He doesn’t hold back his criticism
I was looking at one of my interviews with philosophy professors and was struck by this little explanation of why he had not picked someone as his dissertation supervisor (directeur in…
Tag: France
Threatened, Forgotten, and Lost Foods
An intriguing call for papers for a 2017 conference in France: Threatened, Forgotten and Lost Foods: Causes and Mechanisms of Their Decline 14th – 21st centuries TERESMA Conference 4-5…
Revisiting field interviews
I’ve been going back lately to my interviews with French philosophy teachers and students. I just never had time to transcribe or work on most of them during…
American representations of French social movements
So over in France these days there’s a pretty major protest movement against efforts by François Hollande’s Socialist Party government, and its current Minister of Labor Myriam El…
Philosophers without infrastructure, Part 2
Following up on my last post (and indirectly on a couple of older posts), I came across an interesting interview extract that comments in a bit more detail…
Philosophical lab infrastructure
The short version of this post: Philosophers have practically no lab infrastructure. The long version: Coming back to my research about philosophy departments in France, I was recently reading an…
anthro in the news 1/4/16
Sidney Mintz: Founder of the anthropology of food Cultural anthropologist Sarah Hill, associate professor at Western Michigan University, published an article in the Boston Review detailing the work…
Far right Front National first party in French regional elections
Very bad results in France’s regional elections: exit polls set xenophobic far right Front National (FN) first nationwide with over 30% of the votes; Sarkozy’s centre-right Republicans at…
Book Forum — Richard Keller’s Fatal Isolation by Todd Meyers
Richard Keller’s Fatal Isolation: The Devastating Paris Heat Wave of 2003 is a careful accounting of the toll the heat wave took on those most vulnerable in…
Curated Ruins and Un-Memorials: The Afterlife of Detroit’s Michigan Theater
I came across Gabriel Moshenska’s Curated Ruins and the Endurance of Conflict Heritage (2015) via Twitter last week, which happily coincided with my first visit to Detroit’s former Michiga…
Last day in Paris (2011)
I’m not sure whether this little descriptive passage from my fieldnotes will ever have much use in academic discourse, but it does remind me quite vividly of urban space in my fieldsite.…
On real problems
I came across a confrontational moment in one of my interview transcripts. We had been talking about philosophers’ metanarratives about “truth.” But my interlocutor found my question…
Anthro in the news 5/18/15
Disenchantment and British politics Emma Crewe, social anthropologist and research associate at SOAS, the University of London, published an op-ed in the Times Higher Education (U.K.) on how…
Oradour-sur-Glane: Remembering Terror
A Visual Essay. Text and photos by Álvaro Minguito Palomares Oradour-sur-Glane is a symbol of the misfortunes of the Nation. It is important to preserve this memory, so…
The Libyan Disaster: This Time Imperialism Pretends Anti-Interventionism
When it was still called the Socialist People’s Libyan Arab Jamahiriya (Al-Jamahiriya al-arabiya al-Libiya al-sha’abiya al-ishtirakiya), and Col. Muammar Gaddafi was still the de facto head of state,…
Modernity isn’t philosophical
Here’s a tidbit from before Sarkozy was President that gives a certain sense of how his administration was likely to regard philosophy, and the humanities in general: «…
International traces of France in the American South
I’ve been reading up a bit on the international circulation in ideas of the university. It’s not hard to find documentation of how France has for a long…
The world war of the intellect
A snippet from my dissertation chapter on the French university strike of 2009. Nicholas Sarkozy was elected President of the Republic on May 6, 2007, and took office…
What is utopia?
I’ve been thinking about what counts as utopian in my research site, and happened to come across a handy definition by René Schérer, now an emeritus professor. It’s…
Dissertation writing scene
This is the roof of the library where I’m writing a first draft of the introduction to my dissertation. The sunshine is always encouraging. In writing the…
Inscribing Intangible Heritage
Last week, the 2012 session of the Intergovernmental Committee for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage was held at UNESCO in Paris. Of the 36 intangible assets…
Inscribing Intangible Heritage
Last week, the 2012 session of the Intergovernmental Committee for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage was held at UNESCO in Paris. Of the 36 intangible assets…
Inscribing Intangible Heritage
Last week, the 2012 session of the Intergovernmental Committee for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage was held at UNESCO in Paris. Of the 36 intangible assets…
Inscribing Intangible Heritage
Last week, the 2012 session of the Intergovernmental Committee for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage was held at UNESCO in Paris. Of the 36 intangible assets…