Networking Nature: Tracking Terra, Sensing the Sea, Atmo-structures
Lately, when I have the pleasure of walking in the stacks of a regal, well-stocked, old library, and am in a devious mood, I imagine I am an…
Tag: infrastructure
Hearing the Unknown: Case Studies in Cuba and Taiwan
The saga of mysterious sounds afflicting US diplomats in Cuba—and more recently China–has appeared in the US news cycle intermittently over the last couple of years. Since 2017,…
Presentation: MyKnet.org: The cultural history & social life of an indigenous web-based environment
Budka, P. (2019). MyKnet.org: The cultural history and social life of an indigenous web-based environment. Paper at “The Web That Was: Archives, Traces, Reflections” Conference (RESAW19),…
Ebola Afterlives by Eva Vernooij
Image by Eva Vernooij Adiatu[1], a young Sierra Leonean laboratory scientist, turns on the light in the high risk room of the molecular unit of the recently renovated…
Book Chapter: Indigenous Media Technologies in “The Digital Age”
Budka, P. (2019). Indigenous media technologies in “the digital age”: Cultural articulation, digital practices, and sociopolitical concepts. In S. S. Yu & M. D. Matsaganis (Eds.), …
Description/Classification/Threshold: Experiments with Renewable Energy Taxonomy
This is not renewable energy: Nor is this some clever, Magritte-esque meta-commentary on how it is impossible represent or think about renewable energy separate from the technologies…
Voided Spaces: Architectural indices of ravines in Guatemala City
Photo by Jorge Villatoro: Ravine in Zone 3, Guatemala City Deep, canyon-like ravines fracture forty-two percent of Guatemala City. Covered in thick, wet, and dense foliage, these ravines…
Infrastructure after disasters
On October 21, 1868, at approximately eight o’clock in the morning, a major earthquake on the Hayward Fault near Oakland, California shook the Bay Area. The earthquake caused…
Nuclear State, Nuclear Waste
Nuclear State, Nuclear Waste: Emily Simmonds on Canada as a nuclear nation & ongoing colonialism through uranium mining.
Computable Norms: Clinical Practice Guidelines and Digital Infrastructure
I’m a sociocultural anthropologist by training. Until recently, my research focused on environmental issues in Ecuador. Yet, my attempt to address the gaps left by traditional anthropological ap…
The Sacrifice Zones of American “Energy Independence”: Pipeline and Refinery Expansion in the Chicago Region
By Graham Pickren, Roosevelt University § The United States is seemingly on its way to “energy independence.” Since the oil price increases and gas lines of the 1970s shocked…
Is Uncertainty a Useful Concept? Tracking Environmental Damage in the Lao Hydropower Industry
The collapse last week of a major hydropower dam in southern Laos, the Xe Pian-Xe Namnoy, as a tropical storm dumped an unknown, but massive, volume of water into…
Omar Dewachi’s Ungovernable Life: Mandatory Medicine and Statecraft in Iraq by Anna Zogas
Ungovernable Life: Mandatory Medicine and Statecraft in Iraq Omar Dewachi Stanford University Press, 2017. 239 pp. Every year, tens of thousands of Iraqi patients leave their country…
What is the Museum Anthropology Review Business (Labor) Model?
Alternate title: How to give away $99,000 worth of articles. Although it has become normalized in open access/scholarly publication reform discussions to speak in this way, it often…
Politics in environmental research infrastructure formation: When top-down policy-making meets bottom-up fragmentation
By: Elena Parmiggiani, Helena Karasti, Karen Baker, and Andrea Botero The environmental sciences have been a fertile ground for the development of scientific infrastructures (a.k.a. cyberinfrastructur…
Paper: Indigenous articulations in the digital age
Budka, P. (2018). Indigenous articulations in the digital age: Reflections on historical developments, activist engagements and mundane practices. Paper at International Communication Association 2018…
Seminar: Indigenous Media 2018
For the 4th time I am organizing the seminar “Indigenous Media” for the MA Program Visual and Media Anthropology at the Free University Berlin. In this course, students…
David Loher: Complicity or pragmatism? A labor movement and its fight against the asbestos industry
This post is part of a feature on “How Capitalists Think,” moderated and edited by Patrick Neveling (University of Bergen) and Tijo Salverda (University of Cologne). This contribution…
The Testing Revolution: Investigating Diagnostic Devices in Global Health by Alice Street
Image by Alice Street in collaboration with Jennifer Littlejohn. The origins of laboratory medicine are often traced to the establishment of a small clinical laboratory in Guy’s Hospital,…
Conference: ICA 2018 Pre-Conference “Articulating Voice. The Expressivity and Performativity of Media Practices”
International Communication Association (ICA) 2018 Pre-Conference “Articulating Voice. The Expressivity and Performativity of Media Practices” May 24, 2018, Prague, Czech Republic Conferen…
Living a good life through infrastructure. A Review of three recent monographs on Central Asia
This post belongs into a series of posts on the workshop “The Future of Central Asian Studies” organized by Prof. Dr. Judith Beyer and Prof. Dr. Madeleine Reeves…
CfP: The Digital Turn: New Directions in Media Anthropology
The EASA Media Anthropology Network is organising a network panel at the 15th EASA Biennial Conference “Staying, Moving, Settling” in Stockholm, 14-17 August, 2018. Please find the Call…
#Review: The Road – An Ethnography of (Im)Mobility, Space, and Cross-border Infrastructures in the Balkans
Central to the capturing cover-image, the downhill stone-paved street of the Pazari district of Gjirokastër, south Albania, reflects the orientation of Dimitris Dalakoglou’s book The Road: An Ethnogra…
On Edge: China’s Frontiers in a Time of Change
In 2011, China’s state-run general content television channel, CCTV-4, launched a monumental 100-part series with a title that translates as “Borderland Journey” (边疆行). The premise of the show is…