I study the material politics of energy transitions and sustainability measures. My background is in sociology, and I published widely on relational approaches like actor-network theory, on economic sociology, digital methods, and interdisciplinary discussions in waste, energy and valuation studies. Currently, I am researching the establishment and maintenance of data centres and their entanglement with planetary resources in the project "Infrastructuring Data Centres".
Since 09/2022
Postdoctoral researcher, collaborative research center Virtual Living Realities (Virtuelle Lebenswelten), sub-project A02: Infrastructuring Data Centres, Ruhr-University
2021-2022
Postdoctoral researcher, collaborative research center Media of Cooperation, sub-project A04: Normal Interruptions (Train infrastructures)
2019-2022
Coordinator, RUSTlab, Ruhr-University
2013-2019
Doctoral researcher, Social Theory, Kassel University (PhD thesis on e-waste, see here for more).
2009-2013
MA in Sociology, Friedrich-Schiller University Jena
2012
Semester abroad, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New-Delhi
2008-2013
BA in Sociology and Interculture Business Communication, Friedrich-Schiller University Jena
Groth, Karla/Laser, Stefan/Sarther, Isabelle/Schirrmacher, Jennifer (2022): Artenübergreifende Fürsorge? Die Corona-Pandemie und das Mensch-Tier-Verhältnis [Interspecies care? The Corona pandemic and the human-animal relation]. Human-Animal Studies. Bielefeld: transcript.
Laser, Stefan (2022): Wert mit Abfall befragen. Eine soziomaterielle Perspektive auf die Erzeugung von Wert mit Einsichten aus ethnographischer Forschung zu Elektroschrott [Enquiring value through waste. A sociomaterial perspective on the creation of value with insights from ethnographic research on electronic waste]. Zeitschrift für Soziologie 51(2): 1-18.
Laser, Stefan (2022): Verausgabung auf „Strava“ und mit „Powermeter“: über technologisch vermittelte Selbstbewertung beim Radsport und eine energiesoziologische Perspektive [Expenditure on “Strava” and with “Powermeter”: On technologically mediated self-evaluation in cycling and an energetic perspective in Sociology]. Österreichische Zeitschrift für Soziologie 47(4): in press.
Laser, Stefan/Sørensen, Estrid (2021): Re-imagining river restoration. Temporalities, landscapes and values of the Emscher set in a post-mining environment. Berliner Blätter 84 (2): 65-85. Open access.
Laser, Stefan (2020): Hightech am Ende. Über das globale Recycling von Elektroschrott und die Entstehung neuer Werte. Reihe: Soziologie des Wertens und Bewertens [Hightech at the end. On the global recycling of electronic waste and the creation of new values. Series: Sociology of Valuation and Evaluation]. Wiesbaden: Springer VS.
Laser, Stefan/Alison Stowell (2020): Thinking like Apple’s recycling robots: Towards the activation of responsibility in a postenvironmentalist world. Ephemera 20(3), 163–194. Open access.
Laser, Stefan (2020): Sorting, shredding and smelting scrap: The production of value by deformation at a high-tech recycler of electronic waste. Valuation Studies 7(2): 221-255. Open access.
Greeson, Emma/Laser, Stefan/Pyyhtinen, Olli (2020): Introduction: Dis/assembling value. Lessons from waste valuation practices. Valuation Studies 7(2): 151-166. Open access.
Schlitz, Nicolas/Laser, Stefan (2019): Facing frictions: Waste and globalized inequalities. Austrian Journal of Development Studies: 35(2-3): 5-32. Open access.
Kropf, Jonathan/Laser, Stefan (Eds.) (2018): Digitale Bewertungspraktiken. Für eine Bewertungssoziologie des Digitalen. Reihe: Soziologie des Wertens und Bewertens [Digital valuation practices. For a sociology of valuation of the digital. Series: Sociology of Values and Valuation]. Wiesbaden: Springer VS.
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Last update: Oct 16, 2023
