In the framework of the DEAGENCY research project, I investigate mass graves from the Second World War in Slovenia, with a particular focus on the social and cultural implications of their recent opening, exhumation, reburial, commemoration, and memory politics. My research examines how the study of mass graves, exhumation processes, memorialization practices, and visits to these sites affect various individuals, including researchers, relatives of the deceased, and local communities. I am particularly interested in perceptions of the materiality and agency of the dead and the ways in which the deceased continue to shape social relations and collective memory.
I am Associate Professor of Cultural and Social Anthropology at the Department of Ethnology and Cultural Anthropology, Faculty of Arts, University of Ljubljana. I teach courses on research methodology in ethnology and cultural anthropology, urban anthropology, the anthropology of violence, migration studies, and the ethnology of Australia and Oceania. I also serve as co-coordinator of the Joint Master’s Programme CREOLE: Cultural Differences and Transnational Processes.
My research interests include transnational migration and diaspora studies, social memory, urbanization and spatial studies, the anthropology of art, and, more recently, issues related to mass graves. I currently lead the research programme Ethnological Research of Cultural Knowledge, Practices and Forms of Sociality (2022–2027).
I have held visiting professorships at several international universities, including Universidad Autónoma de Barcelona (2019–2020) and Universidad de Buenos Aires (2010–2011, 2015, 2017, 2023, and 2025). My publications include two monographs, several edited volumes and special issues, and articles in peer-reviewed journals. My monographs, published in Slovenian, are titled “Tracing Roots”: Transnational Migration between Argentina and Europe and Urbanization and Constitution of Ethnic Communities in Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea. Other notable publications include the edited volume Moving Places: Relations, Return and Belonging (co-edited with Nataša Gregorič Bon, Berghahn Books, 2016), the special issue Art and Migration in Two Homelands, and the special issue Agentive Properties of the Dead over Time and in Different Social Contexts in Anthropological Notebooks (co-edited with Petra Hamer, 2025).
Selected publications (full bibliography:
https://bib.cobiss.net/bibliographies/si/webBiblio/bib201_20260103_213845_22414.html):
ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2009-4369
Monographs:
REPIČ, Jaka. 2013. Urbanizacija in vzpostavljanje etničnih skupnosti v Port Moresbyju, Papua Nova Gvineja. Ljubljana: Znanstvena založba Filozofske fakultete. https://ebooks.uni-lj.si/ZalozbaUL/catalog/book/100.
Edited volumes:
REPIČ, Jaka in Urša GERŠAK, ur. 2025. Pogledi na Branislavo Sušnik in njen prispevek k raziskavam paragvajskih staroselskih ljudstev. Ljubljana: Znanstvena založba Univerze v Ljubljani. https://ebooks.uni-lj.si/ZalozbaUL/catalog/book/722.
Special issues in scientific journals:
REPIČ, Jaka. 2017. Art and migration. Dve domovini/Two Homelands, vol. 46.
Articles in scientific journals:
REPIČ, Jaka. 2010. Ambivalent identities emerging in transnational migrations between Argentina and Slovenia. Dve domovini/Two homelands 31: 121-134.
REPIČ, Jaka. 2011. Appropriation of space and water in informal urban settlements of Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea. Anthropological notebooks 17(3): 73-87.
REPIČ, Jaka. 2012. Les Slovènes d’Argentine: le concept de patrie dans la construction d’une communautè diasporique. Ethnologie francaise 42(2): 231-240.
REPIČ, Jaka. 2017. The impact of mobilities on visual arts in the Slovenian diaspora in Argentina. Dve domovini/Two Homelands 46: 7-22
REPIČ, Jaka. 2018. Memorialization of the first world war in the landscape of the Julian Alps. Folklore: Electronic Journal of Folklore 73: 27-46. DOI: 10.7592/FEJF2018.73.repic.
REPIČ, Jaka. 2019. Yugoslavia from the other side : memorialization of the Yugoslavian communist revolution among Slovenians in Argentina. Łódzkie studia etnograficzne 58: 117-134. DOI: 10.12775/LSE.2019.58.07.
REPIČ, Jaka. 2021. Podobe o Branislavi Sušnik med Slovenci v Argentini : migracija, življenje v Paragvaju in povezave z domovino. Dve domovini: razprave o izseljenstvu 53: 11-26. DOI: 10.3986/dd.2021.1.02.
REPIČ, Jaka. 2023. Violence, exile, and homeland in visual arts in the Slovenian diaspora in Argentina. Arts. 12: 93. DOI: 10.3390/arts12030093.
REPIČ, Jaka. 2025. Mass graves and exhumations in Slovenia : agency of the dead, their remains and the materiality of mass graves. Anthropological notebooks 31(2): 27-51. DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.17469410.
REPIČ, Jaka. 2026. Repič, Jaka. 2026. Unearthing Memories: The Agency of Place and Material Remains in Mass Grave Exhumations and Commemorations in Slovenia. Český lid 113 (1): 99–122. https://doi.org/10.21104/CL.2026.1.06
Chapters in edited volumes:
REPIČ, Jaka. 2016. Tracing Roots: Slovenian Diaspora in Argentina and Return Mobilities. V: Moving Places: Relations, Return and Belonging. Nataša Gregorič Bon in Jaka Repič, ur. London in New York: Berghahn Books. Str. 85-104.
GREGORIČ BON, Nataša in REPIČ, JAKA. 2016. Introduction. V: Moving Places: Relations, Return and Belonging. Nataša Gregorič Bon in Jaka Repič, ur. London in New York: Berghahn Books. Str. 1-20.
REPIČ, Jaka. 2023. Environmental relationships in transhuman pastoralism in Bohinj, North-Western Slovenian Alps. V: BAJIČ, Blaž (ur.), SVETEL, Ana (ur.). Sensory environmental relationships : between memories of the past and imaginings of the future. Washington; Malaga: Vernon Press, cop. 2023. Str. 109-131.
REPIČ, Jaka. 2025. Animizem, perspektivizem in večvrstna družba v zgodnjih raziskavah Branislave Sušnik. V: REPIČ, Jaka (ur.), GERŠAK, Urša (ur.). Pogledi na Branislavo Sušnik in njen prispevek k raziskavam paragvajskih staroselskih ljudstev. Ljubljana: Založba Univerze, 2025. Str. 203-225. Zbirka Zupaničeva knjižnica, št. 57. ISBN 978-961-297-528-9. ISSN 1855-671X. https://ebooks.uni-lj.si/ZalozbaUL/catalog/view/722/1101/11263.