Jun 1, 2024: Peter Schweitzer Receives IASSA Award 2024

Peter Schweitzer receives the IASSA Award 2024 in Bodø.

The International Arctic Social Sciences Association (IASSA) has granted Peter Schweitzer an Honorary Lifetime Membership Award in recognition of his sustained and significant contribution to Arctic social sciences. The award ceremony took place on June 1, 2024, during the 11th International Congress of Arctic Social Sciences (ICASS XI) and as part of the Arctic Congress Bodø 2024.

Besides his leadership of the ERC Advanced Grant project “Building Arctic Futures: Transport Infrastructures and Sustainable Northern Communities” (InfraNorth), Peter Schweitzer is Professor at the Department of Social and Cultural Anthropology, University of Vienna, Professor Emeritus at the University of Alaska Fairbanks, and Research Group Leader at the Austrian Polar Research Institute (APRI). In the past, he has been president of the International Arctic Social Sciences Association (IASSA), chair of the Social and Human Sciences Working Group of the International Arctic Science Committee (IASC), and director of the Austrian Polar Research Institute (APRI), among other roles.

IASSA is an international association that represents Arctic social scientists, established in 1990 in Fairbanks, Alaska. Since its inception, it has aimed to promote the involvement of social scientists in both national and international Arctic research.

Food, Culture & Society: An International Journal of Multidisciplinary Research

Apr 2026: Article by Katrin Schmid in the Food, Culture & Society Journal

The international multidisciplinary journal Food, Culture & Society has recently published a new article by InfraNorth researcher Katrin Schmid, titled “Transporting Arctic foodways: the infrastructure of food sovereignty in Nunavut, Canada.” The conversation around sustainable food in Canada’s Arctic today is inherently connected to the logistics of transportation. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork (2022–2025), this research […]

Svalbard Airport, Photo by Alexandra Meyer.

Mar 2026: Article by Alexandra Meyer in Polar Geography Special Issue

The quarterly peer-reviewed journal Polar Geography has published the article “Hyperconnected remoteness: the Svalbard airport and community transitions in Longyearbyen” by InfraNorth researcher Alexandra Meyer. The article examines the role of Svalbard Airport in shaping socio-economic transitions and everyday life in Longyearbyen, the largest settlement on the Svalbard archipelago. Drawing on long-term ethnographic fieldwork, complemented […]

InfraNorth researcher Timothy Heleniak presented “Is infrastructure enough? The case of decline in the Faroe Islands” at the European Committee of the Regions (CoR) in Brussels.

Mar 10, 2026: Presentation by Timothy Heleniak at the European Committee of the Regions

On March 10, 2026, InfraNorth researcher Timothy Heleniak presented “Is infrastructure enough? The case of decline in the Faroe Islands” at the concluding conference of the Horizon Europe-funded project PREMIUM_EU. The event was organized by Nordregio and hosted by the European Committee of the Regions in Brussels and live-streamed online. In this talk, Heleniak presented […]

Cover of the Polar Geography journal.

Feb 2026: Article by Susan Vanek in Polar Geography Special Issue

The quarterly peer-reviewed journal Polar Geography has published the article “2200 meters: infrastructure, the future, and the politics of belonging in Greenland and the Arctic” by InfraNorth associate researcher Susan Vanek. The article examines Greenland’s airport expansion project, following its approval in 2015 by Naalakkersuisut (the Government of Greenland) as the largest investment in transportation […]