Alan W. Fisher is a professor of history and Associate Dean of the College of Arts and Letters at Michigan State University. The history of the Ottoman empire and the Turkic peoples, especially the Crimean Tatars, has been the primary focus of his studies and research. Fisher is the author of The Russian Annexation of the Crimea, 1772–1783 (Cambridge University Press, 1970) and has written articles for Slavic Review, Cahiers du monde russe et sovietique, Jahrbücher für Geschichte Osteuropas, Canadian–American Slavic Studies, Humaniora Islamica, and Harvard Ukranian Studies; he is editor of the Bulletin of Turkish Studies Association.