Katharina Ciax

• since 02/2021

Research fellow in the Social Geography working group at Friedrich-Schiller-Universität Jena

Research fellow in DFG-funded project „Atmospheres of (Counter) Terror in European Cities“ cooperation by FSU Jena, Birmingham University, Plymouth University, Cergy-Pontoise University and the L’institute Region Paris

• 02/2021

Master of Arts Sociology at the University of Bielefeld with focus on Qualitative Methods Studies abroad at Ghent University, Belgium

Master thesis: „Accessibility and Exclusion of Public Spaces. An Ethnographic Study of Public Toilets“ 

•  04/2018

Bachelor of Arts Sociology at the University of Duisburg-Essen

Studies abroad at Babeș-Bolyai-University Cluj, Romania

Bachelor thesis: „Wie wird Geschlecht in der Neuen Rechten konstruiert? Eine Strukturanalyse am Beispiel der neurechten Zeitschrift Sezession“ 

• Urban spaces and geopolitics
• Critical security studies
• Sensory ethnography
• Feminist geographies
• Urban infrastructure and affect
• Urban public sanitation

PhD project

Militarised Memories - Urban Atmospheres amid Commemoration and Securitzation

While critical research on urban security and securitization was previously focussed on legislative and political dimensions, such as the increasing implementation of militarized technologies into urban logics of security through video surveillance, highly armed and militarized police patrols and large-scale crowd management, I would like to
a) trace how these changes are incorporated into everyday experiences of public spaces and how they are perceived and negotiated both sensorially and emotionally.
b) Further, I would like to link negotiations of security and securitization in urban spaces with the (state) production of collective memory and examine how these are related to constructions of the enemy, the production of grievable and non-grievable lives and urban security policies and logics. Here I would like to explore questions such as: Who is commemorated (and who is not)?, What is the use of commemoration and for whom?, What social positions are (re-)produced through commemoration? Is commemoration made useful on a political level? Attention will also be paid to subaltern structures of commemoration and their practices. 
c) In addition, I would like to connect my dissertation project methodologically and theoretically to the DFG-funded project "Atmospheres of Counter (Terrorism) in European Cities" in which I will make the everyday experience of urban spaces tangible through the concept and lens of atmospheres. 

In addition to a sensory observation of urban spaces and urban memorial sites, I would like to make use of various sensory-ethnographic methods such as go-along interviews and sound recordings, which will enable me to trace the emotional-affective experience of city dwellers everyday life. 

• Ciax, K. & S. Runkel (2024): Geopolitics of Urban Squares: Atmospheric Securitization and Counterterrorism in Everyday Urban Spaces in Berlin. Geopolitics. DOI: 10.1080/14650045.2023.2283465 [accepted]
• klo:lektiv (2023): Raum Macht Toilette – Toilette Macht Raum. Ein Gespräch. [kon] paper 9(online). München.
• klo:lektiv (2023): >> Ich will!<< Ein Klo-Manifest. [kon] paper 9. München. 
• Author collective Rosa Loo (2023): IncLoo*sive Architecture. Arch+ 252. (Download the article at the following linkExternal link.)
• Fierlafijn Annys, M. & Ciax, K. (2022): Stuck in Movement [Film]. AAG Shorts 2022; filmgeographies.com
• Ciax, K. (2022): Flushing Down Hegemony. Public Toilet Infrastructure and the Politics of Accessibility. Jenaer Sozialgeographische Manuskripte, Vol. 20. https://doi.org/10.22032/dbt.50222External link
• Ciax, K. (2020): Gelebter feministischer Anarchismus in Rojava? Teilhabe, Partizipation und citizenship in den autonomen Gebieten Nordsyriens. In: Ciax, K., Fuß, F., Papies, L., Schiedel, H. & Staake, L. (Hrsg.): Anarchafeministische Perspektiven. Moers: Syndikat A.
• Ciax, K., Fuß, F., Papies, L., Schiedel, H. & Staake, L. (Hrsg.): Anarchafeministische Perspektiven. Moers: Syndikat A.
• Aue, R., Bongers-Römer, S., Ciax, K., Kayser, M., Kuhn, L. & Peklo, C. (Hrsg.): Pissen* ist politisch: Feministische und kritisch-geographische Perspektiven auf Geographien der Notdurft. Feministische Geo-Rundmail 84.

Full list pdf, 277 kb · deof publications and presentations.

• Ciax, K. (2023): Urban Places and Anti-Terror. An atmospheric analysis of affective-spatial securitization on the Breitscheidplatz. New Cultural Geography. 26.-28.01.2023; Halle an der Saale.
• Ciax, K. [invited]: „Researching Atmospheres of Urban Counter-Terrorism: Methods and Approaches to capture the In-Between“, research seminar in the context of the ERC-Project „Urban Terrorism in Europe (2004-19): Remembering, Imagining, and Anticipating Violence“, University of Birmingham, 05.04.2022.
• Ciax, K. (2022): „If you see something, say something“: Affective atmospheres within the Counter-Terror State. AAG Annual Meeting; 25.2.-1.3.2022; New York. 
• Kayser, M., Martens, T. & Ciax, K. (2021): Pissen ist Politisch. Workshop at Recht auf Stadt Forum; 3.-5. Sep. 2021; Bonn. 
• Ciax, K. (2021): Atmospheres of (Counter)Terror in European Cities. City, Public Space & Body Conference; 14.-15. Dec. 2021; Goldsmiths, University of London.
• Ciax, K. & Peklo, C. (2021): Intimacies of Infrastructure: Affective Encounters in Public Toilet Spaces. Everybody's Business – Toilets as a Contested Space Conference. 18.-19. Nov. 2021. Humboldt University Berlin.
• Ciax, K. & Runkel, S. (2021): Atmospheres of (Counter)Terrorism. How do terror and security responses change the atmosphere in public spaces in European cities? Poster presented at: IBIT Symposium Event Security. 19.-20. Oct. 2021. Olympiastadium Berlin. 

• Arbeitskreis Feministische GeographienExternal link
• klo:lektivExternal link