Professor Safran holds a PhD from Princeton University in Slavic Languages and Literatures, 1998. Dissertation: "Narratives of Jewish acculturation in the Russian Empire: Bogrov, Orzeszkowa, Leskov, Chekhov." Adviser: Caryl Emerson She attended Yale University, earning a B.A., magna cum laude, with honors in Soviet and East European Studies, 1990.

Research Interests : Nineteenth- and early twentieth-century Russian literature; Polish literature; Yiddish literature; Jewish Studies; folklore; Realism; the aesthetics of ethnicity; the relationship between sacred and secular writing.