Farias Ignacio
Person

Prof. Ignacio Farías

Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin

Ignacio Farías’s research docuses on current ecological and infrastructuraltransformations of cities and challenges to the democratization of city-making. His most recent work explores 1) how (micro)climatological knowledge entered the field of urban planning, 2) how heat, noise and wireless signals come to matter in contemporary urbanism and 3) how human health and multispecies cohabitation are negotiated in polluted riparian areas.

Werdegang

Academic Education

2003 – 2008: Dr. Phil., Institute of European Ethnology, Humboldt University of Berlin, Germany
2001 – 2003: D.E.A. in Social and Cultural Anthropology, Universidad de Barcelona, Spain
1996 – 2001: Licentiate in Sociology, Minor in Philosophy, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Chile

Professional Experience (selected)

Since 2018: Professor of Urban Anthropology, Institute of European Ethnology, Humboldt University of Berlin, Germany
2015 – 2018: Assistant Professor of Participatory Technology Design, Department of Architecture & Munich Center for Technology in Society, Technische Universität München, Germany
2009 – 2015: Research Fellow, then Project Lead, Research unit “Cultural Sources of Newness”. Wissenschaftszentrum Berlin für Sozialforschung (WZB), Germany
2008 – 2014: Associate Researcher, Instituto de Ciencias Sociales, Universidad Diego Portales, Chile
2005 – 2007 DFG-Fellow, Center for Metropolitan Studies, Technische Universität Berlin, Germany

Mitgliedschaften (maximal 5)

2015 – 2020: Editor of EASST Review: www.easst.net/review
2013 – 2016: Elected Member of Academic Council of the European Association of Studies of Science and Technology (EASST)

Projekte (maximal 5)

2023-2025: “Re-Scaling Global Health. Human Health and Multispecies Cohabitation on an Urban Planet”, Exploration Project on Planetary Health, Berlin University Alliance

2023-2024: Multimodal Appreciation. Prototypes for the evaluation and institutionalisation of
more-than-textual ethnography. Programm Open-Up. Volkswagen Foundation

2022-2026: „Urban Vibrations: How physical waves come to matter in contemporary urbanism”, EU, ERC Consolidator Grant

2022-2025: „The Urban Microclimate Regime. The Constitution of Spaces and Infrastructures of Heat”, Subproject within DFG-SFB (Collaborative Research Center) “The Re-Figuration of Spaces”, DFG

2022-2023: “Stock Development through Public-Civic-Partnerships. Collaboration, Controversies,
Modelling
“, Program ZukunftBAU of the Federal Ministry of Housing, Urban Development and Construction. Funding, Federal Ministry of Housing, Urban Development and Construction

2016-2019: „Smarter Together: Smart and Inclusive Solutions for a Better Life in Urban Districts“, EU Horizon 2020a

Publikationen (maximal 5)

Farías, I., Criado, T., Remter. F. (2023): How would animals and architects co-design if we built the right contract?, In: Tironi M./Chilet, M./Hermansen, P/Marín, C. (Eds.) Design For More-Than-Human Futures: Towards Post-Anthropocentric Worlding. London: Routledge.

Farías, I., Löw, M., Steets, S., Schmidt-Lux, T. (2023): Kultursoziologische Stadtforschung. Grundlagen, Analysen, Perspektiven, Campus.

Farías, I., Paulus, J. (2021): Die Räume der Akteur-Netzwerk-Theorie: Über die Formation, Deformation und Transformation des Sozialen, In: Heinrich, J./Marguin, S./Million, A./Stollmann, J. (Eds.) Methoden der qualitativen Raumforschung. Ein interdisziplinäres Handbuch. Wiesbaden: DG Verlag.

Farías, I., Blok, A. (2020): Urban Cosmopolitics, In: Schwanen, Tim/van Kempen, Ronald (Eds.) Handbook of Urban Geography.

Farías, I., Widmer, S. (2018): Ordinary smart cities: How calculated users, professional citizens, technology companies and city administrations engage in a more-than-digital politics, Technoscienza.

Farías, I., Blok, A. (2016): Introduction: Technical Democracy as a Challenge for Urban Studies, CITY: analysis of urban trends, culture, theory, policy, action, Vol. 20, Issue 4: 539-548.

Farías, I. (2016): Devising Hybrid Forums: Technical Democracy in a Dangerous World”. CITY: analysis of urban trends, culture, theory, policy, action, Vol. 20, Issue 4: 549-562.

Farías, I. (2015): Städtisches Leben von und mit Schadstoffen. Materielle Intimität als Einschränkung
urbaner Dingpolitik, Berliner Blätter. Ethnographische und ethnologische Beiträge 69: 70-83.

Tironi, M., Farías, I. (2015): Building a park, immunising life: Environmental management and radical
asymmetry, Geoforum, Vol. 66: 167-175