Uğur Aslan will join the HCAS as the new Postdoctoral Fellow in the Arts for the academic year 2026–27. The  promotes new forms of dialogue between art and scholarship. 

In the fall of 2025, the HCAS launched the new . This invitational fellowship program aims to facilitate intellectual exchange between researchers across the globe and diversify epistemic perspectives, thereby promoting high-quality academic research. Dr. Rachel Ayuk Ojong Diba, the first fellow in this program, joins the Collegium for 2026–27.

Finally, the HCAS continues  for Baltic, Belarusian, Ukrainian, and Russian scholars. In the next academic year, the HCAS will host five Kone Foundation Visiting Fellows.

The next calls for the HCAS Fellowships will open in mid-August 2026 and close in mid-September 2026. 

Prof. Anne McCants, Professor of History and Margaret MacVicar Faculty Fellow at MIT
Fellowship period: 2026–27

Dr. Paolo Amorosa
Field of research: International law
Current affiliation: University of Helsinki
Project title: Narco-Sustainability: The Environmental Cost of International Drug Control
Fellowship period: 2026–28

Prof. Andreas Elpidorou
Field of research: Philosophy
Current affiliation: University of Louisville
Project title: Boredom at the Margins
Fellowship period: 2026–27

Prof. Stephen Finlay
Field of research: Philosophy
Current affiliation: University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign
Project title: How Much Objectivity Can We Get?
Fellowship period: 2026–27

Prof. Christian Laes 
Field of research: Ancient history
Current affiliation: University of Manchester
Project title: Vita Aesopi (version G). The Extraordinary Life of an Enslaved Person in Antiquity. Slavery and Freedom in a Synchronic and Diachronic Perspective
Fellowship period: 2026–27

Dr. Timo Miettinen 
Field of research: European studies
Current affiliation: University of Helsinki
Project title: Shared Sovereignty as Freedom: A Philosophical Genealogy of European Federalism
Fellowship period: 2026–28

Dr. Guillaume Minea-Pic
Field of research: Political history
Current affiliation: École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales
Project title: Imperial Agents in a Falling Empire: Local KGB Practices and Democratisation in Georgia, Lithuania, Moldova, and Ukraine, 1985–1991
Fellowship period: 2026–29

Dr. Berfin Nur Osso
Field of research: Law
Current affiliation: University of Helsinki
Project title: VOLARES – Volatile Borders: Law, Asylum, and Refugee Struggles in the Digital Age
Fellowship period: 2027–29

Dr. Thera Ringhofer 
Field of research: Linguistics
Current affiliation: University of Helsinki
Project title: Many Times: Multiple-Tense Systems in Social, Cognitive, and Linguistic Perspectives
Fellowship period: 2026–28

Dr. Serrin Rutledge-Prior
Field of research: Political science
Current affiliation: Queen’s University
Project title: Animal Liberation and Women’s Emancipatory Thought
Fellowship period: 2026–29

Dr. Lena Tambs 
Field of research: Archaeology
Current affiliation: University of Helsinki
Project title: Who Built the New Ptolemaic Settlements? Decision Making and Socio-Material Networks in 3rd Century BCE Philadelphia (Fayum, Egypt)
Fellowship period: 2026–28

Prof. Imogen Tyler
Field of research: Sociology
Current affiliation: Lancaster University
Project title: Elemental Inequalities
Fellowship period: 2026–27

Dr. Mark Windsor 
Field of research: Aesthetics
Current affiliation: Uppsala University
Project title: Aesthetic Understanding as Value
Fellowship period: 2026–28

Dr. Carl Johan Berglund
Field of research: Exegetics
Current affiliation: University College Stockholm
Project title: Subcultural Norms and Ideals in Early Christian Apostle Stories
Fellowship period: 2026–27

Dr. Uğur Aslan 
Field of research: Music, ethnomusicology
Current affiliation: Independent scholar
Project title: Arctic AmbiScapes: Sonic Ambiance, Christmas, and the Seasonal Soundscape of Lapland
Fellowship period: 2026–27

Dr. Rachel Ayuk Ojong Diba
Field of research: Linguistics
Current affiliation: University of Buea
Project title: Small-Scale Multilingualism or a Monolingual Mindset: Contrasting Language Ideologies in Lower Fungom and Bazou, Cameroon
Fellowship period: 2026–27

Dr. Francesca Arnavas
Field of research: Literature
Current affiliation: University of Tartu
Project title: Mind Wandering and Reading
Fellowship period: Spring 2027

Dr. Andriy Fert
Field of research: History
Current affiliation: Kyiev School of Economics
Project title: To Deal with Russian Heritage in Church: A Comparison of Ukrainian and Finnish Orthodox Churches

Dr. Ivan Fomin
Field of research: Political science
Current affiliation: Charles University
Project title: Statisms (Dis)-Entangled: Ideological Patterns of Mobilizing and Utilizing Force in Russia’s Strategic Culture
Fellowship period: Fall 2026

Dr. Karin Kallas-Pöder
Field of research: Theology and religious studies
Current affiliation: Independent scholar
Project title: Meaningful living without free choice: a Jewish perspective
Fellowship period: Fall 2026

Dr. Irina Paert
Field of research: Theology and religious studies
Current affiliation: University of Tartu
Project title: “Barbarism and inhumanity?”: the Orthodox Church’s discourses and treatments of domestic violence on the Russian Empire’s ‘Western’ frontier, 1860s–1917
Fellowship period: Spring 2027