Otto
Latva
Links
Areas of expertise
Teaching
I have extensive experience in teaching, coordinating education, and academic supervision. Between 2022 and 2024, I worked as a University Lecturer in Cultural Heritage Studies. I was responsible for the Master's thesis seminar in the subject and also taught several courses within the discipline. Additionally, I was in charge of teaching and coordinating museology at the Pori campus.
Since 2012, I have lectured in numerous courses at the University of Turku, Åbo Akademi, and the University of Helsinki. The lecture topics have primarily focused on cultural history related to the sea and nature, the historical relationship between humans and animals, and the methods and theories of multispecies history. I have organised several courses, including the first one titled “Plants and Animals – The Humanist as a Researcher of Nature-related Topics,” which I co-organised with my colleague Heta Lähdesmäki in 2015. In 2020, I organised the lecture course “Sea, Nature and Finnish Culture” as part of the FICS program at the School of History, Culture and Arts Studies. In 2024, I organised a joint course for the School of History, Culture and Arts Studies titled “The Human Scientist as a Nature Researcher.”
I have also served as the responsible teacher for several seminars. The first was a thematic seminar on oral history for Master’s students in Cultural History at the University of Turku during 2013–2014. Since 2014, I have co-led the thematic seminar “Memory and Narrative” for Master’s students together with University Lecturer Maarit Leskelä-Kärki and later with doctoral researcher Karoliina Sjö. In the spring of 2021, I held a seminar titled “Environmental and Maritime History” for history students at the University of Turku, which focused on participants’ theses or essays exploring related topics.
Through the thematic seminars in cultural history, I have indirectly contributed to the supervision of several Master’s theses. In addition, I have officially supervised Master’s theses in Cultural History, Cultural Heritage Studies, and Geography at the University of Turku. At Åbo Akademi, I have supervised Master’s theses in Marine Biology. Currently, I am supervising six different doctoral dissertations.
Research
I am a cultural and environmental historian focusing especially on human relationships with nature. I have the title of docent in the field of more-than-human history. I have studied widely the early modern as well as the nineteenth-century and twentieth-century societies and cultures. In my previous studies, I have investigated the shared history of humans with animals and plants, the long-term understanding of the marine environment, and the history of everyday life in archipelago communities. I am also interested in many other matters concerning the relationship between humans and non-human nature. In addition to this, I am interested in the methods of digital humanities.
I have led a research project, Disappeared, Endangered and Newly Arrived Species: The Human Relationship with the Changing Biodiversity of the Baltic Sea (HumBio). The webpage of the project is https://sites.utu.fi/humbio/en/. The project was funded by the Academy of Finland, 2021-2025.
I have also led the Memories of Porpoises: The shared past of humans and porpoises in the Finnish sea area project. The project was funded by the Weisell Foundation 2022-2023, and the webpage of the project is https://sites.utu.fi/pyoriaismuistot/en/
In addition to these, I have led Fauna and Flora Fennica (FaFFe) project, funded by the Alred Kordelin Foundation's Major Cultural Projects programme 2023-2025. The webpage of the project is https://sites.utu.fi/faffe/en/