ProfessorEmma Kowal

I am a cultural and medical anthropologist. My previous work as a medical doctor and public health researcher in Indigenous health settings in Australia has led me to pursue two intersecting lines of theory and empirical research:
* Australian racial politics: Indigeneity and Whiteness, settler colonialism and postcolonialism, racism and anti-racism.
* Science and technology studies (STS): the anthropology of biomedical research, genomics, bioethics, and public health.

I have authored over 150 publications including 94 peer-reviewed books, articles and book chapters. Seventy percent of my journal articles appear in high-ranked (Q1 Scimago) journals. My work is highly cited for my discipline, with 4642 Google Scholar citations and an h-index of 35. My work has been translated into Mandarin, French, Spanish, and German. I have received 32 grants and consultancies worth over $23 million AU, including $3.5M as sole/first investigator.

I am a national and international research leader in anthropology, STS, and interdisciplinary research. I founded the Deakin Science and Society Network, co-founded the Australasian STS Graduate Network (AusSTS), and am Past President of the Society for Social Studies of Science (4S). Previously I co-founded and was inaugural Deputy Director of the National Centre for Indigenous Genomics at ANU, and co-founded the Australian chapter of the Summer Internship for Indigenous Peoples in Genomics (SING). I serve on many national committees and advisory boards for the National Health and Medical Research Council, the Australian Research Council, the Academy of Social Sciences in Australia, the Australian Academy for Health and Medical Sciences, and the Australian Bureau of Statistics, among others. 

I have published two monographs:

Haunting Biology: Science and Indigeneity in Australia (Duke UP, 2023)

** Awarded the Honourable Mention for the 2024 Fleck Prize, Society for Social Studies of Science **

Trapped in the Gap: Doing Good in Indigenous Australia (Berghahn, 2015)

My edited collections include:

Jardine, B. Kowal, E., and Bangham, J. eds. (2019) How Collections End. BJHS Themes Vol. 4, British Journal for the History of Science, Cambridge University Press (Open Access)

Radin, J. and Kowal, E. eds. (2017) Cryopolitics: Frozen Life in a Melting World. MIT Press

Kowal, E., Hinterberger, A., and Radin, J. eds. (2013) “Indigenous Body Parts and Postcolonial Technoscience.” Special Issue of Social Studies of Science 43 (4)

See links on the teal bar (over there on the left) for access to my publications on Academia and podcasts about my work, and check out the videos below.

I am always keen to hear from prospective postgraduate students - email me!