Sabina Riss is a registered Austrian architect who holds a PhD and has been a long-time university lecturer with expertise in gender and women's issues. She researches, teaches, publishes, communicates, and consults on diversity and gender perspectives in housing and urban planning in relation to equity-friendly planning structures, planning processes, and planning content. She obtained her doctorate with distinction on the attempted influence and participation of women by means of feminist concepts and everyday planning in 20th century urban and residential construction, for which she received the doctoral award of the City of Vienna.
Her academic and practical activities focus on gender-sensitive planning of the built environment (urban planning and housing from a women's and gender perspective housing research - sociological and societal aspects, social sustainability, women's issues, gender and diversity in spatial, urban and housing planning) as well as on gender equality in education and practice of the planning profession (women's research in education and professional practice of planning professional research and women's research on structural conditions and disadvantages in planning professions, importance of diversity in planning professions).
Through research, studies, research-led teaching, lectures, invited expert reports, publications, media contributions and in the context of public events, Sabina Riss raises awareness of the importance and potential for change on equal opportunities and equality. She is vice-chairwomen in the Women's Committee of the Vienna Chamber of Architects. At the faculty she is member of the Working Group for Equal Treatment Issues and the feminist collective Claiming*Spaces. She is internationally requested and commissioned by city councils, research and mediation institutions, universities as well as organizations and associations.
Sabina Riss publishes in books and academic and professional journals on gender and feminist perspectives on housing, housing policy, public space and urban design in history and present, the situation of women in the housing market, gender & diversity and representation of women in architectural education and practice. She s is co-author of housing studies (e.g. Wohnbau in Wien: Alltagsgerecht, smart, nachhaltig. User perspectives in women-specific housing projects) and studies on professional field architecture (e.g. Women's careers in the housing industry. Reconciliation of architectural profession and family).
Sabina Riss communicates findings from women-specific research and teaching at conferences and symposia and curates exhibitions (including Women and Housing for Vienna Housing Research). She lectures internationally on women's issues in planning and is invited to participate in panel discussions and as a scientific expert (including Frauen Bauen Stadt, FrauenMUT). She is an international consultant on gender planning (e.g. city councils of Amsterdam, Worms, Bratislava and Bregenz) and was an expert for the Viennese gender model project DIE Stadt. She appears in international TV documentaries, short films and podcasts.
