Doctor Antonio Zirión is a Research Professor in the Department of Anthropology at the Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana (UAM) Iztapalapa Campus. He was Head of that Department from 2014 to 2018. He is a member of the National System of Researchers. He holds a Ph.D. in Anthropological Sciences from the Iztapalapa Campus of UAM, a Master in Visual Anthropology from the University of Manchester, and an Ethnologist from the National School of Anthropology and History.

He received the Mexican Academy of Sciences Award for the best doctoral thesis in Social Sciences and Humanities (2010) and an Honorable Mention of the Fray Bernardino de Sahagún Award from INAH (2011). He has been a visiting professor at the University of Bremen (Germany), at the International School of Film and TV (Cuba), and at Centro de Capacitación Cinematográfica (Mexico).

He is the author and coordinator of several books and articles specialized in visual anthropology, ethnographic cinema, film archives, urban and youth cultures, and anthropology of the senses and emotions.

In 2022, he received two important editorial awards (Antonio García Cubas Award from INAH and the Editorial Art Award from CANIEM) for the book Redescubriendo el Archivo Etnográfico Audiovisual (UAM/Elefanta, 2021).

He is also a photographer and documentary filmmaker with exhibited work and two published photo books: Mano de obra (UAM/Ediciones del Lunes, 2014) and Traspasos (Artes de México, 2014). His documentaries include Voces de la Guerrero (2004) and Fuera de foco (2013), co-directed with the Homovidens collective, which have won several international awards.

He has been a manager, curator, and jury in different festivals, museums, and film, photo, and visual arts competitions in Mexico and other countries. He was the founder of the collectives Homovidens, Etnoscopio, and the Red Mexicana de Antropología Visual. Since 2007 he has collaborated as a documentary film programmer in the DocsMX festival and the AMBULANTE Documentary Tour.