Samantha Maurer Fox
Curriculum vitae
EDUCATION
2018, Columbia University
PhD, Anthropology
Dissertation: The Afterlife of Utopia: Urban Renewal in Germany’s Model Socialist City
2010, Freie Universität Berlin
MA, Visual and Media Anthropology
2008, Dartmouth College
BA with high honors, Senior Fellowship, minor in English
PROFESSIONAL APPOINTMENTS
2020-present, Lehigh University
Assistant Professor of Urban Anthropology
Department of Sociology & Anthropology
2018-2020, The New School for Social Research
Postdoctoral Fellow in Climate Change and Migration
Zolberg Institute on Migration and Mobility
PUBLICATIONS
Articles
2024, “A City of Newcomers: Temporality, Migration and Solidarity in the former East Germany,” City & Society.
2021, “I Feel Brandenburg: Temporality, Vacancy, and Migration in Germany’s Model Socialist City,” Anthropology Quarterly.
2020, “The Socialist Bratwurst: East German Urbanism and its Reemergence in the Present.” The Journal of Urban History.
2020, “Street Lighting and the Uneasy Coexistence of Socialist and Capitalist Urban Imaginaries.” Environment and Planning D: Society and Space.
Books
Forthcoming 2026, The Afterlife of Utopia: Urban Renewal in Germany’s Model Socialist City, Cornell University Press.
Policy, Reviews, and Commentary
2024, Review of Asylum and Extraction in the Republic of Nauru, Current Anthropology
2021, Review of Building Socialism: The Afterlife of East German Architecture in Urban Vietnam, Anthropology Quarterly.
2019, Fox, Schulz, and Turner, “Reimagine the Canals Community Engagement Report.” Albany: The Rockefeller Institute of Government.
2018, “Dark: Energy Politics in an Age of Latency,” Europe Now, Issue 14
2017, Review of Divided Subjects, Invisible Borderlands, Europe Now, Issue 4
Edited Volumes
2017, eds. Undine Frömming, Steffen Köhn, Samantha Fox, and Mike Terry, Digital Environments: Ethnographic Perspectives Across Global Online and Offline Spaces. Transkript Verlag, Edition Medienwissenschaft and Columbia University Press.
Book Chapters
2013, “Listen to the Radio: AM Radio, Second Life, and Innovations in an Emerging Medium.”
225-232 in Virtual Environments and Cultures, edited by Undine Frömming
Peter Lang Verlag, 2013
Photographic Publications
2011, Historicizing the Uses of the Past: Scandinavian Perspectives on History Culture,
Historical Consciousness and Didactics of History Related to World War II, edited by
Helle Bjerg, Claudia Lenz, and Erik Thorstensen. Transkript Verlag
Consulting Work
2019-2021, BuroHappold Engineering, Cities Group
Project Coordinator, Qualitative Research and Community Engagement
Clients: New York State Power Authority, New York City Mayor’s Office of Media and Entertainment
GRANTS AND FELLOWSHIPS
2023, Wenner-Gren Foundation Hunt Fellowship
2019, Parsons Cross School Fund, Migration Across Media Workshop
2017-2018, Andrew W. Mellon/Council for European Studies Dissertation Fellowship
2017-2018, Stipendium des Abgeordnetenhauses von Berlin, declined
2016-2017, Columbia University Heyman Center for Humanities Fellowship
2014-2016, National Science Foundation Dissertation Research Improvement Grant
2014-2016, Wenner Gren Foundation Dissertation Research Grant
2014-2015, Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst Research Grant for Doctoral Candidates
2012-2014, Teaching Fellow, Department of Anthropology, Columbia University
2011-2012, Faculty Fellow, Department of Anthropology, Columbia University
2009, Norwegian Marshall Fund Award, National Academy of Art, Oslo
2009, Freie Universität Berlin Film and Media Fund Grant
2008-2009, Dartmouth College Postgraduate Fellowship
2007-2008, Dartmouth College Senior Fellowship
2007-2008, Dartmouth College Leslie Center for Humanities Fellowship
2008, Dartmouth College Peter D. Smith Arts Award
2007, Dartmouth College Dickey Center for International Understanding Award
INVITED TALKS
2017, “Electricity in East Germany: Reevaluating Lamps, Light and Darkness”
Anthropology Department, Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH, October 27, 2017
2010, “Second Life, Chris Marker, and Artistic Practice” with Kristian Petersen
Universität der Künste (National Academy of Art), Berlin, June 1 2010
CONFERENCE PARTICIPATION
Panels Organized
2019, Extractive Infrastructures, American Anthropological Association
Vancouver, BC, November 20-24 2019
2018, Ambient Infrastructures, American Anthropological Association
San Jose, CA, November 14-18 2018
2018, Belonging to/in Europe: Negotiating Values of National Identity in Uncertain Times
International Conference of Europeanists, Chicago IL, March 30 2018
2017, Temporal Schemes and Nostalgic Projects: Politics, Power, and Narrative
American Anthropological Association, Washington, DC, December 2 2017
2017, Temporalities of Infrastructure: Mediation, Durability and Impermanence in Urban Landscapes
Theoretical Archeology Group, Toronto, ON, May 20 2017
2014, Cityscapes: The Archeology of Urban Convergences
Theoretical Archeology Group 2014 Champaign, IL, May 24 2014
Papers Presented
2019, “The Afterlife of Utopia: Urban Renewal in Germany’s Model Socialist City”
The University of Chicago Speculative Design Symposium: Post-Petroleum Utopias
May 31 2019
2019, “Refugees Welcome?: Vacancy and Homelessness During the European Migrant Crisis”
American Ethnological Society, St. Louis Missouri, March 12-14 2019
2018, “Ambient Infrastructures of Lighting and Environmental Change”
American Anthropological Association, San Jose, CA, November 14-18 2018
2018, “We Too Were Refugees: Generational Divisions in Response to the Refugee Crisis in Germany”
International Conference of Europeanists, Chicago IL, March 30 2018
2017, “From Leninallee to Lindenallee: Temporality and Politics in Renaming German Streets”
Anthropological Association, Washington, DC, December 2 2017
2017, “Street Lamps and Intangible Infrastructures in a Post-Socialist German City”
Theoretical Archeology Group, Toronto, ON, May 20 2017
2015, Seminar member, Wohnungsfrage Akademie, Haus der Kulturen der Welt, Berlin, October 22-28 2015
2014, “Stadt Im Umbau: Loss and Disappearance in Germany’s First Socialist City”
Metropolitan Studies Conference, Technisches Universität Berlin, November 19 2014
2014, “There’s a Great Future in Plastics: Temporality, Documentation, and East German Alltagskultur”
Paper and photographic portfolio, Theoretical Archaeology Group, Champaign, IL, May 24 2014
2013, “Stadtumbau Ost: Urban Voids and Historical Protection in East Germany’s Model Socialist City”
American Anthropological Association, Chicago, IL November 20 2013
*Winner of the 2013 Best Graduate Student Panel Prize, Society for Urban, National, and Transnational Anthropology (SUNTA)
2012, “I Feel Brandenburg: Tracking Place and Memory in/of Germany’s First Socialist City”
German Studies Association Conference, Milwaukee, WI, October 6 2012
2012, “A Portrait of Eisenhüttenstadt”
Women in German Studies (UK) Annual Conference Dublin, Ireland, June 28 2012
2012, “The Afterlife of the Everyday: Archiving East German Alltagskultur”
Paper and photographic portfolio, New School for Social Research Anthropology Graduate Conference, New York, NY, April 28 2012.
TEACHING EXPERIENCE
Undergraduate Courses
The New School, Department of Sociology
Power, Preparedness, Precarity: Urban Resilience in an Age of Uncertainty
Spring 2019, (planned) Spring 2020
The New School, Departments of Anthropology and Urban Studies
Visualizing the Urban
Fall 2019
Graduate Courses
Freie Universität Berlin, Department of Visual and Media Anthropology
Digital Anthropology, with Prof. Dr. Undine Frömming
2010-2018
Teaching Assistant
Columbia University, Department of Anthropology
The Interpretation of Culture (Prof. Catherine Fennell), Spring 2014
Origins of Human Society (Prof. Severin Fowles), Fall 2013
21st Century Archaeology (Prof. Brian Boyd), Spring 2013
Film and Culture (Prof. Meg McLagen), Fall 2012
RESEARCH EXPERIENCE
2014-2016, Guest Researcher, Visual and Media Anthropology, Freie Universität Berlin
2014-2015, Guest Researcher, Center for Metropolitan Studies, Technisches Universität Berlin
2010, Research Assistant, HL-Senteret, Oslo
2009, Guest Researcher, Kunsthøgskolen (National Academy of Art), Oslo
PROFESSIONAL SERVICE
2017-2018, Editorial Board Member, Europe Now
2015-2018, Editorial Board Member, Journal of Visual and Media Anthropology
UNIVERSITY SERVICE
Colloquia Organized
2019-present, Migration Across Media
A workshop series for New School faculty addressing representations of migration,
with participants from the Parsons School of Design, The New School for Social Research,
and the School for Public Engagement
2018-present, Pictures in Motion/of Motion/for Motion
A documentary film series at the New School that screens films addressing
migration followed by discussion by filmmakers and subject matter experts
2013-2014, Cityscapes: Interdisciplinary Conversations on Urbanism through the Ages
Columbia Anthropology and Archaeology Workshop Series
2012-2014, Media Working Group
Columbia Anthropology Workshop Series
Consultant
2012-2014, Columbia University Writing Center
MEDIA COVERAGE
2016, Berliner Zeitung, “Deep in the East: an American in Eisenhüttenstadt,”
Sabine Rennefanz, page 22, June 17th 2016
2016, Märkische Oder Zeitung, “American Under the Spell of the Model City,”
Janet Neiser, June 4th, 2016
RESEARCH INTERESTS
Germany
Urban Renewal
History and Theory of Urban Planning
Late Industrialism
German Energy Policy
Post-Socialism
Cultural Memory
Semiotics
Anthropology of Infrastructure
Visual Anthropology
Archaeology of the Contemporary Past
PROFESSIONAL MEMBERSHIP
2012-present, American Anthropological Association
2012-present, Critical Urban Anthropology Association