Biography summary
Maurizio Meloni is a social theorist and a science and technology studies scholar. He is the author of L'Orecchio di Freud. Societa' della comunicazione e Pensiero Affettivo (Dedalo, 2005); Political Biology: Science and Social Values in Human Heredity from Eugenics to Epigenetics (Palgrave 2016); Impressionable Biologies: From the Archaeology of Plasticity to the Sociology of Epigenetics (Routledge, 2019); co-editor of Biosocial Matters (Wiley 2016); and chief editor of the Palgrave Handbook of Biology and Society (2018). He is currently an ARC Future Fellow and Associate Professor of Sociology at Deakin University, Australia. He has benefited from several research grants, including two Marie Curie fellowships, a Fulbright scholarship, funded visits at the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science (MPIWG, Berlin), DAAD and OEAD fellowships in Germany and Austria, and an annual membership at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton (NJ).
You can find Maurizio's publications on his Academia page.
Affiliations
2013- International Society for the History, Philosophy and Social Studies of Biology (ISHPSSB)
2011- 2016 British Sociological Association (BSA)
2011- Society for the Social Studies of Science (4S)
Knowledge areas
Social Theory
History and Philosophy of Biology and Medicine
Sociology of Epigenetics
Intellectual History
Social Studies of Science
Media appearances
Maurizio Meloni on his recent article 'Porous Bodies: Environmental Biopower and the Politics of Life in Ancient Rome', in Theory Culture and Society, 2020
'Impressionable Biologies: An interview with Maurizio Meloni' in Theory, Culture & Society, 23 October, 2019.
'Re-Thinking the History of Biopower', Discover Society, March 2019
'Epigenetics: Living with a permeable genome', Alfred Deakin Institute for Citizenship and Globalisation, 7 August, 2019.
'New book sheds light on long history behind the rise of the field of epigenetics', Alfred Deakin Institute for Citizenship and Globalisation, 6 Frebruary, 2019.
'Welfare poison: why everything you believed about the politics of nature-nurture may no longer be true' in Discover Society, 5 July, 2016.
'If we’re not careful, epigenetics may bring back eugenic thinking' in The Conversation, 16 March, 2016.
'C is for complexity. Why genetics doesn't outweigh teaching' in Discover Society, 6 January, 2014.
Projects
Impressionable Bodies: Epigenetic Models of Plasticity in the Global South (ARC Future Fellowship)
This project aims to investigate how epigenetics, the science of how environmental factors switch genes on or off, is reshaping notions of the body, heredity and biological plasticity in the global South., Using case studies in Australia, India and South Africa this project comparatively analyses how epigenetics is mobilised in public debates on responsibility, risk and the amelioration of disadvantage. This project expects to ensure the policy translation of epigenetics maximises social benefits and reduces risks of social harm, particularly to vulnerable minority groups.
Epigenetics and Indigenous Australia (ARC Discovery Project, Emma Kowal Lead Investigator, Megan Warin Adelaide Investigator)
This project aims to investigate how epigenetics is being received by Indigenous Australians, and to identify the potential risks and opportunities that narratives of biosocial damage entail. Epigenetics is a rapidly evolving science concerned with how life experiences, such as trauma or stress, can modify DNA and be passed on to negatively affect children's (and possibly grandchildren's) health and development. This project will offer an understanding of the relationships between Indigenous health and epigenetics that will help Indigenous researchers, policymakers, and government bodies make well-informed decisions about the application and direction of this new science. The research will make a significant contribution to understanding how the interplay of biology, race, and society unfold at the intersection of different knowledge systems and at the forefront of technological progress.
Publications
Forgetting how we ate: personalised nutrition and the strategic uses of history
Christopher Mayes, Maurizio Meloni
(2024), Vol. 46, pp. 1-26, History and Philosophy of the Life Sciences, Berlin, Germany, C1
Revitalizing Air: More-than-Human Relations in Urban Health Beyond the Modern-Premodern Binary
M Meloni, C Maller
(2024), pp. 1-17, GeoHumanities, London, Eng., C1
Airs, Waters, Places... and the Exposome: Steps Toward an Integrative Health
Maurizio Meloni
(2023), pp. 1-5, Integrative Approaches in Environmental Health and Exposome Research, Berlin, Germany, B1
Biopolitics After COVID: Notes from the Crisis
M Meloni, M Vatter
(2023), Vol. 26, pp. 368-392, Theory and Event, C1
T Moll, M Meloni, A Issaka
(2023), pp. 1-28, BioSocieties, Berlin, Germany, C1
The 'government of men': Moving beyond Foucault's binaries
M Meloni, G Bashirov
(2023), pp. 1-23, Economy and Society, London, Eng., C1
Epigenetic science and Indigenous health: key issues and considerations for future research
Jaya Keaney, Henrietta Byrne, Megan Warin, Emma Kowal, Maurizio Meloni, Stephanie Gilbert, Jeffrey Craig, Kym Rae, Mark Wenitong, Alex Brown
(2023), Vol. 14, pp. 1-24, International Indigenous Policy Journal, London, Canada, C1
A Foucauldian Moment or the Longue Durée? COVID-19 in Context
Maurizio Meloni
(2022), pp. 53-71, The Viral Politics of Covid-19: Nature, Home, and Planetary Health, Berlin, Germany, B1
Molecular Epigenetics, the Biology of Memory, and Biology as Memory
Maurizio Meloni
(2022), Cultural Memory: From the Sciences to the Humanities, London, Eng., B1
A biosocial return to race? A cautionary view for the postgenomic era
M Meloni, T Moll, A Issaka, C Kuzawa
(2022), pp. 1-24, American Journal of Human Biology, London, Eng., C1
An unproblematized truth: Foucault, biopolitics, and the making of a sociological canon
M Meloni
(2022), pp. 1-20, Social Theory and Health, Berlin, Germany, C1
Christopher Mayes, Elsher Lawson-Boyd, Maurizio Meloni
(2022), Vol. 14, pp. 1-12, Nutrients, Basel, Switzerland, C1
M Meloni, J Reynolds
(2021), Vol. 198, pp. 10685-10708, Synthese, C1
Porous Bodies: Environmental Biopower and the Politics of Life in Ancient Rome
M Meloni
(2021), Vol. 38, pp. 91-115, Theory, Culture and Society, C1
Bodies of the Anthropocene: On the interactive plasticity of earth systems and biological organisms
M Meloni, R Wakefield-Rann, B Mansfield
(2021), Anthropocene Review, C1
Gender Beneath the Skull: Agency, Trauma and Persisting Stereotypes in Neuroepigenetics
E Lawson-Boyd, M Meloni
(2021), Vol. 15, Frontiers in Human Neuroscience, Switzerland, C1
The politics of environments before the environment: Biopolitics in the longue durée
M Meloni
(2021), Vol. 88, pp. 334-344, Studies in History and Philosophy of Science, England, C1
M Warin, E Kowal, M Meloni
(2020), Vol. 45, pp. 87-111, Science Technology and Human Values, London, Eng., C1
"It's Never Too Early": Preconception Care and Postgenomic Models of Life
M Pentecost, M Meloni
(2020), Vol. 5, Frontiers in Sociology, Switzerland, C1
Impressionable biologies: From the archaeology of plasticity to the sociology of epigenetics
M Meloni
(2019), New York, NY>, A1
A postgenomic body: histories, genealogy, politics
M Meloni
(2018), Vol. 24, pp. 3-38, Body & society, London, Eng., C1
M Meloni, R Müller
(2018), Vol. 4, Environmental Epigenetics, England, C1
M Pentecost, M Meloni
(2018), Vol. 18, pp. 60-62, American Journal of Bioethics, United States, C1
The Palgrave Handbook of Biology and Society
M Meloni, J Cromby, D Fitzgerald, S Lloyd
(2018), London, Eng., A7
Ruth Mueller, Clare Hanson, Mark Hanson, Michael Penkler, Georgia Samaras, Luca Chiapperino, John Dupre, Martha Kenney, Christopher Kuzawa, Joanna Latimer, Stephanie Lloyd, Astrid Lunkes, Molly Macdonald, Maurizio Meloni, Brigitte Nerlich, Francesco Panese, Martyn Pickersgill, Sarah Richardson, Joelle Ruegg, Sigrid Schmitz, Aleksandra Stelmach, Paula-Irene Villa
(2017), Vol. 18, pp. 1677-1682, EMBO REPORTS, England, C1-1
Race in an epigenetic time: thinking biology in the plural
Maurizio Meloni
(2017), Vol. 68, pp. 389-409, BRITISH JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY, England, C1-1
Disentangling life: Darwin, selectionism, and the postgenomic return of the environment
M Meloni
(2017), Vol. 62, pp. 10-19, Studies in history and philosophy of science part c: studies in history and philosophy of biological and biomedical sciences, Amsterdam, The Netherlands, C1-1
Political biology: Science and social values in human heredity from eugenics to epigenetics
M Meloni
(2016), Berlin, Germany, A1
The biosocial: sociological themes and issues
M Meloni, S Williams, P Martin
(2016), Vol. 64, pp. 7-25, The Sociological Review Monographs, Chichester, Eng., B1
From boundary-work to boundary object: how biology left and re-entered the social sciences
M Meloni
(2016), Vol. 64, pp. 61-78, The sociological review, Chichester, Eng., C1
The transcendence of the social: Durkheim, Weismann, and the purification of sociology
M Meloni
(2016), Vol. 1, pp. 1-13, Frontiers in sociology, Lausanne, Switzerland, C1
Эпигенетическая революция в пристальном рассмотрении
М Мелони, Д Теста, M Meloni, G Testa
(2015), Vol. 7, pp. 450-467, Политическая концептология: журнал метадисциплинарных исследований, Rostov-on-Don, Russia, C1
Эпигенетическая революция в пристальном рассмотрении
Мaurizio Meloni, G Testa
(2015), Vol. 7, pp. 450-467, Biosfera, Saint Petersburg, Russia, C1
Epigenetics for the social sciences: justice, embodiment, and inheritance in the postgenomic age
M Meloni
(2015), Vol. 34, pp. 125-151, New genetics and society, Abingdon, Eng., C1
Comprehending the body in the era of the epigenome
M Lock, W Burke, J Dupré, H Landecker, J Livingston, P Martin, M Meloni, G Pálsson, R Rapp, K Weiss, A Buchanan
(2015), Vol. 56, pp. 163-177, Current anthropology, Chicago, Ill., C1
Scrutinizing the epigenetics revolution
M Meloni, G Testa
(2014), Vol. 9, pp. 431-456, BioSocieties, Basingstoke, Eng., C1
Biology without biologism: social theory in a postgenomic age
M Meloni
(2014), Vol. 48, pp. 731-746, Sociology, London, Eng., C1
The social brain meets the reactive genome: neuroscience, epigenetics and the new social biology
M Meloni
(2014), Vol. 8, pp. 1-12, Frontiers in human neuroscience, Lausanne, Switzerland, C1
How biology became social, and what it means for social theory
M Meloni
(2014), Vol. 62, pp. 593-614, Sociological review, Chichester, Eng., C1
M Meloni
(2013), pp. 25-49, Essays on Neuroscience and Political Theory : Thinking the Body Politic, London, Eng., B1-1
Moralizing biology: the appeal and limits of the new compassionate view of nature
M Meloni
(2013), Vol. 26, pp. 82-106, History of the human sciences, London, Eng., C1
The cerebral subject at the junction of naturalism and antinaturalism
M Meloni
(2011), pp. 101-115, Neurocultures: glimpses into an expanding universe, Frankfurt, Germany, B1-1
Freud in un' età naturalistica. Tra psicoanalisi e neuroscienze cognitive
M Meloni
(2009), Vol. 55, pp. 931-949, Rivista Italiana di Psicoanalisi, Rome, Italy, C1-1
A triangle of thoughts: Girard, Freud, Lacan
M Meloni
(2002), Vol. 14, pp. 27-56, Journal of European psychoanalysis, Rome, Italy, C1-1
Funded Projects at Deakin
Australian Competitive Grants
Impressionable Bodies: Epigenetic Models of Plasticity in the Global South - External - Dr Maurizio Meloni
A/Prof Maurizio Meloni
ARC Fellowships - Future Fellowships
- 2022: $123,902
- 2021: $247,284
- 2020: $245,353
- 2019: $235,671
- 2018: $112,639
The politics of epigenetic hope and hype in Indigenous Australia
Prof Emma Kowal, A/Prof Maurizio Meloni, Asst/Prof Megan Warin
ARC - Discovery Projects
- 2021: $99,784
- 2020: $101,759
- 2019: $91,682
Supervisions
Elsher Lawson-Boyd
Thesis entitled: Under the Skull: A Study of Embodied Trauma in Neuroepigenetics
Doctor of Philosophy, School of Humanities and Social Sciences