Précis. Alexander Vladimirovich Vaschenko is a renowned specialist in Native American Studies. He was born in Moscow and graduated from the Lomonosov Moscow State University, the Philology Faculty. In 1974, he defended his dissertation on contemporary Indian literature in the United States. In 1977–1995, he worked in the Gorky World Literature Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences, where in 1993 he defended the doctorate thesis on historical epic folklore of the North American Indians, its typology and poetics. Since 1995, Alexander Vaschenko works at the Moscow State University and since 2002, he holds the chair of comparative studies in national literatures and cultures at the Faculty of Foreign Languages and Area Studies of the University; in 2009, he founded there the Culturology Department. Most of his professional activities are related to research, translation, and other introduction of Native American writings to Russia. His interest in Native literature was also represented in The Way of Kinship: An Anthology of Native Siberian Literature published in 2010 by the University of Minnesota Press. The works of contemporary Native writers were translated and edited by A. Vaschenko and C. Clayton Smith.