Steven Lee’s (English) research interests include 20th-century American literature, comparative ethnic studies, and Soviet and post-Soviet studies. His book The Ethnic Avant-Garde (2015) makes a unique contribution to interwar literary, political, and art history, drawing extensively on Russian archives, travel narratives, and artistic exchanges to establish the parameters of an undervalued "ethnic avant-garde."

During the 1920s and 1930s, American minority artists and writers collaborated extensively with the Soviet avant-garde, seeking to build a revolutionary society that would end racial discrimination and advance progressive art. These writers and artists orbited interwar Moscow, where an international avant-garde converged with the Communist International.

The author was a Townsend Fellow in 2011-12.