Susana Narotzky is Professor of Social Anthropology, University of Barcelona. She was honoured with the National Award for Research in the Humanities “Ramón Menéndez Pidal” by the Spanish Research Ministry in 2020. From 2013-2019 she conducted a European Research Council Advanced Grant “Grassroots Economics: Meaning, Project and Practice in the Pursuit of Livelihood” [GRECO] to study the effects of austerity on Southern European livelihoods. Her work is inspired by theories of critical political economy, moral economies, feminist economics, and value regimes. She has received a number of grants and fellowships and was invited to be a member of the Institute for Advanced Study (School of Social Science), Princeton (2019-2020). She is former President of the European Association of Social Anthropology (EASA) and has served as Secretary of the American Anthropological Association.

Research interests

I explore economic practices by focusing on (1) the meanings that produce what is considered valuable, (2) people's understanding of livelihood crises, and (3) comparing expert and folk concepts used to explain economic processes. My research uses an anthropological method stressing ethnographic field work and comparison. Historical path-dependency, forms of institutionalization, and cultural frameworks co-produce differentiation patterns (spatial, social, cultural) that help us understand the economy in a globalized system. The objective of my work is to produce a grounded model of social reproduction processes. Socioecological inequality is my present concern. I investigate valuation processes and valorization practices that affect social, economic, and environmental sustainability. I focus on food systems and compare conventional, organic and agroecological production as they interlock with struggles around socioecological valuation and economic valorization circuits.

Keywords

Economic Anthropology, Food production, Social Reproduction, Crisis, Gender relations, Racism, Valuation, Sustainability