Vanessa LEA

CNRS Research Scientist (HDR)

Contact details

Address
Maison de la Recherche, Jean Jaurès University 5, Allées A. Machado – 31058 TOULOUSE Cedex 1
Office
C232 bis
Email
vanessa.lea@univ-tlse2.fr
Personal Website
https://www.linkedin.com/in/vanessa-lea-596991159/

Taught academic discipline(s)

I teach in the Specialized Master’s degree in Eco‑Engineering (MSEI‑INP‑ENSAT‑Toulouse), supporting students in the development of their “Portfolio”. I also serve as an academic tutor for internships carried out in various institutions as part of the MSEI programme.

Research topics

Trained as an archaeologist, I worked for 25 years on the Neolithic societies of the southern Chasséen. I focused on the socio‑economic changes of north‑western Mediterranean communities from the mid‑5th to the mid‑4th millennium BCE, through the lens of the development of long‑distance distribution networks of Barremian‑Bedoulian flint productions (ANR ProMiTraSil, coord. V. Lea; GDR ChasseoLab co‑direction C. Georjon). Since 2019, I have undertaken a career transition that has led me from archaeology to ecology/environment, and from fundamental research to Participatory Action Research as well as to mediation between the scientific world and the social world. This transition took place in two essential steps:

  • the completion of an HDR in 2020, “ARS – Entropie, de la recherche à l’action”, which addresses the Anthropocene through a broad question: How does the instrumentalisation of nature, while shifting in scale, lead us to rethink our dividing lines: boundaries between natural and artificial, separation of geological, biological and societal times, distinction between humans and non‑humans.
  • a return to study in the Specialized Master’s degree in Eco‑Engineering (MSEI‑INP‑Toulouse), supported by a Professional Training Leave funded by the CNRS (2020).
AToday, my activities fall within Sustainability Science, more specifically Transformative Science (Schneidewind et al., 2016). Transformative science seeks to go beyond observing and analysing societal transformations to play an active role in initiating and catalysing change processes. Its aim is to achieve a deeper understanding of ongoing transformations and to increase society’s capacity for reflexivity regarding these fundamental change processes. I am involved in the CNRS E&E Long‑Term Socio‑Ecological Research Zones (Zones Ateliers), which build, over the long term and within territories, integrated research at the science/society interface.
My involvement takes place at the regional scale within the Pyrénées‑Garonne Workshop Zone, and at the national scale within the Workshop Zone Network, recognised as a CNRS E&E Research Infrastructure since 2028, where I serve as deputy director.

In addition, I coordinate or participate in projects dealing with health and environmental controversies, with a strong interest in developing inter‑ and transdisciplinarity as well as Participatory Action Research (Emepic/HabiTer project, coord. V. Lea; 5p‑Hab project, coord. L. Sébastien). I develop partnerships with civil society, territorial stakeholders and organisations specialised in citizen science, such as the Ecocitizen Institutes for Pollution Knowledge.

Activities / Resume

Current positions :

  • 2022–2027: Deputy Director of the Research Infrastructure CNRS Ecology & Environment Workshop Zone Network. This infrastructure is expected to expand through its merger, from January 2026 onwards, with the Human‑Environment Observatories (OHM), currently structured within the LABEX DRIIHM.
  • 2022–2026: Member of the Executive Committee of the Pyrénées‑Garonne Workshop Zone (ZA PYGAR) and mission officer for the researcher / territorial stakeholders interface.

Degrees :

  • 2019-2021 : Specialized Master’s degree in Eco‑Engineering (National Polytechnic Institute of Toulouse and National School of Agronomy of Toulouse). Thesis “Weaving researcher / society relations within the Workshop Zone system: a reflection to be carried out at different scales”.
  • 09/10/2020 : Habilitation to Direct Research "ARS, Entropie – From research to action” (Université Nice Côte‑d’Azur).
  • 10/06/2002 : PhD in Prehistoric Archaeology, Aix‑Marseille University: “Chasséen lithic industries in eastern Languedoc: characterisation through technological analysis.”
     

Current research project leadership :

Participation in Scientific Councils / Monitoring Committees :

  • 2023/2026 : Member of the Scientific Council of the ERABLE programme. Embedded in the National Strategy for Biodiversity 2030, this programme mobilises elected officials through Action Research on Local Biodiversity…

  • 2023/2026 : Member of the Scientific Council of the Foundation for Research on Biodiversity, scenario2, “Living ‘well’ in 2050 in one’s territory: Which socio‑ecosystems and what place for biodiversity?”. The programme mobilises scenarios as tools for exploring possible and plausible futures… The FRB supports research projects that anchor scenario building within territories and mobilise the knowledge and expertise of a wide diversity of stakeholders. This programme is based on three pillars – artistic approaches, cognitive maps and modelling – and deploys scientific outreach and support activities.
     
  • 2022 : Member of the Monitoring Committee of the Graduate School ODYSSEE – Social and Environmental Sciences, Université Côte d’Azur. The Monitoring Committee is responsible for “providing an opinion and making proposals on the trajectory of the Graduate School and its strategy.” The ODYSSEE Graduate School aims to promote research and training at the interface between the Social Sciences and Humanities (SSH) and environmental sciences, in order to address current socio‑environmental issues while taking into account the viewpoint and contribution of the SSH.

Participation in Participatory Action Research projects :

  • 2023-2025 : ANR EQUIPACT EQUIPer les ACTeur.rice.s  to improve the quality and impacts of citizen and association participation in co‑research in the perspective of ecological, social and democratic transitions. This is an action‑research project, Science With and For Society, involving two research infrastructures (Workshop Zone Network and MSH Network), public laboratories, seven associations, as well as the museum (of Toulouse).
     
  • 2024-2025 : 5p‑Hab project (coord. L. Sébastien), health and environmental controversy concerning lead pollution (Toulouse; Barrière de Paris–Fondeyre district).
     

Previous programme leadership​​​​​​​ :

  • 2016-2023 : GDR (Research Group) no. 3766 ChasséoLab.
     
  • 2009-2013 : National Research Agency programme ANR PROMITRASIL (PROcessus et MIlieux du TRAitement thermique des SILex Barremo-Bédouliens durant la culture du Chasséen, fin 5ème et milieu 4ème millénaire - – north‑western Mediterranean).
     
  • 2003-2007 : PCR (Collective Research Project, Région PACA) Producer and consumer sites during the Chasséen in Vaucluse: management of Barremian‑Bedoulian flints / chrono‑cultural periodisation.

Collective responsibilities​​​​​​​ :

  • 2022-2023 : DIPEE (Dispositif de Partenariat en Ecologie Environnement ; https://www.inee.cnrs.fr/fr/dipee) coordinator for the TRACES laboratory.

  • 2022-2024 : Co‑coordination of the Eco‑TRACES unit as CNRS Sustainable Development representative.

Publications extraites de HAL affiliées à Geode : Géographie de l'environnement

Additional information

My HDR “ARS – Entropie, de la recherche à l’action” (2020) focused on the uses and misuses of fire as tools of the disordered and unpredictable transformation of resources and natural environments, which constitute its guiding thread from the Holocene to the present. This HDR falls within the intersecting fields of Human, Social and Environmental Sciences, with a strong focus on Research / Society interfaces. This manuscript can also be seen as a transposition, to urgent societal issues, of the multi‑scalar and transdisciplinary action models (in the sense of co‑research between researchers and territorial stakeholders) at work in the field of prehistoric archaeology.