Talk On — Debates in Anthropology

In this episode, Christoph Brumann talks to Philipp Demgenski about his book "Seeking a Future for the Past: Space, Power, and Heritage in a Chinese City". The conversation centers around Demgenski's fieldwork in the Qingdao neighborhood of Dabaodao, a former German colony, where he explores the transformation from a slum to a heritage site. Demgenski's research aims to answer a crucial question: why do urban redevelopment projects in China often go wrong, stagnate, or fail? His book delves into this issue, focusing on the city's urban redevelopment projects that have stalled due to a preservation mandate imposed by the government. Through ten years of ethnographic fieldwork, Demgenski sheds light on the diverse experiences of residents, migrant workers, preservationists, and government officials, revealing a bureaucracy that is often scattered and ineffective, leading to deadlocks and stalled redevelopment projects.

In this episode of Talk On, host Jovan Maud talks to his guest Marek Mikuš about a topic concerning (almost) everyone: Debt and how people understand, manage, and live with it. They discuss Marek Mikuš's work in the Emmy Noether Group "Peripheral Debt", his research in the field, and how his forthcoming article "Tracking mortgage pathways in Zaghreb: Everyday economics of debt, housing wealth and debtors agency in a European semi-periphery" came to be. In this article, Marek sheds some light on the financial peculiarities of housing mortgages and how these peculiarities, i.e. the pegging of the mortgage to the Swiss currency instead of the Croatian, can work against debtors and their dream of home ownership. The two talk about debtors' movements, political and legal battles, and a Croatian couple struggling to pay their soaring principles but persisting, even against the hurdles built up by creditors.

In this episode, Christoph Brumann talks to Mario Schmidt about his research that led to his book 'Migrants and masculinity in High-Rise Nairobi: the pressure of being a man in an African city'. Among other things, they talk about how many male migrants design their future on trajectories of personal and economic growth but have to adjust or indefinitely postpone their plans once they arrive in Kenya's capital. They also talk about the pressure these men feel to succeed, the pressure that comes from romantic partners, spouses, relatives in the country, and children. Because of this pressure, they create homosocial spaces in which they participate, where a sense of brotherhood arises and their sense of pressure is alleviated. They also describe how male migrants model their financial, physical, and mental well-being in three different masculine spaces - an ethnically homogenous investment group, an interethnic gym, and the semi-digital sphere of self-help books, workshops, and motivational trainings on man- and fatherhood. The book is available for open access: https://library.oapen.org/handle/20.500.12657/86009

In this episode, Jovan Maud talks to Annika Lems about her book "Frontiers of Belonging. The Education of Unaccompanied Refugee Youth" published by Indiana University Press. During the conversation, they address the specifics of Swiss integration policy. Which is comparable to the refugee policies of many other European countries. But how well does this system work?

In this episode, Christoph Brumann talks to Mascha Schulz about her research on nonreligion in Bangladesh. Further, they discuss the special issue "An Anthropology of Nonreligion?" published in the Berghan journal "Religion and Society" edited by Mascha and Stefan Binder. They touch on topics like why Anthropology is a latecomer in Nonreligious Studies, why it is no less important, forms of organised nonreligion, and the Satanic Temple. https://www.berghahnjournals.com/view/journals/religion-and-society/14/1/religion-and-society.14.issue-1.xml

In this episode, Jovan Maud talks to Romm Lewkowicz about his research on how migration specifically in Europe became a laboratory for experimentation in documentation and documentation technologies.

In this episode, Christoph Brumann talks to our director Biao Xiang about his bestselling book 'Self as Method — Thinking through China and the World'. During the conversation, they touch on topics such as Chinese youth, the gentry, Hannah Arendt, how failure can lead to success, why language is more important than theory, and why everyone is a stranger.