Dr Timothy Heffernan

I am an anthropologist driven by a deep curiosity about how communities confront and recover from life-altering events. From environmental disasters to political and economic upheavals, my research explores the stories of resilience, connection and transformation that emerge in the wake of crisis. Rooted in anthropological fieldwork, I seek to understand not just how unwelcome change is endured, but how recovery unfolds in complex, unpredictable ways.

Living and working on Gadigal Country, I work with communities in Australia and Europe affected by event-based hardship, such as environmental disasters and political and economic crises. Informed by ethnographic fieldwork, my research examines the connection between communities' experiences of unwelcome change and the ways they set about recovering, noting this is rarely straightforward.

Currently, I am a Research Fellow at UNSW School of Built Environment and was a visiting researcher (2022-2024) at the ANU School of Psychology and Medicine. My research has been funded by the Australian and NSW Governments and UACES: University Association for Contemporary European Studies.

I am co-editor of The Anthropology of Ambiguity (Manchester UP, 2024) and the author of the draft manuscript Compassionate Solidarity: Crisis, recovery and kincentric politics in Iceland. In addition, I have published in several leading peer-reviewed journals including Social Anthropology, History and Anthropology, Conflict and Society, Disasters and The Australian Journal of Emergency Management.

Inaugural network lead: UNSW Interdisciplinary Ethnography Network (UNSW IEN)