Galina Aleksandrovna Balashova

Galina Aleksandrovna Balashova is a specialist in Amharic language and
Ethiopian literature. After the graduation from the Department of
African Studies of Leningrad State University (headed at that time by
academician Dmitry Alekseyevich Olderogge, the founder of modern African
studies in Russia) she worked for six years in Ethiopia (her work
distinguished with government award), later worked for five years at the
Russian Cultural Centre in Nigeria. For more than twenty years she was
lecturing in Amharic language in Leningrad (now – Saint-Petersburg)
State University. Currently Galina Balashova is a research fellow at the
Institute of African Studies, Russian Academy of Sciences, Associate
Professor of the Faculty of Asian and African studies, Moscow State
University. She is the author of more than 120 publications on various
aspects of Ethiopian culture. Among them monograph “Modern Ethiopian
drama” (M, 2008, in Russian), then translated into English “Drama in
modern ethiopian literature and theatre” (Moscow / St. Petersburg 2012)
with some additions. She is the permanent representative of Russia at
the International Committee for Ethiopian research and the
Vice-President of Russian-Ethiopian Friendship Society.