Celebrating Allies – part 4: “Looking text straight in the face”
To conclude this week we wish to highlight the hard work of one more Allie – namely Marie-Louise Karttunen. She has been with us since the beginning, offering…
Tag: Stuff
Celebrating Allies – part 3: Are you looking for a ghostwriter? REDUX
Today we continue to celebrate the Allies who handle so much of behind-the-scenes work that is needed to keep fan-bu-tastic (=fabulous meets fantastic) content appearing on our beloved…
Celebrating Allies – part 2: Combating stereotypes with Rusty Radiators – REDUX
Yesterday we highlighted one important development that took place for the Allegra team in March of 2014, namely that we were joined by Ninnu Koskenalho who for the…
Because we’re #HAPPY? REDUX
Today we have, once again, witnessed the arrival of the World Happiness Reports – reports that claim nothing less than to offer a neatly quantified, ‘objective’ measurement of just…
Celebrating Allies – ALL WEEK! Glimpses from behind the scenes!
Over the past few weeks, Allegra has been deeply engaged with a theme that is both topical and urgent: human smuggling. Close observers may have noticed that with…
An Anniversary as a Laboratory #HumanRights
This Allegra week we focus on a theme that we have addressed numerous times earlier: human rights. This repeated attention is not entirely coincidental as the theme features…
Magic little gecko, won’t you become a doctor?
Yesterday I took my two children, aged 4 and 7, to the doctor. Both had been ill for the past week; the older one was suffering from a…
The Deportation Conundrum – REDUX #BORDERS
Today we re-visit a post on the deportation conundrum by Barak Kalir. The post was first published in the spring of 2014 as a part of our thread…
Lived Theories: Hayek’s Neoliberalism and #Pragmatism
One way of characterizing Amy Levine’s rich ethnographic inquiry into pragmatism is to posit South Korean Civil Movement Organisations as a satisfyingly thorough answer to the question: “how…
Boilerplate Clauses as Pragmatic Knowledge Practices #pragmatisms
Prompted by the invitation to participate in this thematic week on #pragmatisms for Allegra, I would like to share some reflections from my ethnographic reading of a concrete…
Knowing Economies, Doing Economies: How Sociologists of Markets Have Acknowledged the Legacy of #Pragmatism
In her new book, South Korean Civil Movement Organisations: Hope, Crisis and Pragmatism in Democratic Transition, Amy Levine shows us how a commitment to American pragmatism crosses disciplinary…
#Pragmatisms as Historical, Holistic, Total Social Facts
The theme of #pragmatisms comes from my fieldwork with a handful of civil movement organisations in Seoul during the mid-2000s. It was a buzzword in South Korea and…
REDUX: Scenes of #Gentrification
Scene One: London Soho and Bloomsbury I used to love London for its Indian and Thai vegan restaurants, vibrant queer cafes, independent bookstores, second hand antiquaries, esoteric health…
Gentrification, diversification & events – let’s take it SLOW!
Ever so often we find it indispensable to remind ourselves & everyone else that one of Allegra’s guiding mottos is ‘slow food for thought‘. Indeed, one of the…
Up the Anthropologist – Anthropology Day, Jukebox, Migration & Breakfast
Hello everyone – it’s yet another glorious Allegra week! Fine, admittedly the weather in some parts of the world (aka where this post is being written) does not…
REDUX: From Crisis to the University of Utopia aka MURI!
We conclude this dark thematic week on University Crisis with our insistence to be also ‘tongue in cheek’. We remind both ourselves and others: when policy making is…
REDUX: The Neoliberal Race to the Bottom Affects Us All!* #UniversityCrisis
Over the last years academics from different disciplines have become increasingly visible on popular and social media, narrating personal stories and reflecting on the growing casualization of academi…
REDUX: Bourgeois Knowledge #UniversityCrisis
Young man: Hey, what’s he talking about? Old man: The professor is discussing ideas of justice and humanity in the philosophy of Plato. Young man: Plato? Old man:…
What happens in Turkey?
On January 19 we posted on our website this petition as a form of support to Turkish academics. We have then asked a Turkish scholar – who prefers…
#LoldiersofOdin: Do you work internationally?
Loldiers of Odin, I have been deeply impressed by your upstanding actions and determination to keep our streets safe – and joyful! Via your actions you have set…
REDUX: Boredom and the “Life Unlived” – Sapiens-Allegra Writing Competition!
Most of our devoted Allies will remember that we started this year with a bang, aka by launching the SAPIENS-Allegra writing competition to discover new public anthropologists. For…
Making Sense of Violence Against Minority Women: Notes on Skepticism, Discomfort & Privilege in #Fieldwork
What is it like to do fieldwork within a marginalized social group? Especially when you – the researcher – hail from the dominant community? How do you deal…
Cologne: Why cultural explanations are dangerous for feminism
The sexual assaults that occurred in Cologne on New Year’s Eve will long be remembered in Germany and in Europe more broadly. What a pity that each time…
Lessons from a King
For El Señor On January 8 I followed – along with perhaps most of the world’s population connected to the net – the coverage of the recapture of the man…