Valeria Siniscalchi

Valeria Siniscalchi serves as Director of Studies (Professor) at the School for Advanced Studies in the Social Sciences (EHESS) in Marseille, France, holding the Chair of Anthropology of Economies. She directs the CeRCLEs Research Center on Circulations, Links and Exchanges and leads EHESS-Marseille's Social Sciences doctoral training program and Comparative Research in Anthropology, History and Sociology Master's specialization.

Her academic foundation includes a Doctorate in Ethnology and Social Anthropology from the University of Rome "La Sapienza" (1996) and an HDR (Habilitation to Supervise Research) from the University of Aix-Marseille (2017). Early career teaching occurred at the University of Rome (1996-2004), followed by sustained research leadership at EHESS.

Professor Siniscalchi's research pioneers the political anthropology of economies, examining food systems as political arenas and transnational activism. Her ethnographic work reveals how movements like Slow Food construct political spaces through moral economies, while current studies analyze Marseille's AMAP vegetable basket systems and Sardinian cheese regulation. This work bridges environmental anthropology, economic circulation, and alternative currency practices within protected areas and industrial districts.

Her publications demonstrate consistent focus on food activism's evolution from grassroots mobilizations to global governance structures, with increasing attention to European food values and the political life of goods. This trajectory reflects deepening engagement with how economic practices construct power relations across local and transnational scales.

Scientific recognition includes:

• Ministero dell'Università e della ricerca scientifica Scholarship (Italy, 1992-1995; 1999-2001)
• Fondation Fyssen Laureate (France, 2002-2003)

She served as President of the European Association for Social Anthropologists (2017-2018) and held EASA Executive Committee membership (2015-2018).

As doctoral program director and HDR-qualified supervisor, she mentors emerging anthropologists while coordinating major international collaborations including the ANR project "The Political Life of Goods" and the University of Massachusetts-Amherst CHESS program "Grassroots: Economies, Communities, and Heritage". Her leadership extends to EHESS governance as former Board of Directors member (2009-2017) and Scientific Council member (2012-2013).

Research operations center on the CeRCLEs Research Center, with active fieldwork in Marseille's food networks and ongoing analysis of transnational food movements through partnerships like the international working group on food mobilizations coordinated with Carole Counihan.