Bio

Florian Purkarthofer is a researcher at the Department of East Asian Studies, Faculty of Philological and Cultural Studies, University of Vienna, Austria and interested in urban studies, hetero-/utopias as critique, and research on sensation and perception in contemporary societies. He is currently working on a project on urban space in Tokyo as a nexus of conflicting individual perceptions and social constructions, by employing experimental methods from multisensory anthropology. Further projects aim at delving into human and non-human cocreation of urban spaces and the social life of digital sensations.

Research & Projects

Current Research

Outreach & Events

Publishing & Editorial Engagement

Teaching & Didactic Activities

Publications

Mandl, Martin, & Purkarthofer, Florian (eds.) (2021). Junge Wiener Ostasienwissenschaften. Deutsche Gesellschaft für Asienkunde DGA. Asien: the German journal on contemporary Asia Band 158/159, 7-10. https://doi.org/10.11588/asien.2021.158/159.20419

Purkarthofer, Florian (2021). “Chasing the Locals in Urban Japan: An Anthropocentric Approach to Conceptualizing Multilayered Locals in Contemporary Tokyo”. Asien: the German journal on contemporary Asia, 158/159, 134–160. https://doi.org/10.11588/asien.2021.158/159.20426

Gmeinbauer, Christina & Polak-Rottmann, Sebastian & Purkarthofer, Florian (eds.) (2020). Wiener Selektion japanologischer Methoden: Jahrgang 2020. Abt. für Japanologie des Inst. für Ostasienwiss. der Univ. Wien. (= Beiträge zur Japanologie – BZJ; 48). https://doi.org/10.25365/BZJ-048-000.

Gmeinbauer, Christina & Polak-Rottmann, Sebastian & Purkarthofer, Florian (2020). “Die Qual der Methodenwahl: Vorwort”. In Wiener Selektion japanologischer Methoden: Jahrgang 2020. Wien: Abt. für Japanologie des Inst. für Ostasienwiss. der Univ. Wien, 7-16. https://doi.org/10.25365/BZJ-048-002.

Purkarthofer, Florian & Polak-Rottmann, Sebastian (2020). “‘Reden ist Silber, Zuhören ist Gold’: Durchführung und Analyse qualitativer Interviews in Japan”. In Wiener Selektion japanologischer Methoden: Jahrgang 2020. Wien: Abt. für Japanologie des Inst. für Ostasienwiss. der Univ. Wien, 127 – 156. https://doi.org/10.25365/BZJ-048-008.

Purkarthofer, Florian (2020). “Tokyo behind Screens: Participant Observation in a City of Mobile Digital Communication”. International Quarterly for Asian Studies, 50(3-4), 55–78. DOI: https://doi.org/10.11588/iqas.2019.3-4.10706.

Purkarthofer, Florian (2020). Tokyo’s architecture and urban structure: Change in an ever-changing city. in B. Holthus, I. Gagné, W. Manzenreiter, & F. Waldenberger (Hrsg.), Japan Through the Lens of the Tokyo Olympics London: Routledge, 47-51. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003033905.

Purkarthofer, Florian (2019). “An anthropology of the machine: Tokyo’s commuter train network: by Michael Fisch, Chicago and London, The University of Chicago Press”. Contemporary Japan: journal of the German Institute for Japanese Studies Tokyo, 32/1, 145-147. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/18692729.2019.1603823.

Purkarthofer, Florian & Mühleder, Peter, & Eder, Andreas (2017). “Students Emergency Action for Liberal Democracy (SEALDs): Innenansicht politischen Engagements, dessen Erfolg und Ende”. MINIKOMI: Austrian Journal of Japanese Studies, 86, 5 – 10. URL: https://journals.univie.ac.at/index.php/aaj/article/view/086_005-010_ART_EDER2017.

Purkarthofer, Florian (2014). “Soziologische Raumtheorien in Japan: Eine diskursiv-hermeneutische Spurensuche nach den Ideen, Konzepten und Theorien zu Raum im gegenwärtigen japanischsprachigen soziologischen Diskurs”. MA Thesis, Vienna: University of Vienna. http://othes.univie.ac.at/31761/.

Mühleder, Peter & Purkarthofer, Florian (2014). “Practicing criticism: Hyôron, hihyô, kuriteishizumu and the changing structures of critique in modern and contemporary Japan”. MINIKOMI: Austrian Journal of Japanese Studies, 84, 5-14. URL: https://journals.univie.ac.at/index.php/aaj/article/view/084_005-014_ART_M%C3%9CHLEDER2014.

Talks & Conferences

2023

AntSoc: Anthropology and Sociology Section:
Navigating the New Normal: Coping with uncertainty, precarity and change in a (dis)connected Japan:

Florian Purkarthofer & Susanne Klien (Section Convenors) | 17 – 20 Aug 2023 | 17th International Conference of the European Association of Japanese Studies | Ghent University | Belgium | https://eajs.eu/2023-sections

2022

On the Road (Again): Plädoyer für kritisch-involvierte Feldforschung an Orten des alltäglichen Lebens und gegen einen misanthropischen Wissenschaftsbetrieb
Florian Purkarthofer (Speaker) | 25 Aug 2022 | 18. Deutschsprachiger Japanolog*innentag | Heinrich-Heine-Universität Düsseldorf | Germany | https://www.modernes-japan.hhu.de/japanologentag

Tōno–Tōkyō und retour: Reflexionen über räumliche und geographische Ausdrucksformen sozialer Differenzierung in japanischer Gegenwartsliteratur
Florian Purkarthofer & Tamara Kamerer (Universität Wien) | 25 Aug 2022 | 18. Deutschsprachiger Japanolog*innentag | Heinrich-Heine-Universität Düsseldorf | Germany | https://www.modernes-japan.hhu.de/japanologentag

Post-Human anthropology of the senses: An attempt to disentangle Tokyo’s localities from jumbled line(s), split screens, and (dis-)connections
Florian Purkarthofer (Speaker) | 08 Jul 2022 | 31st JAWS Conference | Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona  | Barcelona, Spain | https://grupsderecerca.uab.cat/gregal/en/content/jaws-conference-barcelona-2022

Gentrification or what? Refining Gentrification in the Context of Japanese Cities
Heide Imai  & Florian Purkarthofer (Speakers) | 17 May 2022 | Neighborhood Transformation in East Asian Cities: Is “Gentrification” the Right Frame of Reference? | Chiba, Japan | https://ukna.asia/gentrification

 2021

To Whom It May Concern: Rethinking the Questions of ‘Whose Games? Whose City?’ Through Sensation, Affect and Involvement
Florian Purkarthofer (Speaker) | 7 Dec 2021 | Olympic Games and Global Cities | Fondation France-Japon de l’EHESS | Paris, France | https://oggc.hypotheses.org/olympic-games-and-global-cities-international-symposium

Trains of Thought: Inquiries into the Social Space of eki-mae through the Everyday Practices of Waiting, Meeting and Leaving
Florian Purkarthofer (Speaker) | 28 Aug 2021 | EAJS 2021 – 16th International Conference of the European Association for Japanese Studies | Ghent University | Ghent, Belgium | https://nomadit.co.uk/eajs/eajs2021/

2020

The Narrow Streets Behind the Doors of Perception: Unscrambling Everyday Urban Space Through Senses and Discourses
Florian Purkarthofer (Speaker) | 27 Feb 2020 | Cultures of Sense in Japan | The University of Melbourne | Melbourne, Australia

2019

Shifts in Urban Transformation: Tokyo’s Architecture and Urban Structure Analyzed Through the 2020 Olympic Games
Florian Purkarthofer (Speaker) | VSJF Annual Conference 2019 “Metropolitan Japan in Historical and Contemporary Perspective” | Ruhr University Bochum | Bochum, Germany

The City Behind the Screens: Digitally Shared Perceptions and Networks of Imagined Tastes and Smells
Florian Purkarthofer (Speaker) | 16 Apr 2019 | JAWS Workshop 2019 | Aarhus University | Aarhus, Denmark | https://japananthropologyworkshop.org/conference-report-jaws-2019-at-aarhus-university/

Tokyo Topoi – Was urbane Orte ausmacht und was aus Orten gemacht wird
Florian Purkarthofer (Speaker) | 13 Feb 2019 | OAG Tokyo

2018

“Inner city life, inner city pressure” Thinking local urban spaces through senses and discourses
Florian Purkarthofer (Speaker) | 12 Dec 2018 | DIJ Social Science Study Group | DIJ Tokyo

Home is where the hatred is: Rendering ‘the local’ through proximity and affect in urban Tokyo
Florian Purkarthofer (Speaker) | 19 Oct 2018 |

From Transport to Movement and Noise to Sound: Researching Western Tokyo through Conflicting Auditory Sensations
Florian Purkarthofer (Speaker) | 14 Sep 2018 |

Multisensorische Räume im Zeitalter des Virtuellen: Wahrnehmung und Konstruktion von urbanen Räumen in Zeiten vermehrter und vermischter Kommunikation­smöglichkeiten
Florian Purkarthofer (Speaker) | 29 Aug 2018 |

Communicating Public Spaces – An Anthropological Approach to Discourse and Multisensory Perception of Space in Urban Tokyo
Florian Purkarthofer (Speaker) | 23 Feb 2018 |

2017

Die Fragmentierung der Öffentlichkeit: Wahrnehmungen und Konstruktionen von urbanen Räumen im gegenwärtigen Tokyo
Florian Purkarthofer (Speaker) | 30 Nov 2017 |

Eine Explorative Datenanalyse japanischer Filmdatenbanken
Florian Purkarthofer (Speaker), Peter Mühleder (Speaker) | 1 Nov 2017 |

“Space Oddity – Fragmented Discourses on Socially Constructed Urban Spaces in Western Tokyo”
Florian Purkarthofer (Speaker) | 1 Nov 2017 |

Utopian Critique and Critical Urban Utopias – about the paradox of utopian critique (not) becoming a lived urban utopia
Florian Purkarthofer (Speaker) | 23 Sep 2017 |

Individual Perception and Social Construction of Urban Spaces
Florian Purkarthofer (Speaker) | 29 Aug 2017 |

Whose Games? Whose City? Whom should we ask? – Questioning contemporary forms of decision making and public participation in urban planning projects
Florian Purkarthofer (Speaker) | 10 Jun 2017 | London, Rio, Tokyo Olympics Symposium | Goldsmiths, University of London | https://goldolympics.wordpress.com/

2015

“Shimokita Voice” but Meidaimae Silence? – An Anthropological Approach to Discourse and Multisensory Perception of Space in Urban Tokyo
Florian Purkarthofer (Speaker) | 24 Sep 2015 → 26 Sep 2015 | 5th International Postgraduate Conference at the Hong Kong Polytechnic University: „Whose Voice? Theory & Practice“ | The Hong Kong Polytechnic University (PolyU) | SA

Tokioter Raumethnographien. Lebensräume zwischen individueller Wahrnehmung und sozialer Konstruktion
Florian Purkarthofer (Speaker) | 26 Aug 2015 → 28 Aug 2015 | Japanologentag 2015 | LMU München

2014

Tokyo, Urban Space and the Production of Information
Florian Purkarthofer (Speaker) | 28 Jun 2014 → 29 Jun 2014 | Cultural Typhoon | ICU Tokyo

Organized Conferences & Workshops

Theorie Café: Discussions about Area Studies and Theory
Florian Purkarthofer (Organiser) | 3 Nov 2017

Cultural Typhoon in Europe 2016: Places and Spaces of Cultural Production in East Asia
Florian Purkarthofer (Co-Organiser) | 22 Sept 2016 → 25 Sept 2016
https://culturaltyphooneurope.wordpress.com/p1/

Hyôron 評論: Kritik zwischen Populärkultur und Wissenschaft
Florian Purkarthofer (Co-Organiser) | 15 March 2013 → 16 March 2013