Critical Readings around "Regimes of Taste"

Dominique is a graduate student at the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam pursuing a Research Master in Global History. He graduated in 2018 from the university of Amsterdam writing a Ba-thesis for the history program on the Dutch recruitment campaign for the Indonesian war of Independence (1945-1949) and a Ba-thesis for the philosophy program on Foucault’s historical philosophy of science. During an exchange, he also studied political philosophy at Université Paris Nanterre (Paris X) as part of his Ba. He is currently teacher’s assistant for the Ba-colloquium at the VU and writing his Research Master thesis on the development of French postcolonial theory. Specifically he is interested in the contribution of activist intellectuals from the former  colonies to European political thought  about freedom or liberty. As such a case study is made of the Vietnamese activist-philosopher Tran Duc Thao. In a similar way, he is also interested in the often unacknowledged relationship between colonialism and European culture, for instance on eating habits, literature, art, and counterculture. As an engaged student Dominique has been helping the Dutch Refugee Organization to help give newly arrivals a warm welcome in the Netherlands. His research interests include postcolonial studies, migration studies, history and philosophy of science, and decolonization.

Madison is an Undergraduate student at Brown University pursuing her BA in  Anthropology on the socio-cultural track and International and Public Affairs on the development track. She is currently writing her Senior Honors Thesis in Anthropology on the performance of gender in costume and textile museums and exhibits. With an attention to the history of these collections, Madison is interested in how museums can garner their role as public facing institutions to intervene in these gendered narratives in order to envision a relationship to gender that radically imagines otherwise. As a research assistant to the RCMC's Un/Engendering the Collections project, Madison will explore these topics beyond the scope of just costume and textiles, but rather museum studies at large. As a participant in the Engaged Scholars Program through the Swearer Center at Brown University, Madison is dedicated to incorporating meaningful engagement into her work and sees this as a vital aspect of beginning the process of decolonizing museums. While still trying to figure out her research interests as an Undergraduate student, Madison is interested in pursuing curatorial work and museum studies at the graduate level post-graduation. Her research interests include: futurity studies, gender and sexuality studies, environmental anthropology, art history and decolonial theory.