معرفی
Dr Richard Irvine is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Social Anthropology at the University of St Andrews, within the School of Philosophical and Anthropological Studies. His research bridges environmental anthropology and the anthropology of religion, focusing on geological temporality, environmental risk perception, and monastic practices. He holds a PhD from the University of Cambridge (2011) and has conducted fieldwork in the UK and Mongolia. Irvine chairs a sub-honours curriculum review and teaches modules including Anthropology of Catastrophe and Research Methods. His work explores how human temporalities intersect with Earth’s deep time, as detailed in his book An Anthropology of Deep Time (2020). He also investigates contemporary secular and religious phenomena, including monastic responses to lockdown and the cultural memory of pilgrimage sites like Our Lady of Ipswich.
- Education: PhD in Anthropology, University of Cambridge (2011)
Research interests include the disjunction between human timescales and geological processes, the role of religious practice in secular contexts, and environmental communication through literature and music. His fieldwork in Mongolian communities and East Anglian fenlands highlights ecological and cultural adaptations to environmental change. Irvine’s recent publications address topics like climate change perception in children, the anthropology of boredom during lockdown, and the social life of inexpressible spiritual experiences in Benedictine monasteries.
His advising includes PhD candidates Bimbo Omopo and Sharonne Specker. Grants and research projects have explored energy transitions, peatland ecosystems, and the intersection of art with environmental anthropology. Irvine is affiliated with the university’s environmental humanities initiatives and contributes to interdisciplinary dialogues on the Anthropocene.
