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About

Leopoldina Fortunati is a pioneering communication scholar whose work sits at the intersection of technology, society, and human-machine relations, with a particular focus on social robotics, domestic technology, and human-machine communication. Over the past decade, she has made substantial contributions to understanding how robots are transitioning from industrial settings into the intimate spaces of everyday life — homes, schools, and public environments. Fortunati's most influential work, her 2019 examination of definitions of "social robots" (114 citations), draws on social representations theory to illuminate how expert and popular understandings of robots interact and diverge, offering a rare bridge between academic and lay discourse. Her critical political-economy approach to robotization and the domestic sphere challenges assumptions embedded in classical economic theory, while her broader body of work — including studies of children's imaginaries about robots and playful human-robot interaction — demonstrates a commitment to understanding robots from a deeply human perspective. With contributions to the emerging field of Human-Machine Communication and editorial leadership on special issues dedicated to social robotics, Fortunati has helped shape the scholarly agenda for an entire generation of researchers grappling with what it means to live alongside intelligent machines. Her work remains essential reading for anyone exploring technology's social and cultural dimensions.