Yiorgo Topalidis

Candidate statement

Yiorgo Topalidis is a Visiting Lecturer in the Department of Behavioral Sciences at Flagler College. Yiorgo’s research interests include emigration of Ottoman Greeks to the U.S. and the construction, contestation, and transgenerational transfer of White identity. His most recent publications appear in the Journal of Modern Greek Studies, the Journal of Sociology of Race and Ethnicity, and the Journal of Urban History. If elected to the Modern Greek Studies Association’s Executive Board, Yiorgo’s expertise in Public History and Digital Sociology will align well with the responsibilities of the Membership & Publicity and Graduate Studies committees in the following ways. First, Yiorgo regularly uses social media to recruit research participants and publish digital content, tasks carried out by the Membership & Publicity committee. Additionally, Yiorgo has served on an ad hoc committee that selected the winner of the Victor Papacosma Graduate Essay Prize and has guided undergraduate and graduate research at Flagler College and the University of Florida, both of which reflect the functions of the Graduate Studies committee.