Julia Velkova is a Professor of Media and Culture at the Department of Culture and Society at Linköping University. She is also a Profutura Scientia Fellow (2023-2028) at the Swedish Collegium for Advanced Studies; and a Research Affiliate at the Global Media Technologies and Cultures Lab, University of California, Santa Barbara. Her research is on digital technologies, computing and software cultures, media infrastructures and media production from interdisciplinary perspectives grounded in media studies, science and technology studies, and anthropological approaches. Themes that she explores in her research focus on value conflicts, inequalities, ideas of sustainability and contingent temporalities that emerge with the development and dismantling of media technologies and infrastructures such as data centers, software, algorithms, and communication networks. She initiated and co-directs the DataLab at Linköping University.
Velkova has co-edited several books, among which Media Backends: Digital Infrastructures and Sociotechnical Relations (2023); Beyond academic publics: Conversations about scholarly collaborations with cultural institutions (2024); AI Infrastructures and Sustainability: Expanding Perspectives on Automation, Communication and Media (in print/2025); as well as special issues on digital infrastructure temporalities and critical data studies.
She has received research grants as PI from the Marianne and Marcus Wallenberg Foundation; CHANSE/FORTE; and the Foundation for Baltic and East European Studies; and as co-PI from the Riksbankens Jubileumsfond; and the Swedish Energy Agency. She has also served as vice-chair of the Media Industries and Cultural Production Section of ECREA.
During 2025-2026 she is on sabbatical at the Swedish Collegium for Advanced Studies where is working on completing two books. The first one is "Bits and Watts: Electrifying Digital Media in the Age of Climate Change" which explores ideas of sustainability, inequalities and legacies that emerge as data center infrastructures grow and interrelate with energy systems. This research is based on Velkova's decade-long research on this topic; and 2) An edited collection on the chronopolitics of technological endings, with Marisa Cohn (forthcoming with Open Humanities Press). This book emerges from her new work within her Profutura fellowship.
1. ”When Communication Networks Come to Die: Socio-cultural perspectives on infrastructure dismantling” (2023-2028). This project is the main focus of her Profutura fellowship. She works to develop socio-cultural perspectives on infrastructure dismantling, with focus on questions of power, regimes of value, and citizenship. Her empiric focus is on the ongoing decommissioning of the landline telephone network in Sweden.
2. ”Megabytes vs Megawatts: Understanding Infrastructural Frictions between Data Centers and Energy Grids for Sustainable Digitalization” (2023-2027), funded by Marianne and Marcus Wallenberg Foundation. This project explores attempts to make data center infrastructures sustainable, and novel problems that emerge in their interrelation with electricity grids in Sweden in a context of energy transitions.
Velkova is also the Swedish PI of REIMAGINE ADM: Reimagining public values in algorithmic futures (2022 – 2025), funded by the Collaboration of Humanities and Social Sciences in Europe (CHANSE) that develops new vocabularies and methods to explore how algorithmic systems pressure social values in practice.
Velkova has co-edited several books, among which Media Backends: Digital Infrastructures and Sociotechnical Relations (2023); Beyond academic publics: Conversations about scholarly collaborations with cultural institutions (2024); AI Infrastructures and Sustainability: Expanding Perspectives on Automation, Communication and Media (in print/2025); as well as special issues on digital infrastructure temporalities and critical data studies.
She has received research grants as PI from the Marianne and Marcus Wallenberg Foundation; CHANSE/FORTE; and the Foundation for Baltic and East European Studies; and as co-PI from the Riksbankens Jubileumsfond; and the Swedish Energy Agency. She has also served as vice-chair of the Media Industries and Cultural Production Section of ECREA.
During 2025-2026 she is on sabbatical at the Swedish Collegium for Advanced Studies where is working on completing two books. The first one is "Bits and Watts: Electrifying Digital Media in the Age of Climate Change" which explores ideas of sustainability, inequalities and legacies that emerge as data center infrastructures grow and interrelate with energy systems. This research is based on Velkova's decade-long research on this topic; and 2) An edited collection on the chronopolitics of technological endings, with Marisa Cohn (forthcoming with Open Humanities Press). This book emerges from her new work within her Profutura fellowship.
Current research
Velkova currently directs two major research projects as PI:1. ”When Communication Networks Come to Die: Socio-cultural perspectives on infrastructure dismantling” (2023-2028). This project is the main focus of her Profutura fellowship. She works to develop socio-cultural perspectives on infrastructure dismantling, with focus on questions of power, regimes of value, and citizenship. Her empiric focus is on the ongoing decommissioning of the landline telephone network in Sweden.
2. ”Megabytes vs Megawatts: Understanding Infrastructural Frictions between Data Centers and Energy Grids for Sustainable Digitalization” (2023-2027), funded by Marianne and Marcus Wallenberg Foundation. This project explores attempts to make data center infrastructures sustainable, and novel problems that emerge in their interrelation with electricity grids in Sweden in a context of energy transitions.
Velkova is also the Swedish PI of REIMAGINE ADM: Reimagining public values in algorithmic futures (2022 – 2025), funded by the Collaboration of Humanities and Social Sciences in Europe (CHANSE) that develops new vocabularies and methods to explore how algorithmic systems pressure social values in practice.
Past Research Projects
- From Earth Stations to Data Centers: Network buildings as transnational infrastructures and logistical media. (Riksbankens Jubileumsfond, 2019 - 2022)
- Hushåll som infrastrukturknutpunkter (VR/Energimyndigheten, 2018 - 2022)
- [Resistans och Effekt: Smarta Elnät](https://smartgridsforthemany.se/)
(Kamprad Stiftelsen, 2019 - 2023)
- Kommuner i med- och motvind – Lärdomar om möjligheter och utmaningar från kommuners planering för vindkraftsetableringar sedan 2009
(2022-2024)
Read more about Julia's research on her personal webpage: www.juliavelkova.org.
