Ekaterina Pirozhenko completed her undergraduate degree, Diploma Summa Cum Laude in German philology at the Saint-Petersburg State University, Russia; M.A. in German Studies at the University of Northern Iowa, and a Ph.D. in Germanic Studies at the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC), where she held a two-years-Post-Doctoral Teaching position in the Honors College. Before coming to Harvard in 2023, she worked as Senior Lecturer in the Department of Germanic Studies, Assistant Dean of Admissions and Advising, and Administrative Director of Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Program at Cornell University (2013-2022).

Her teaching and research interests include fairy tales, contemporary German-language writers with transnational background, and the representation of Low-German-Speaking Mennonites in cinema.