Fall 2011
October 4***:
Fall Welcome Event
François Richard, Assistant Professor, Department of Anthropology, University of Chicago
Title: In Pursuit of ‘Vernacular Cosmopolitanisms’: Historical Archaeology in Senegal and the Material Contours of the African Atlantic
Discussant: Genviève Godbout, Ph.D. Student, Department of Anthropology, University of Chicago
***Please note: This opening event will be held at a different location. Please contact the coordinator, Zeb Dingley (zdingley@uchicago.edu), for further details and directions.
October 6:
October 18:
November 1:
November 8:
Discussant: George Paul Meiu, Ph.D. Candidate, Department of Anthropology, University of Chicago
***The discussion of Professor Cole’s book is co-sponsored by the African Studies Workshop and the Chicago Center for Contemporary Theory.
November 15:
Winter 2012
January 10
Brady Smith, PhD Student, Department of English, University of Chicago
Title: “Ecology, Economy, and the Contemporary African Novel” Discussant: Matthew Knisley, PhD Student, Department of Anthropology, University of Chicago
February 7
Nick Smith, PhD Candidate, Department of Political Science, University of Chicago
Title: “Silencing the Criminal Past: South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission and Post-Apartheid State Building” Discussant: Mary Robertson, PhD Student, Department of Anthropology, University of Chicago
February 9
Co-Sponsored with the Ethnoise! Ethnomusicology Workshop
Kelly Askew, Department of Anthropology, University of Michigan Title: “‘Poetry in Motion’: Ethnography vs. Cinematography in a Swahili Music Documentary
February 21
Special Event: Guest Lecture
Nigel Gibson, Director of the Honors Program, Emerson College
Title: Thinking Fanon: Fifty Years Later
March 1
**Suggested Event: Sawyer Seminar: Understanding Sexual Violence in Conflict: Gendered Dynamics of Victimization (regional focus on Great Lakes region)**
Keynote by Dr. Elisabeth Wood Franke Institute Joseph Regenstein Library S-118, 4:30-6:00, reception to follow
March 2
**Suggested Event: Sawyer Seminar: Understanding Sexual Violence in Conflict: Gendered Dynamics of Victimization (regional focus on Great Lakes region)**
Working conference, Classics 110, 8:30-5:00 Presentations by Dr. Elisabeth Wood (Yale University), Dr. Dara Cohen (University of Minnesota), Jocelyn Kelly MS (Harvard Humanitarian Initiative), and a student panel (Mackenzie Israel-Trummel, Jonathan Shaw, and Amanda Blair)
March 6
Mark Geraghty, PhD Candidate, Department of Anthropology, University of Chicago
Title: Gacaca, Jenicide Discussant: Nusrat Chowdhury, Visiting Lecturer, Northwestern University
Spring 2012
March 27
Mark Auslander, Associate Professor, Central Washington University
Title: Ancestral Futures: Divining the Dead in Contemporary Southern African Art Discussant: Leslie Wilson, PhD Candidate, Department of Art History, University of Chicago
April 3
George Paul Meiu, PhD Candidate, Department of Anthropology, University of Chicago
Title: ”Beach-Boy Elders” and “Young Big-Men”: Queer Temporalities of Aging in Kenya’s Ethno-Erotic Economies Discussant: Kate McHarry, PhD Candidate, Department of Anthropology, University of Chicago
April 10
Special Film Screening
Les Noirs de France (Pascal Blanchard, 2012)
“Drawing on archives and testimonies, the documentary “Noirs de France” by French historian Pascal Blanchard, depicts 130 years of shared history – from 1889 to nowadays – between Black people and France. Starting in 1889 with the World’s Fair, when Black people became “visible” in French society, the film then takes us through the two World Wars, the colonial period, the struggles for independence, and the time of the migrations from Africa and the West Indies, bearing in mind the African American influence since the Interwar period.” 5:00–6:30, Cobb Hall, Room 218
April 17
Emily Lynn Osborn, Assistant Professor, Department of History, University of Chicago Title: Our New Husbands Are Here: Households, Gender and Politics in a West African State from the Slave Trade to Colonial Rule (Ohio University Press, 2011) Discussant: Paul Ocobock, Assistant Professor, Department of History, University of Notre Dame
April 19–20
Suggested Sawyer Symposium Seminar
Sexuality and Colonial Black Atlantic Cities Conference
“The symposium on Sexuality and Colonial Black Atlantic Cities examines how gender figures in the study of colonial Africa, the Atlantic world, and modern cities. Encompassing the period of colonialism from the eighteenth to twentieth centuries in Africa, the Americas, and Europe, scholars explore what might be called “the Black Atlantic” as well as areas beyond.”
May 1
Elizabeth Brummel, PhD Candidate, Department of Anthropology, University of Chicago
Title: ”So I changed my name to Next Generation:” Narrating selves and producing futures in contemporary urban Kenya. Discussant: Jay Schutte, PhD Student, Department of Anthropology, University of Chicago
May 8
Red Lion Seminar
Gordon Mathews, Professor, Department of Anthropology, Chinese University of Hong Kong
Title: Ghetto at the Center of the World
May 10
William Summerhill, Professor, Department of History, University of California at Los Angeles
Title: “From Quelimane to The City: Rio Slavers, London Bankers, and the Atlantic Origins of Representative Government in Brazil, 1796-1831” Discussant: José Juan Pérez Meléndez
May 15
Joshua Walker, PhD Candidate, Department of Anthropology, University of Chicago
Title: Diamond Imagery and Extraction: Re/production in Mbujimayi, DR Congo Discussant: Mary Robertson, PhD Student, Department of Anthropology, University of Chicago
May 16
Special Guest Lecture
Danny Hoffman, Associate Professor, Department of Anthropology, University of Washington
Title: Human Garbage Lives Here: Ex-Combatants and the Struggle for Urban Space in Post-war West Africa
May 29
Vicki Brennan, Assistant Professor, Department of Religion, University of Vermont
Title: TBA Discussant: TBA