Kathryn Goldfarb

Kathryn Goldfarb is an Associate Professor at the University of Colorado, Boulder in the Department of Anthropology. A cultural and medical anthropologist, her work interrogates the intersections of kinship theory, public policy, environmental justice, and sensory ethnography. She is the author of Fragile Kinships: Child Welfare and Well-Being in Japan (Cornell University Press 2024) and co-editor of Difficult Attachments: Anxieties of Kinship and Care (Rutgers University Press 2024).

• Principal Investigator, Smoke Exposure and Underserved Wildland Fire Communities (NOAA/NWS funded)
• Collaborator, Marshall Fire Story Project (Louisville Historical Museum)
• Co-PI with Arielle Milkman on interdisciplinary air quality research

Her research interests span multiple domains:

• Kinship and Embodiment: Critically analyzing blood vs. chosen family structures in Japan
• Environmental Justice: Through the Knowing Air project
• Social Studies of Science: Including neuroscientific determinism and atmospheric data

While her publication history shows strong engagement with Japanese child welfare systems and kinship theory, recent work extends to environmental data co-production and interdisciplinary collaborations with mechanical engineering and law departments. She combines participatory methods with critical theory to examine how invisible pollutants and social marginalization intersect in public health outcomes.

Current projects include:

• Knowing Air: Atmospheric data ethnography in Colorado
• Smoke Exposure: Wildland fire community health impacts