Alexa Färber

Prof. Dr. Alexa Färber holds the Chair of Historical Dimensioning of Everyday Cultures at the University of Vienna's Department of European Ethnology within the Faculty of Historical and Cultural Studies. Her research integrates ethnographic analysis with knowledge anthropology, focusing on urban studies, collaborative design practices, and interdisciplinary public engagement. She earned her PhD at Humboldt University Berlin and held roles including junior professor at HU Berlin and professor at HafenCity University Hamburg before joining Vienna in 2018.

Her education includes studies in Islamic Studies and European Ethnology across Hamburg, Toulouse, and Berlin. Key research areas include city representation, urban promise theory, and audio-visual methodologies. Notable projects include the Horizon 2020 'Infrastructuring Libraries in Transformation' and FWF-funded 'Realfiction Klimarechnungshof' exploring climate change communication through real fiction.

Publications span urban ethnography, visual anthropology, and interdisciplinary collaboration, with recent work analyzing World's Fairs as knowledge practices and urban libraries as social infrastructures. She leads the 'talkingphotobooks.net' blog and participates in French-German urban research networks. Her work bridges academic research with practical urban interventions, emphasizing collaborative and participatory methods.