Filipa Soares holds a PhD in Environmental Geography from the University of Oxford, and a BA and Master’s in Anthropology from the New University of Lisbon. She is currently a Junior Research Fellow at the Instituto de Ciências Sociais da Universidade de Lisboa, on the project ABIDE – “Animal Abidings: recovering from disasters in more-than-human communities”, funded by the European Research Council.

Her research examines the political and sociocultural dimensions of nature conservation and the management of socioecological processes, with a special focus on rewilding, species reintroductions and (wild)fire, as well as human-nonhuman relationships in Europe. Her PhD thesis, funded by the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT) and the UK’s Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC), analysed the socio- and biopolitical implications of rewilding as a new way of conceiving, governing, and choreographing ecological disturbances, particularly large herbivores, in England and Scotland.

At ICS-ULisboa, Filipa teaches in the postgraduate course “Animals and Society” and was part of the team of two national projects, both funded by FCT: “People and Fire: Reducing risk, living with risk” (2020-22) and RENERGY “Socio-Technical Consensus and Controversy on Renewable Energies” (2013-14). Since 2022, she has been part of the team led by the Centre for Research in Anthropology (CRIA) responsible for conducting social consultations on large predators’ conservation/rewilding and reintroduction projects in Portugal – Iberian wolf and Iberian lynx, respectively –, funded by the EU's LIFE programme.

In addition to these projects, Filipa has participated and collaborated in several studies on human-animals relationships, namely: perceptions regarding the possible reintroduction of the Iberian wolf, golden eagle and griffon vulture in Serra da Estrela Natural Park, Portugal (Master's thesis), literary representations of the wolf and birdlife in Portugal and the relationship between humans and other species in medieval Portugal (FALCO project).

Filipa is part of the Human-Animal Studies Hub and the Research Group SHIFT: Environment, Territory and Society at ICS-ULisboa.

Areas of Expertise: Cultural and Environmental Geography and Environmental Anthropology

Keywords: more-than-human geographies, wildlife conservation, rewilding, fire, human-nonhuman relations