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Alumni Spotlight: Dr. Mikhail Sergeev

By Religion Department

Sep. 12, 2024

image of Mikhail sitting at his desk wearing a black t-shirt and glasses smiling at the camera

Mikhail Sergeev is an American scholar of Russian descent, specializing in the fields of religion, philosophy, and modern art (Ph.D., Temple University, 1997). His influence extends beyond academia, having served as an editor of the book series Contemporary Russian Philosophy at Brill Publishers in the Netherlands (2016–2019) and as chair of the Department of Religion, Philosophy, and Theology at the Wilmette Institute (2017–21), demonstrating the extent of his professional experience and influence. Mikhail Sergeev's teaching career has been marked by a diverse range of courses, spanning Western civilization, religious studies, the history of philosophy, and modern art. His offerings have included specialized classes, such as Religion, Art, and the Apocalypse, Holy War, and the Afterlife, showcasing the breadth of his knowledge and expertise. He has taught a variety of humanity disciplines at the University of the Arts, Philadelphia (1997–2024). Sergeev also taught undergraduate and graduate courses in Bahá’í theology and philosophy at the Wilmette Institute, Illinois, the Graduate Theological Union (Berkeley, California), and as an Affiliate Professor at the United Theological Seminary of the Twin Cities in New Brighton, Minnesota. Now, he teaches courses in World religion and Asian cultures at the Department of Religion at Temple University, Philadelphia. Sergeev organized thirty-seven and participated in more than fifty panels and roundtables at regional, national, and international conferences, including the World Congress of Philosophy in 1998, which was held in Boston, MA.

He is a member of the editorial boards of nine scholarly journals in Russia, Ukraine, and Uzbekistan, including the journals Philosophical Thought (Filosofskaia mysl’) and Philosophy and Culture (Filosofiia i cul'tura) of the Russian Academy of Sciences. Mikhail Sergeev has published more than two hundred scholarly, literary, and journalistic articles in the United States, Canada, Great Britain, Germany, the Netherlands, Poland, the Czech Republic, Greece, Slovakia, Ukraine, Russia, Japan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, and Azerbaijan. Some of his articles were translated into Polish and Japanese, and his books were reviewed in Germany, Japan, Poland, Russia, Slovakia, and the United States. Sergeev is the author and contributing editor of fifteen books, including the monograph Theory of Religious Cycles: Tradition, Modernity, and the Bahá’í Faith (Brill, 2015).