Ruth Falkenberg BSc., MA.
Biography
Ruth Falkenberg is a PhD student and research assistant at the Research Platform "Responsible Research and Innovation (RRI) in Academic Practice", working in the project “Valuing, Being and Knowing in Research Practices”. In the project, Maximilian Fochler, Lisa Sigl, and Ruth Falkenberg closely collaborate with three research groups from the crop and soil sciences to explore how valuation practices and processes of subjectification are entangled with strategic decisions in the researchers’ work.
In her PhD project Ruth thus pursues her broader interest in cultures of knowledge production and valuation practices in academia. In particular, she is interested in notions of ‘innovativeness’ as a particular way of ascribing worth to research and what kinds of research come to be understood as innovative in the current scientific system. Her dissertation moreover explores how the currently predominating orientation towards novel, cutting-edge, and innovative research relates to and is intertwined with the aim of producing knowledge that makes meaningful contributions to current socio-environmental problems.
Ruth has completed the master programme Science, Technology, and Society at the university of Vienna in June 2019. In her master thesis she has dealt with valuations in medical yoga research. In doing so, she has focused on the situated valuations that researchers perform in negotiating the encounter between yoga and biomedicine theoretically and methodologically, as well as on how these concrete valuations are influenced by broader institutional, structural, and discursive regimes of valuation.
Publications
Falkenberg RI (Editorial Journalist), Fochler M (Editorial Journalist), Sigl L (Editorial Journalist). Collaboratively exploring notions of innovativeness in research practices. A short tale of interdisciplinary publishing. 2022.
Falkenberg RI, Fochler M, Sigl L, Bürstmayr H, Eichorst S, Michel S et al. The breakthrough paradox. How focusing on one form of innovation jeopardizes the advancement of science. The EMBO Journal. 2022 May 27;23(7).
Falkenberg RI. Book review: De Saille Stevienna, Medvecky Fabien, van Oudheusden Michiel, Albertson Kevin, Amanatidou Effie, Birabi Timothy and Pansera Mario (2020) Responsibility Beyond Growth: A Case for Responsible Stagnation. Science & Technology Studies. 2021 Dec 15;34(4):97-99. doi.org/10.23987/sts.102620
Falkenberg RI. Re-invent Yourself! How Demands for Innovativeness Reshape Epistemic Practices. Minerva. 2021 Jun 8;59(4):423–444. doi.org/10.1007/s11024-021-09447-4
Falkenberg RI (Editorial Journalist). Being productive in times of crisis, making the crisis productive?! 2020.
Falkenberg RI. Downward-facing dog meets randomised controlled trial: Investigating valuations in medical yoga research. 2019.
Falkenberg RI. Yoga and immune system functioning: a systematic review of randomized controlled trials. Journal of Behavioral Medicine. 2018 Aug;41(4):467-482. doi.org/10.1007/s10865-018-9914-y