Elaine MacKinnon, Ph.D.

Professor of History
School of Humanities College of Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences

678-839-6048
emcclarn@westga.t4i95UT6ha2ypVedu

Technology Learning Center - Room 3222
Office Hours
Virtual: Mondays, Tuesdays and Thursdays 2:00 pm to 4:00 pm and by appt

Download curriculum vitae for Elaine MacKinnon, Ph.D. in PDF
Elaine MacKinnon, Ph.D.
Biography

Fields of Study: Medieval and Imperial Russia, Soviet History, Contemporary Russia

Dr. MacKinnon's current research interests include Stalinism, Soviet historians and reinterpretation of Stalin, and forced labor in the former USSR.

Education / Degrees
  • B.A., Slavic Languages and Literature; Certificate in Russian Studies, Princeton University, 1983
  • Certificate, Georgia NT-4 Secondary School Social Sciences Teaching Certificate, Armstrong State College, 1986
  • M.A., Modern European History, Emory University, 1990
  • Ph.D., Modern European History, Emory University, 1995
Courses Taught
Course Sections and Syllabi

Fall 2025 Sections

Summer 2025 Sections

Spring 2025 Sections

Fall 2024 Sections

Spring 2024 Sections

Fall 2023 Sections

Summer 2023 Sections

Spring 2023 Sections

Fall 2022 Sections

Summer 2022 Sections

Spring 2022 Sections

Fall 2021 Sections

Summer 2021 Sections

Spring 2021 Sections

Fall 2020 Sections

Publication List

Places of Encounter: Time, Place, and Connectivity in World History, Volumes I and II, Westview Press, 2012

Elaine MacKinnon, Translator and Editor, Miklashevskaya, Ludmilla. Gender and Survival in Soviet Russia: A Life in the Shadow of Stalin’s Terror. London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2020.

Translator and Editor, V.A. Kozlov, Mass Uprisings in the USSR: Protest and Rebellion in the USSR (M.E. Sharpe, 2002). [View Publication External Resource]

“Grasping at the Whirlwinds of Change: Transitional Leadership in Comparative Perspective: The Case Studies of Mikhail Gorbachev and F.W. de Klerk,” Canadian Journal of History, XLIII (Spring-Summer 2008), 69-107.

“Writing History for Stalin: Isaak Izrailovich Mints and the Istoriia Grazhdanskoi Voiny,” Kritika: Explorations in Russian and Eurasian History 6, 1(Winter 2005): 5-54.

“Glasnost and the Independent Press: Debates Over Stalinism During the Perestroika Period, 1985-1991,” in S.M. Usmanov, ed., Sotsial’no-Gumanitarnye Nauki v Vysshey Shkole na Rubezhe XX-XXI: Problemy i Puti Resheniia (Birsk: Birsk State Pedagogical

“The Politics of History and Historical Revisionism: De-Stalinization and the Search for Identity in Gorbachev’s Russia, 1985-1991,” The History Teacher, Vol. 31, No. 2 (February 1998), pp. 153-171.

Co-author with Steve Goodson, “Introduction” in Studies in the Social Sciences, Vol. XXXVI, “The Impact of the Cold War on American Popular Culture,” April 1999.

“The Debate Continues: Views on Stalinism from the Former Soviet Union,” The Soviet and Post-Soviet Review, Vol. 20, No. 1 (1993), pp. 11-33.

“The Human Factor in Soviet History,” A Review Essay of Dmitri Volkogonov, Autopsy for an Empire and Martin McCauley, Gorbachev, published by H-Russia, December 12, 1999.

Review essay on Suzanne Sternthal, Gorbachev’s Reforms and Mark Galeotti, Gorbachev and His Revolution, Russian History, Vol. 25, Nos. 3-4 (Fall-Winter 1998), pp. 492-496.

Translation from Russian to English of Oleg Khlevnuik, Review Essay on Stalin’s Terror and Stalin’s “Loyal Executioner,” Kritika: Explorations in Russian and Eurasian History, 4, 3 (Summer 2003), pp. 760-767.

Translation from Russian to English of E.A. Osokina, “Lynne Viola and Peasant Rebels Under Stalin. Collectivization and the Culture of Peasant Resistance,” International Labor and Working-Class History, No. 54 (Fall 1998)

Translation from Russian to English of H.A. Osokina, “Soviet Workers and Rationing Norms, 1928-1935: Real or Illusory Privilege?” The Soviet and Post-Soviet Review, Vol. 19, Nos. 1-3 (1992), pp. 53-70.

The Forgotten Victims: Childhood and the Soviet Gulag, 1929-1953, The Carl Beck Papers in Russian and East European Studies, Number 2203 (University Library System, University of Pittsburgh Press, 2012).