Assoc. Prof., PhD Saša Poljak Istenič
sasa.poljak(at)zrc-sazu.si
Institution: ZRC SAZU
Saša Poljak Istenič is a Senior Research Associate at the Research Centre of the Slovenian Academy of Sciences and Arts (ZRC SAZU), based at the Institute of Slovenian Ethnology. She earned her PhD in Ethnology and Cultural Anthropology from the University of Ljubljana in 2012 and has since contributed to a range of scholarly, editorial, and professional bodies. She is a member of the National Commission for the Safeguarding of Intangible Cultural Heritage at the Slovenian Ministry of Culture and serves as Vice-President of the Expert Committee of the Slovene Ethnographic Museum. She is also a long-standing member of SIEF, EASA, and the Slovene Ethnological Society, which she values as key spaces for scholarly exchange and professional networking.
Her research interests sit at the intersections of everyday life, cultural heritage, urban futures, and climate change. She has secured competitive funding from the Slovenian Research and Innovation Agency (ARIS), CHANSE/HERA, Horizon Europe, and other transnational programmes. Her recent work includes projects on climate-neutrality policies in Ljubljana, perceptions of crisis along the Slovenian–Italian border, and the role of handicrafts in supporting tourism development in remote rural areas.
She has substantial teaching experience, delivering lectures and seminars on heritage and tourism, gastronomy, and placemaking. She is an Associate Professor at the University of Maribor (Slovenia) and an external lecturer at the University of Klagenfurt (Austria). In 2024–2025, she served as Vice-Dean of the Postgraduate School ZRC SAZU in Ljubljana. Beyond formal teaching, she has led study circles and children’s workshops on cultural heritage, and in creative workshops drawing on lateral-thinking methods she supports students in critically reflecting on urban futures.
She is a founding editor of the professional ethnological blog Vsakdanjik: Etnološki zapisi (Everyday Life: Ethnological Notes). From 2019 to 2025, she served as editor of Glasnik Slovenskega etnološkega društva (Bulletin of the Slovene Ethnological Society) and she continues to contribute to editorial work, including service on editorial boards for academic series dedicated to ethnological doctoral dissertations. She has also guest co-edited special issues for journals in Slovenia and Croatia.
Website: https://isn2.zrc-sazu.si/en/sodelavci/sa%C5%A1a-poljak-isteni%C4%8D-en
SIEF Directory: https://www.siefhome.org/members/sief/13450
