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Workshop: Poetics, Materialisms, Formations. Current Contributions to Urban Lives from Cities in the South

28-29 June 2023

It is now commonly agreed that urban socio-material life worlds in the global south demand their own conceptual language to be properly framed and understood. The resulting attentions and concepts prove to be conducive to relevant insights across world regions. This workshop explores three areas of such cross-ferptilization that are immanent to the work of invited workshop participants: poetics, materialisms, and formations.

The workshop will offer ethnographically and historically informed, theoretical insights into these three areas that are co-constitutive of the urban dimension of stories and histories of conviviality-inequality. It compares and juxtaposes examples from across the different regions in the global south, especially Asia and Latin America.

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Workshop: Plant Science meets Social Science

12.-13.7.2022

The research forum “Plant Biology and the Politics of Nutrition” (BiPoN) at the University of Cologne (UoC) will hold a workshop on human-plant (co)domestication to bring together experts from various disciplines and different parts of the world. We will discuss with scholars from plant biology, agronomy, geography, cultural and social anthropology as well as with the BiPoN scholarship holders about their research on human-plant interaction, (co)domestication, the role of local landraces, orphan crops or wild species for human nutrition, or on human cultivation and domestication of plants in general. The BiPoN workshop offers BiPoN scholarship holders the opportunity to present their Master’s projects and discuss them with experts from different academic backgrounds. Guest auditors are warmly welcome. No conference fees will be charged.

Venue: Maternus Haus Cologne


Seminar Workshop on Religion and Sustainability

June 25, 2022

How are religion and sustainability related? Do religious communities contribute to social transformations towards sustainability? And if so, in which ways? Or does religion in fact hinder or counteract sustainability?

The lecture series explores these questions by focusing on the relationship between religious communities and socio-ecological transformations. The starting point is the observation that there has been a strong increase in the engagement with ecological sustainability in religious communities in recent decades, which is referred to as the “greening of religion” (Jonathan Chaplin).

Further Information


Afri-Climethics 2022

June 24, 2022

The series of lectures, titled “Climate Ethics: Structuring a Standard for African Trade and Development,“ will build on the success of the 2021 conference “Environmental Justice in Africa: Cultural and Economic Impacts on the Legal Systems.“ (Dennis Agelebe, ed., Pretoria University Press, 2022), which was hosted by the ELC, with generous support from the University of Cologne‘s Global South Studies Center (GSSC).

Programme


Book Launch

7. April 2022, 18 Uhr

Rautenstrauch-Joest Museum

Four anthropologists describe life in river deltas in Myanmar, Canada, Brazil and Senegal. Through numerous portraits, short texts and photo stories, they provide insights into everyday life in these volatile landscapes. Deltas can be seen as "hotspots" of global change and as “barometers” for coming upheavals worldwide. Based on their ethnographic research, the authors tell us how colonial shadows, constantly shifting terrain and flexible traditions are reflected in people’s everyday lives. The book provides insight into the different – but often very similar – ways of living together in river deltas.

On this evening, the authors, who work at the Institute of Social and Cultural Anthropology and the Global South Studies Center at the University of Cologne, will present the illustrated book and look forward to questions and discussions!

https://delta.phil-fak.uni-koeln.de/neues-bei-delta/buchvorstellung-deltawelten-im-rautenstrauch-joest-museum


Report Back Event: Co-teaching as a decolonizing exercise

15. Dezember 2021, 16 Uhr

Presentation and Discussion of the Co-Teaching Project within an Interdisciplinary Colloquium at the University of Cologne

In the winter term 2021/22, a pilot phase with two co-taught seminars was initiated. To reflect upon the experiences made, at the report back event the following questions will be addressed: What are the objectives of the project? What are lessons learned? In which direction is the project evolving?

https://blog.uni-koeln.de/decolonizing-academia/


Transatlantic Tandem Talk: Land Conservation to Counter Climate Change? Lessons from Africa

7. Dezember 2021, 18 Uhr

In this Transatlantic Tandem Talk, Prof. Michael Bollig from the Global South Studies Center at the University of Cologne, and Prof. J. Terrence McCabe from the University of Colorado Boulder discuss the impact of climate change and conservation on rural and tribal communities in Southern and Eastern Africa. These communities face an increased frequency and intensity of disasters like extreme droughts and locust infestations.

https://www.dwih-newyork.org/en/event/land-conservation-to-counter-climate-change-lessons-from-africa/


Digitales Kolloquium: „Geschichte im Dialog. Karrierewege für Historiker*innen“

Wintersemester 21/22: Montags, 17:45-19:15 Uhr (via Zoom)

Ein geisteswissenschaftliches Studium ermöglicht den Erwerb einer Vielzahl an wichtigen Schlüsselqualifikationen, die Absolvent*innen verschiedene Karrierewege abseits der wissenschaftlichen Laufbahn ebnen können. Mit diesem Kolloquium soll Studierenden gezielt die Möglichkeit gegebenen werden, in einen Dialog mit Historiker*innen zu treten, die in ganz unterschiedlichen Berufsfeldern erfolgreich tätig sind. So werden Gäste aus den Bereichen der Politik, der internationalen Organisationen, der Öffentlichkeitsarbeit, des Archiv- und Verlagswesens, der Begabtenförderung, der Gedenkstättenarbeit, des Wissenschaftsmanagements und der freien Wirtschaft berichten und im gemeinsamen Gespräch Berufsperspektiven vorstellen. Indem Alumni des Historischen Instituts direkt einbezogen werden, können auch konkrete Bezüge zur Universität zu Köln hergestellt und dabei potentielle Praktikumsmöglichkeiten thematisiert werden. Die Veranstaltung richtet sich abteilungsübergreifend an alle Studierenden der Geschichtswissenschaften und darüber hinaus fakultätsöffentlich an alle Interessierten aus anderen geisteswissenschaftlichen Fächern.

Lehrstuhl für Internationale Geschichte und historische Friedens- und Konfliktforschung
Prof. Dr. Fabian Klose / Dr. Arvid Schors


NIICE Global Conclave 2021

25-27-June, 2021

NIICE Global Conclave is flagship event of Nepal Institute for International Cooperation and Engagement (NIICE). It is a three-day event under the theme – Connecting Nepal to the World. The Global Conclave aims to bring the leaders, diplomats, business leaders and scholars from the region as well as the countries that matters to Nepal. The objective of the conclave is to introduce Nepal to the world and at the same time update the Nepalese policy makers and experts about the fast-changing geopolitics, which will help Nepal reshape its foreign policy to achieve its national goal.

Further information:

https://niice.org.np/archives/events/niice-global-conclave-2021


International Conference: Urban Planning in the Americas in the 20th Century

17.-19. June, 2021

The international conference “Urban planning in the Americas in the 20th century” pursues two aims: First, it historicizes the challenges for urban planning taking into account the 20th century. Second, it focusses on the whole of the American continent – an innovative perspective that apart from subjects as slavery, migration or indigenous cultures has rarely been taken. Research on urban planning and architecture in the Americas is limited to a few comparative studies, although historians’ interest in the built environment has grown. The conference therefore aims at applying the spatial and material turn to the history of the Americas, centering on the planning and design of urban spaces.

For zoom link and further information please contact:

katharina.schembs@uni-koeln.de


Lecture: Magellan and the Philippines. 500 years later

7. Juni 2021, 10.30h –11.45h MET

The discovery voyages and the following colonial expansion of European powers –the monarchies of Portugal and Spain being the earliest ones–have been the object of exaltation and of criticism from their beginning. The evolution of post-colonial discourse has led to enrich the variety of perspectives on the voyages of Columbus, Da Gama, Alvares Cabral and Magellan. The Quincentennial activities in the Republic of the Philippines, but also in Spain, are another markstone in the ever-developing interpretation of the historical encounter of East and West. Deputy Speaker Loren Legarda’s first hand information and her own contribution to a Philippine vision of the encounter will be of utmost interest for researchers and students of Ruhr-Universität Bochum and Universität zu Köln.

Speaker: Mrs Loren Legarda:

Welcome by: PD Dr. Sarah Albiez-Wieck (UC) and Prof. Dr. Roger Friedlein (RUB)

Please register writing an email to l.helguerokandt@uni-koeln.de


Berliner Brasilientage: Brasilien im multiplen Krisenmodus

Brasilien durchläuft aktuell mehrere, simultane Krisen: Politisch setzt der Zuwachs des Rechtsextremismus die demokratischen Institutionen sowie das demokratische Miteinander immer mehr unter Druck. Wirtschaftlich verfestigt sich die seit 2015 anhaltende Stagnation durch die politische Verharmlosung der Pandemie und die daraus folgende unkontrollierte Verbreitung des Coronavirus. Ökologisch führen bewusste Lockerungen von Umweltauflagen und eine gezielte Schwächung der Umweltschutzinstitutionen zu einer beispiellosen ökologischen Krise. Diese multiplen Krisen bedingen und vertiefen sich wechselseitig, während das Land immer tiefer in eine beinahe dystopische Sackgasse geführt wird.

Die insgesamt neun geplanten Sitzungen der Veranstaltungsreihe umfassen Podiumsdiskussionen und Hauptvorträge mit Kommentaren bzw. Ko-Referaten.

01./08./15. Dezember 2020

12./19./26. Januar 2021

02./09./16. Februar 2021

Mehr Informationen

http://mecila.net/brasiliendialoge-de/

 


Workshop Skill and Scale in Transnational Mediumship II

Cologne/Siegen December 13-14, 2018

Organization:
Marcello Muscari, Universidade de São Paulo / a.r.t.e.s. Graduate School for the Humanities Cologne

Contact:
Marcello Muscari: mmuscari@gmail.com / Leonie van Dreuten: ldreuten@uni-koeln.de

Venue:
a.r.t.e.s. Graduate School for the Humanities Cologne, Aachener Str. 217 | 50931 Köln, 3. OG | Raum 3.A06

More information

 


CRC Lecture "Large-scale land acquisitions in the Global South. A global phenomenon with local-level repercussions"

Prof. Dr. Kerstin Nolte (Leibniz Universität Hannover)

The demand for agricultural land has increased over the last decade. This is reflected in the rise in large-scale land acquisitions by foreign and domestic investors, particularly in Sub-Saharan Africa. This presentation will focus on the processes through which land is being acquired and consultations drawing on field research in Zambia, Kenya and Mali. Further, I will discuss the impacts of large-scale land acquisitions on target regions. I focus on the potential employment creation from large-scale farms as well as the livelihood implications that arise from large-scale farms in Zambia.

Venue: Geozentrum Bonn, Meckenheimer Allee 176, Ü 8

Further Information: https://www.crc228.de/crc-lecture-series/

 


Lesung: Abdulrazak Gurnah mit seinem Roman "Schwarz auf weiss"

Zu Gast bei Stimmen Afrikas

MONTAG 29. OKT 2018, 19 UHR
GALERIE ART OF BUNA e.V., Genter Str. 26, 50672 Köln
Eintritt 8 € (ermäßigt 5 €)

Abdulrazak Gurnah (Tansania/ UK) erzählt die Geschichte eines Jungen, der versucht in England Heimat zu finden. Seine Liebesgeschichte ist ein Plädoyer fur Toleranz und eine Abrechnung mit dem alltäglichen Rassismus. Sie wird gelesen von Stefko Hanushevsky und moderiert von Ulrich Noller. Das Gespräch mit dem Autor übersetzt Azizé Flittner.

 


5th Global Conference on Economic Geography 2018 (GCEG 2018)

Theme: Dynamics in an Unequal World
Date and location: July 24 – 28, 2018, University of Cologne


Rationale:
The title “Dynamics in an Unequal World” is based on the premise that the world is far from being flat. Worldwide, we see uneven developments in which regions and countries rise, while other fall. The growth of specialized economic clusters like Silicon Valley or the growing numbers of Global Cities in which economic headquarter functions accumulate are only two examples that agglomeration and marginalization processes are not diminishing on a local, national, or global scale. What are the drivers of these developments and what are the implications? Who will be the next winners and who the losers? What is the role of rural and urban areas for economic development in the future and what is the role of the different regions in the Global South?
Economic geography, with its focus on uneven development, is well-positioned to map these dynamics, explore the implications, and formulate new ways in which economies can be conceptualized and researched.

Further information: gceg2018.com

 


Convivial [Hi]Stories. Envisioning 'Conviviality' in Colonial and Modern Latin America

June 14-15, Neuer Senatssaal, Hauptgebäude, University of Cologne

This conference is concerned with discourses and practices of ‘conviviality’ – coexistence and cohabitation with difference – in the unequal societies of early and late modern South and Middle America and the Caribbean. It brings together scholars in the humanities and social sciences with an interest in ideas that envision forms of living – or, for that matter, working, dwelling, or learning – together that surmount, contain, or accommodate difference. Focusing on the centuries spanning from the early 1500s into the late 1900s, papers examine a wide range of such endeavours in the southern Americas – from creolité movements in the Caribbean to nostalgia for Al-Andalus as a model for conviviality.

For further information please consult: http://lateinamerika.phil-fak.uni-koeln.de/rvl2018.html

 


Köln liest Keun – Lesung und Podiumsdiskussion

Datum: 20. Juni 2017, 18.30 Uhr
Ort: Aula 2, Hauptgebäude, Universität zu Köln

Podiumsdiskussion:
Kind aller Länder – Kind keines Landes? Von Fluchterfahrungen, Fremdsein und Sprachlosigkeit

Es diskutieren: 

Al Huseen Mohamad Amin & Al Huseen Al Moomin Billah (Geflüchtete aus Syrien), Christiane Falge (Hochschule für Gesundheit, Bochum), Barbara Hofner (Kölner Syrienhilfe)

Moderiert von: Sabine Damir-Geilsdorf (GSSC, UzK) & Martin Zillinger (GSSC, UzK)

Grußwort von: Manuela Günter (Prorektorin für Gleichstellung & Diversity, UzK)

Die Veranstaltung kreist um den thematischen Schwerpunkt von „Kind aller Länder“ und nimmt Bezug auf Erfahrungen mit Flucht und Fremdsein, Sprach-und Kulturbarrieren sowie Heimatlosigkeit. Nach einer Einführung durch den Migrationsforscher Jun.-Prof. Dr. Martin Zillinger und die Islamwissenschaftlerin Prof.in Dr. Sabine Damir-Geilsdorf (beide GSSC, Universität zu Köln) liest der Schauspieler und Radio-Moderator Jörn Behr Auszüge aus  „Kind aller Länder“. Auf dem Podium treffen sich in Köln lebende Menschen, die aus ihrer Fluchtperspektive von ihrem Ankommen in Köln berichten, eine Person, die geflüchtete Menschen im Rahmen der Kölner Syrienhilfe unterstützt, sowie eine Forscherin, die zu Flucht und Gesundheit arbeitet. Moderiert wird die Gesprächsrunde von Herrn Zillinger und Frau Damir-Geilsdorf. Ein Get-Together im Anschluss an die Veranstaltung bietet Gelegenheit zum Austausch.

 


DWIH Conference: CityScapes

Date: 29 Sept to 1 Oct 2016
Location: Silver Oak Hall, India Habitat Centre, New Delhi

Our PIs Frauke Kraas and Clemens Greiner represent the GSSC at the DWIH Conference CityScapes. Frauke Kraas will also be a Keynote Speaker at the conference.

Program: http://www.dwih.in/sites/default/files/cityscapesprogramme.pdf

 


International Geographical Congress in Beijing

August 2016

Fünf KollegInnen des Global South Studies Center und der Kölner Geographie haben an dem International Geographical Congress in Beijing Ende August 2016 teilgenommen. Insgesamt war die deutsche Geographie mit 49 TeilnehmerInnen auf dem alle vier Jahre stattfindenden Weltkongress gut vertreten. Ziel des Kongresses ist es, die neuesten Forschungsergebnisse im Bereich der Physischen und Humangeographie auszutauschen, internationale Netzwerke zu vertiefen und Diskussionen zur Entwicklung der Forschung und Lehre im Fach zu führen.

 


Nach dem Exzess: Eine Bestandsaufnahme zur Silvesternacht von Köln und zu ihren Folgen

Datum: 23. Juni 2016, 19 Uhr
Ort: Gloria-Theater, Apostelnstraße 11, Köln

Eine Veranstaltung von: Zeit-Magazin

In Kooperation mit: Global South Studies Center, CA IV Cultures and Societies in Transition, a.r.t.e.s. Graduate School for the Humanities

Eine einzige Nacht hat eine Stadt und die politische Kultur in Deutschland verändert. Die sexuellen Übergriffe, die im und rund um den Kölner Hauptbahnhof stattgefunden haben, liegen nun fast sechs Monate zurück, und dennoch beherrschen sie weiter die öffentliche Diskussion. Aus der Empörung über sexualisierte Gewalt wurde schnell eine hitzige Debatte über die Migrations- und Asylpolitik in Deutschland. Doch was wissen wir ein halbes Jahr später über die Ereignisse und Akteure? Gibt es einen neuen Sexismus in Deutschland? Welche Rolle spielen unterschiedliche Frauenbilder für die Integration? Wie soll die deutsche Gesellschaft mit straffälligen Migranten umgehen?

Es diskutieren: Seyran Ates, Rechtsanwältin und Frauenrechtlerin, Mohamed Amjahid, Politischer Reporter beim ZEITmagazin, Henriette Reker, Oberbürgermeisterin von Köln, Werner Schiffauer, Kulturanthropologe und Migrationsexperte, Europa-Universität Viadrina in Frankfurt

Moderation: Martin Zillinger, Ethnologe und Nordafrika-Experte, Universität zu Köln

Uhrzeit: 19.00 Uhr

Ort: Gloria-Theater, Apostelnstraße 11, Köln

Eintritt: 9,– € / ermäßigt 5,– € zzgl. Gebühren

 


Wie viel Sklaverei braucht(e) der Kapitalismus?

Datum und Uhrzeit: 4. Februar 2016, 18-20 Uhr

Ort: Universität Kassel, Arnold Bode Straße 10, Raum 0225

mit Michael Zeuske (GSSC) und Manuela Boatcă (Universität Freiburg)

Bis heute herrscht die Meinung vor, dass Aufklärung und industrielle Revolution die Sklaverei politisch und wirtschaftlich obsolet gemacht haben. Der Aufbruch in die Moderne bedeutete das Ende des 'vormodernen' Zwangsverhältnisses Sklaverei. Die neuere Forschung stellt diese Selbstversicherung unserer westlichen Zivilisation in Frage. Zusammen mit Michael Zeuske (Global South Studies Center, Universität zu Köln) und Manuela Boatcă (Universität Freiburg) wird die Bedeutung der Sklaverei im Kapitalismus im Kontext der neuen Forschungsergebnisse kritisch diskutiert.

 


Film presentation: "Akil – Awareness" at the Film Festival of the Society for Visual Anthropology

Date: 19 November 2015Location: Denver (USA)

Dr. Michael Hoffmann (GSSC) is the director of this ethnographic film he has realized with Italian director Tommaso Dolcetta.

Synopsis:

Akil tells the story of Baburam Chaudhary, who was born as a bonded laborer (Kamaiya) in the remote Kailali district of Western Nepal. In 2000, Baburam was freed after the government’s decision to abolish the Kamaiya system of debt-bondage. Baburam became a local leader of a political movement of Kamaiyas. The film traces Baburam’s life and his story of urban revolt against the state in a country whose political landscape has been marked by revolution and rapid political change.

For more information see: http://societyforvisualanthropology.org/mediafestival/akil-awareness/

 


International Symposium: "The Brazilian National Truth Commission in the Context of Latin America: Local, National, and Global Perspectives"

15 to 17 October in Hannover (Germany)

Dr. Nina Schneider (GSSC) organizes international symposium "The Brazilian National Truth Commission in the Context of Latin America: Local, National, and Global Perspectives" funded by the Volkswagen Foundation.

In the early 1980s, a new policy instrument emerged in Latin America to address the hundreds of thousands of tortured, killed, or disappeared citizens of the Cold War period. Truth commissions – ‘temporary’ bodies ‘empowered by the state’ (Hayner 2002: 14) to produce an official report including recommendations – have meanwhile spread globally and catalysed a breadth of academic studies from a variety of disciplines.

Still, conflicting interpretations of truth commissions coexist. While some scholars regard them as national institutions tasked with “national” purposes like “nation building” or “national reconciliation”, others regard them primarily as global tools with diverse functions such as to spread a specific political-economic model. Scholars also offer contrasting assessments concerning the complex local, national, and global entanglements associated with commissions. While recent studies have analysed the process of ‘transnationalisation’ (an increasing standardization), others have cautioned to pay more attention to local experiences of commissions.

The proposed symposium seeks to re-evaluate these unresolved questions taking as case studies the Brazilian National Truth Commission (hereafter NTC) and other Latin American commissions: To what extent can we conceive of commissions as local, national, or global tools? What are their stated and de facto political and socio-economic objectives?

In order to answer these questions, the symposium is divided into three main sections ranging from the local and historically specific (Brazilian model) to the global and general (truth commissions in the twenty-first century). The first section provides a timely in-depth assessment of the continent’s most recent commission – the Brazilian NTC with its historically unique structure – a National Commission and a network of approximately 80 local commissions. The second part compares the Brazilian NTC with previous truth commissions in Latin America in order to contrast the commissions’ historical functions and legacies from a national or global (or “entangled”) perspective, respectively. The third section discusses the tension between a process of global “diffusion” or “transnationalisation” of commissions and their locally specific implementation/invention, and critically revisits the contrasting scholarly methods of analysis.


Venue: Schloss Herrenhausen, Herrenhäuser Str. 5, D-30419 Hannover

Date: 15 to 17 October 2015

For more information: https://brtruthcommission.wordpress.com/venue/

 


Workshop: Migration, Ethnicity, and the State

Date: 27 to 29 March 2015 
Location: Sun Yat-Sen University, Guangzhou, China

Prof. Dr. Michaela Pelican and Dr. Tobias Schwarz (UoC Forum ‘Ethnicity as a Political Resource’, Cologne, Germany) and the Center of Urban Studies, Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou co-organize workshop on Migration, Ethnicity, and the State

Migration of people from one region to another is a phenomenon that stretches back through human history. Globalization has put the relocation of people in an international focus and has made the matter of ethnic identity, belonging, and the handling of national and international policy frameworks highly discussed topics. As the diverse reactions of people and governments to international and internal migration show, we still do not have sufficient knowledge of variations in the political importance of ethnicity in this context today as well as in previous historical periods. In this conference, we attempt to develop a comprehensive understanding of the interrelation of migration, ethnicity, and the state by addressing it from three different angles:

1. What role does migration play in the processes of ethnogenesis, and how can we locate diaspora groups within this context, viewed in different regional and historical contexts?

2. Are there visible ethnic migration patterns and governmental regulations concerning migration?

3. In which ways do governments differentiate between population groups regarding their access to rights and privileges?

For this endeavor we invite scholars from diverse disciplines and global regions to interact in three consecutive roundtable discussions, and to jointly develop a comprehensive approach to the role of ethnicity in the context of migration and national policy frameworks.

For more information:

http://ethnicity-forum.phil-fak.uni-koeln.de/index.php?id=21705

 


Exhibition: "Freedom of Speech and the Media in Southeast Asia"

Prof. Dr. Sandra Kurfürst (GSSC) in cooperation with the "Southeast-Asia Information Center" present the exhibition "Freedom of Speech and the Media in Southeast Asia" ("Medien- und Meinungsfreiheit in Südostasien") at the Faculty of Arts and Humanities, University of Cologne.The 9th of December Anett Keller, freelance journalist and member of the "Southeast-Asia Information Center", will give a lecture on the role of the media during the Indonesian election campaign in 2014.

Venue exhibition: Foyer, Faculty of Arts and Humanities, University of Cologne
Date exhibition: December 1-12, 2014

Venue lecture: Gyrhofstr. 15, building 136, Room XXXI
Date lecture: December 9th, 18-20 h

For more information:http://www.asienhaus.de/soainfo/unsere-arbeit/medien-und-meinungsfreiheit/