Ciara Kierans is a professor of social anthropology and an AIAS-PIREAU fellow at the Aarhus Institute of Advanced Studies (AIAS) from 2023-2024. Through fieldwork in western Mexico, she has developed a growing interest in filtration processes such as biological, ecological and social mechanisms in the interaction between humans, the environment, and disease.

This interest is also the driving force behind the new research project, FILTERSCAPE, which with an ERC Advanced Grant of €2,3 million from the European Reaseach Council can now be realized.

"The ERC grant provides a unique opportunity for anthropology to develop new knowledge about the relationship between health and the environment – with a particular focus on the relations of filtration processes. Anthropology is a discipline committed to the study of relations across time and space, and is particularly well suited to promote dialogue, collaboration and shared understandings – all of which are crucial in addressing complex environmental and health challenges,” says Ciara Kierans. She elaborates:

- I am very grateful to colleagues at the Aarhus Institute for Advanced Studies and the PIREAU platform, who made it possible for me to write the application; to colleagues at the Department of Anthropology and colleagues in Mexico and Liverpool, where the early ideas for FILTERSCAPE took root.

Filtering as a key to understanding

River basins – landscapes where contamination accumulates – are facing serious challenges today. Pollution from agriculture, industry, urban development, climate change and flooding affects not only the quality of water, but also the health of people, animals, ecosystems and communities. According to Ciara Kierans, this calls for new ways of understanding complex pollution flows.

"By following filtration processes in both Denmark and Mexico – two countries facing distinct water challenges – the project will shed light on how filtration occurs in everything from wetlands to waste-water infrastructures and human bodies. Through a series of research studies, we will not only investigate how filtering works, but also how it can serve as a model for new forms of collaboration and thinking," says Ciara Kierans.

A new way of thinking about health 

FILTERSCAPE will thus contribute with a new way of thinking about health – not just as something related to the body or disease, but as that which emerges in the interaction between people, nature, technology and the landscapes we inhabit.

The project will reimagine our planet’s health as a filterscape or filtering assemblage, showing the role human and multi-species filtering must play in shaping and making our landscapes liveable.

In this way, the project will show how a better understanding of the different kinds of filtering processes within a river basin can help create a healthier and more sustainable environment.

Facts about the ERC Advanced Grant “FILTERSCAPE”

The European Research Council (ERC) awards ERC Advanced Grants (AdG) to exceptional research leaders who have already achieved outstanding research results, and they support ambitious, curiosity-driven projects that could lead to major scientific breakthroughs. See all 2025 ERC grantees here:
https://erc.europa.eu/news-events/news/erc-2024-advanced-grants-results

• Title: “FILTERSCAPE: Contaminant flows, landscape governance and the making of new anthropological knowledge for planetary health”
• Amount awarded: €2,317,071.25
• Project period: December 2025 – December 2030

In connection with the project, two postdocs in environmental history, two postdocs in anthropology, a PhD student, an anthropologist who is an expert in river systems (Professor Heather Anne Swanson) and an artist who works with water will be employed.

Contact

Ciara Kierans, Professor, 2023-2024 AIAS-PIREAU Fellow
E-mail: au688627@cas.au.dk

Department of Anthropology
School of Culture and Society
Aarhus University
Denmark