Barbara Sieferle

Dr. Barbara Sieferle is an academic affiliated with the Institute for Cultural Anthropology and European Ethnology at the University of Freiburg. She held the role of Acting Professor from April 2023 to September 2023. Her work focuses on cultural anthropology of punishment, prison research, and ethnographic methods. Key research projects include Life after Imprisonment (DFG-funded) and Experience as a research perspective (DFG network). She earned her doctorate in European Ethnology from the University of Innsbruck in 2017, with a dissertation on pilgrimage corporeality.

Education:

• PhD in European Ethnology (University of Innsbruck, 2017)
• Studies in Ethnology and Sociology (University of Freiburg, 2006–2012)
• Visiting studies at Leiden University (2011–2012)

Research Interests: Barbara Sieferle’s work examines punishment and its cultural dimensions, post-imprisonment experiences, deviance, and embodiment. She employs phenomenologically oriented ethnography to explore topics like stigma, liminality, and reintegration. Her recent work emphasizes the interplay between lived experience and cultural analysis.

Grants & Projects:

• DFG Research Project: Life after Imprisonment
• DFG Network: Experience as a Cultural-Analytical Perspective

Labs/Teams: Active in the Institute’s research groups focused on punishment culture and ethnographic methodology. Collaborations include the Kulturwissenschaftliche Perspektiven network.