Heather A. Horst is a Vice Chancellor's Senior Research Fellow in the School of Media and Communication at RMIT University in Melbourne, Australia and a Research Fellow in the MA Program in Digital Anthropology at University College London. Her current research includes a study of mobiles, money and mobility in Haiti and the Dominican Republic (with Erin B. Taylor and Espelencia Baptiste, funded by the Institute for Money, Technology and Financial Inclusion).

A sociocultural anthropologist by training, Heather’s research focuses upon the relationship between place, space and new media.  Specifically, her work explores transformations in the organization and understandings of family life in light of new media, material and consumer culture, and transnational migration. She is the co-author of The Cell Phone: An Anthropology of Communication (Horst and Miller, Berg, 2006), the first ethnography of mobile phones in the developing world, and Hanging Out, Messing Around and Geeking Out: Kids Living and Learning with Digital Media (MIT Press, 2009, Ito, et. al.) that explores new forms of participation and learning in and through digital media. She is currently working on a manuscript that examines the relationship between communities, networks and society among youth and families living in the Silicon Valley region. Her research has been published in a range of journals, including Social Anthropology, Current Anthropology, Journal of Material Culture, Global Networks, Identities, International Journal of Communication and the Caribbean Review of Gender Studies. She has been a guest editor for special issues of the International Journal of Communication, Journal of Material Culture, International Journal of Cultural Studies, New Media and Society and Home Cultures. 

Prior to joining RMIT, Heather held research positions at Univesity of California, Irvine, University of California, Berkeley, University of Southern California, University of the West Indies, Mona and University College London. She has a PhD in Social Anthropology from the University of London, an MA in Anthropology from University of California, Santa Barbara and a BA in Anthropology from the University of Minnesota.

Contact Details:

Dr. Heather A. Horst
Vice Chancellor's Senior Research Fellow
School of Media and Communication
Design Research Institute
RMIT University, Building 9.4.39
Melbourne, VIC 3001
Australia

Email: heather.horst@rmit.edu.au
Phone: +(61) (3) 9925 3988