Anthropology in Troubled Times

This year’s annual Anthropology Day will be about ‘Anthropology in Troubled Times’ and will be held in Museum Volkenkunde. We take our lead from Paul Stoller’s (Paul Stoller, Doing Anthropology in Troubled Times) recent call for an engaged anthropology, and ask how anthropology deals with and positions itself with respect to the social challenges and heated political debates our world is facing today. How does anthropology relate to anti-racist activism and racist responses, challenges to white privilege and colonial histories, critical issues like refugee rights and environmental crisis, but also a significant swing to the right that resonates in our classrooms? To what extent do these challenges shape the discipline and in what ways should anthropologists reflect on this influence?

We will come together in the Museum Volkenkunde in Leiden to share and discuss insights in order to explore anthropology’s positioning and chart desirable paths for anthropology in these troubled times. Besides a thought provoking keynote lecture, we are planning a panel discussion on the need to decolonize anthropology, a workshop on diversity in the classroom, and we will ask whether the anthropological canon is largely made up of dead white men.

09:30 AM Arrival

09:40 AM – 11:10 AM
Roundtable ‘Decolonizing Anthropology?’
Ghassan Hage, Jasmijn Rana, Tarim Flach, Peter Pels, Rita Ouedraogo (speakers), Anouk de Koning, Wayne Modest (moderators)
Grote Zaal

11:40 AM – 01:10 PM
World Café Workshop over diversiteit in het onderwijs
Elke Linders, Nicole Sanches, Kathrine van den Bogert (sprekers)
Paviljoenzaal

Beyond conventional media strategies: Visual Anthropology’s use of experimental multimodal methodologies in addressing urgent matters
Mark Westmoreland & Sabine Luning, Ildikó Zonga Plájás, Janine Prins (speakers), Eddy Appels (moderator)
Grote Zaal

Ethics, integrity and data Management: Anthropological  Strategies
t.b.a. (speakers), t.b.a. (moderator)
Nooterzaal

02:10 PM – 03:40 PM
Decentering  Courses and Curricula in Anthropology
t.b.a. (speakers), Sabine Luning (moderator)
Paviljoenzaal

Ethnographic practice for troubled times
Femke Brandt & Jenny Josefsson & Marja Spierenburg, Nick Massey, Sherilyn Deen (speakers), Yatun Sastramidjaja (moderator)
Grote Zaal

Diversiteit in de praktijk: Noodzakelijk kwaad of noodzakelijke stap?
Dionne Abdoelhafiezkhan, Wim Haan, Marieke Slootman, Anneke Mosman, Mustapha Charifi (sprekers), Jacqueline Franssens (moderator)
Nooterzaal

04:10 PM – 05:00 PM
Racist Sorcery: Can Anthropology provide the counter-spell?
Ghassan Hage (keynote speaker)
Grote Zaal