Jenia Gorbanenko is an anthropologist (PhD), specialising in the study of religion and outer space. In her doctoral research, carried out as part of the ETHNO-ISS team - a project funded by the European Research Council to undertake a multi-sited ethnography of the International Space Station - she interrogated the Russian Orthodox Christian perspective on space exploration. Prior to joining the ETHNO-ISS team, Jenia researched the post-Soviet religious revival in Russia. She has co-edited an open access volume Exploring Ethnography of Outer Space: Methods and Perspectives and is currently working on turning her PhD thesis into a book. Having worked in commercial and applied anthropology since 2016, Jenia is also a freelance ethnographic consultant and qualitative researcher.
Forthcoming events
* "Observing Above and Below: Power, Affect, and Knowledge Production in Space and Earth Sciences" panel, WAU Congress, Antigua, Guatemala, 11/2025
Publications in preparation
* Gorbanenko J. Which way to Heaven? Russian Orthodox icons and cosmonaut exemplars
* Gorbanenko J. Anthropology of religion and science in outer space, in Jeevendrampillai D. & Parkhurst A. eds. Extra-terrestrial Anthropology, London: Routledge
* Gorbanenko J. Saints and cosmonauts, in Buchli V., Jeevendrampillai D., Mercier D., Petrou P. & Praet I. eds. Off-Earth Atlas
* Gorbanenko J. Praying with cosmonauts: Russian Orthodox in the space age, Analogia
Books
* Gorbanenko J., Jeevendrampillai D. & Kozel A. eds. 2025. Exploring Ethnography of Outer Space: Methods and Perspectives. New York: Routledge [open access]
Peer reviewed articles
* Gorbanenko J. 2024. A working typology of transcendence in anthropology, Religion and Society: Advances in Research [open access]
* Carroll T., Lackenby N. & Gorbanenko J. 2022. Apophatic love, contagion, and surveillance: Orthodox Christian responses to the global pandemic, Anthropology & Medicine [open access]
Chapters
* Jeevendrampillai D., Buchli V., Parkhurst A., Kozel A., Bunch G. & Gorbanenko J. 2023. An Ethnography of an Extra-terrestrial Society: The International Space Station,
in Salazar J. F. & Gorman A. eds. The Routledge Handbook of Social Studies of Outer Space
Articles in Russian
* Gorbanenko E. 2023. Krestnyǐ khod in orbit: enchurching science and the planet, Neprikosnovennij Zapas, 150, 4/2023 [open access]
Podcasts and event recordings
* Why do we build temple in space?, SOAS Japan Research Centre, event organiser, virtual, 25/05/2023
* COSS Catalyst: Space Temples, UCL Institute of Advances Studies, event organiser and host, virtual, 09/03/2023
* Orthodox Christian Responses to the COVID-19 Pandemic, SciPod, podcast, 09/2022
* Anthropology of religion in space: Russian Orthodoxy and the ISS, University of the Underground, lecture, virtual, 05/2021