Mikael graduated from Linnaeus University in 2013 with a bachelor's degrees in political science and German.
In 2011-2012, he spent a semester studying political science at the University of Passau and completed an internship at the regional representation office of the European Commission in Munich. From 2014 to 2016, Mikael taught Swedish and German language courses at Washington University in St. Louis while working on his master's thesis. After finishing his master's degree, Mikael decided to stay at WashU to pursue a PhD. In his dissertation, Mikael explores the intersections of public transit networks and representations of urban space in Berlin literature and film around the turn of the twentieth century.