Gonçalo D. Santos is an Assistant Professor of Social-Cultural Anthropology in the Department of Life Sciences at the University of Coimbra. He is also a Senior Researcher at CIAS—Research Centre for Anthropology and Health, University of Coimbra, where he coordinates the Research Cluster “Technoscience, Society, and Environment”. He held previous professorial and research positions at the London School of Economics and Political Science, the Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology in Germany, and the University of Hong Kong. He is the author of Chinese Village Life Today (University of Washington Press, 2021) and the co-editor of Transforming Patriarchy. Chinese Families in the 21st Century (U. of Washington Press, 2017). His research has been published in leading journals in the fields of anthropology, Asian studies, and social studies of science and technology, including Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, Current Anthropology, HAU, Modern Asian Studies, Technology and Culture, and Zhongguo Xueshu. His research explores new critical approaches to questions of modernity and social, moral, and technological transformation in contemporary China. He is the founder of the International Research Network Sci-Tech Asia, and is an invited member of the Research Group on Culture and Society of the Initiative for U.S.-China Dialogue on Global Issues at Georgetown University. Some of his recent research is influenced by post-humanist theorizations in anthropology and the human sciences and seeks to encourage the development of new ways of thinking about the civilizational challenges of the Anthropocene and the current environmental crisis. In 2021-2022, he was the curator of the international colloquium: “Pluralizing the Anthropocene. Reenvisioning the Future of the Planet in the 21st century”.
Gonçalo D. Santos
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Personal webpage
| Research Interests |
|---|
| Family |
| Gender |
| Intimate Life |
| Care |
| Health |
| Reproduction |
| Modernity |
| Material Culture |
| Social Transformation |
| Anthropocene |
| Environmental Humanities |
| Social Studies of Science and Technology |
| History of Anthropology |
| Visual Anthropology |
| China |
| East Asia |
| Teaching |
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Anthropological Theory and History (undergraduate course) |
Material Culture and Museology (undergraduate course) |
Technology, Power, and Culture (graduate course) |
| Main Publications |
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Santos, Gonçalo. 2021. Chinese Village Life Today. Building Families in an Age of Transition. Seattle, Washington: University of Washington Press. [English] |
Santos, Gonçalo, and Stevan Harrell. (eds) 2017. Transforming Patriarchy. Chinese Families in the 21st Century. Seattle, Washington: University of Washington Press. [English] |
Santos, Gonçalo. 2021. ” The Polyphony of Nature.” HAU: Journal of Ethnographic Theory 11 (2): 847-51. [English] |
Santos, Gonçalo, et al. 2021. “Capitalism, Overwork, and Polanyi’s Dialectics of Freedom: Emerging Visions of Work-Life Balance in Contemporary Urban China”. In Work, Society, and the Ethical Self. Chimeras of Freedom in the Neoliberal Era. Edited by Chris Hann. Oxford: Berghahn (Max Planck Studies in Anthropology and Economy). [English] |
Santos, Gonçalo. 2020. “Birthing Stories and Techno-Moral Change across Generations. Coping with Hospital Births and High-Tech Medicalization in rural South China, 1960s-2010s.” Technology and Culture 61 (2): 581-616 [English] |
Santos, Gonçalo (江绍龙) and Stevan Harrell (郝瑞). 2019. ”21 世纪中国家庭的权力 构成形态. ‘男权家长制’作为一种分析框架 (Changing Power Configurations in 21st century Chinese Families. Using Patriarchy as an Analytical Category).” Zhongguo Xueshu 中国学术 (China Scholarship) 41: 79-124. [Chinese] |
Santos, Gonçalo. 2018. “Technological Choices and Modern Material Civilization. Reflections on Everyday Toilet Practices in rural South China.” In Anthropology and Civilizational Analysis. Eurasian Explorations. Edited by Johann Arnason and Chris Hann. New York: SUNY Press, pp.259-80. [English] |
Santos, Gonçalo. 2017. “Multiple mothering and labor migration in rural South China.” In Transforming Patriarchy. Chinese Families in the 21st Century. Edited by Gonçalo Santos and Stevan Harrell. Seattle: University of Washington Press, pp.91-110. [English] |
Santos, Gonçalo. 2016. “On Intimate Choices and Troubles in Rural South China.” Modern Asian Studies 50 (4): 1298-1326. [English] |
Santos, Gonçalo. 2013. “Technologies of Ethical Imagination”, In Ordinary Ethics in China Today. Edited by Charles Stafford. London: Berg (LSE Monographs on Social Anthropology Series), pp.194-221. [English] |
Santos, Gonçalo. 2012. “The Birth of Physical Anthropology in Late Imperial Portugal.” Current Anthropology 53 S5: 33-45 (Wenner-Gren Symposium) [English] |
Santos, Gonçalo. 2011. “Rethinking the Green revolution in South China. Technological Materialities and Human-environment Relations.” East Asian Science, Technology, and Society: an International Journal 5 (4): 1-27. [English] |
Santos, Gonçalo. 2010. “L’Agriculture Traditionnelle Chinoise est-elle Verte et jusqu’où?” In L’Empreinte de la Technique. Comment les Technologies Changent les Societés? Colloque de Cerisy. Edited by Thierry Gaudin and Élie Faroult. Paris: L’Harmattan, pp.117-39. [French] |
Santos, Gonçalo. 2008. “On ‘same-year siblings’ in rural South China.” Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute 14 (3): 535-553. (Reprinted in edited volume: The Ways of Friendship. Anthropological Perspectives. Edited by Amit Desai and Evan Killick. Oxford: Berghahn Books, 2010) [English] |
| Research Projects |
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Project Name: “Intersections of Knowledge. Climate Change Science and Perceptions of Marine Ecological Degradation in Traditional Fishing Communities in Portugal” |
Project Name: Technology and Reproductive Labor in East Asia, 1900s-2000s, with Jacob Eyferth (University of Chicago) and Suzanne Gottschang (Smith College) |
Project Name: “Women and Birth in Transition: The Politics of Childbirth Medicalization in Reform era China,” with Jun Zhang (City U. Hong Kong) |
Project Name: “Chinese Midwives under Socialism: An Oral History Project” |
Project Name: “Making Modernity in East Asia. Technologies of Everyday Life, 19th-21st centuries,” Co-Principal Investigator (Co-PI), a collaborative project led by researchers at the University of Hong Kong |
Project Name: “Technology, Charitable Benefaction, and Humanitarian Aid in Contemporary China.” Principal Investigator (PI) |
Project Name: “Intimate Modernities. Love, Money, and Everyday Ethics in the Hills of Guangdong, 1970s-2010s.” Principal Investigator (PI) |
Project Name: “Chinese Patriliny and Human Cognition.” Principal Investigator (PI) |
Project Name: “The Changing Dynamics of Kinship and Family in Contemporary China.” Principal Investigator (PI) |
Project Name: “The Process of Kinship and Identity in Rural China”, Principal Investigator (PI) |
| Creative Output |
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Since 2018 – Producer and Host of the Podcast Series: TechnoViews, Available in all major podcast platforms: Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Spotify, etc |
2021-2022 — Curator, Exhibition of the 1st International Competition of Ethnographic Photography “UrbanAct. Images of Environmental Action and Activism in the 21st century” |