Research group leader
Tarja Rautiainen-Keskustalo
Researchers
Aino Kangaspuro Haaparanta is a PhD researcher in media studies at Tampere University. Her research is situated in the fields of media ecology, material media studies, and journalism studies. In her doctoral dissertation, she examines journalism as a form of the data economy, with a particular focus on how the ecological sustainability of journalism itself is understood within the media sector that produces journalistic publicness.
Antti Kurko is a doctoral researcher in media studies. His research focuses on the ontology of digital waste, and situates itself in the fields of media ecology, social scientific waste studies, and science- and technology studies. In his doctoral dissertation he studies how digital waste relates to digital mundane life, and more broadly to planetary sustainability issues.
Joni Savila is a doctoral researcher in media studies at the University of Tampere. His research examines new food production technologies, drawing on media theory as well as science and technology studies. Technologies always mediate something, so they can be analyzed through the concept of mediation (lat. medium, pl. media). In food technologies, it is about mediating food (energy) to humans. Modern production technologies operate as part of a broader global infrastructure with extensive ecomaterial connections to Planet Earth. These connections consist of chains of diverse intermediaries through which both data and a wide variety of other materials flow, starting with products from the mining industry. In his study, Savila examines how developers of food production technologies see their technology's role as a builder of a more sustainable future within these webs of ecomaterial ties.
Kalle Laakso is a PhD researcher at Tampere University Game Research Lab. Their background is in sociology and current research is situated in game studies on the subject of players, gender and streaming culture. Their prior research deals in diversity, equity and inclusion within game culture as well as sociological research into robotization of work and care robotics.
Mirka Muilu currently works as a university teacher in Media Studies. Her research is situated in the fields of media ecology, material media studies, and digital culture. In her work she is interested in ecomaterial media theory, media infrastructures, and the conditions of experience, perception, and knowledge in digital media environments.
In her doctoral dissertation (2025), she examined Hannah Arendt’s thought from the perspective of material media theory. She has published peer-reviewed scholarly articles in both national and international journals, focusing on the materiality of media, theoretical approaches to technology, and questions of space and agency.
Niina Uusitalo
