Research seminar spring 2017

Schedule/Schema, spring 2017

Day and time:	Wednesdays at 14.15-16.00 (if not otherwise stated)
Venue:	Uppsala: 3-2028; Visby: B10
Video conference:	Facilities available for all seminars
Language(s):	Swedish or English; follows the program
Texts:	Texts to be discussion is to be circulated one week before the seminar; the texts should be sent to the two seminar organizer
Seminar Organizers:	Sverker Finnström, sverker.finnstrom@antro.uu.se
Post seminar:	Organized by the presenter/s

Feb 1
Oscar Pripp, “Den mångkulturella fantasin”
Ordf.: Sverker Finnström
 
Feb 15
Sten Hagberg, “Democracy and Security seen from below: Self-defense groups, socio-political grievances and the rule of law in Malian and Burkinabe municipalities” (draft article)
Chair: Sverker Finnström
Discussant: TBA
 
March 1
Elisa Lopez, thesis chapter
Chair: Eren Zink
Discussant: TBA
 
March 15
Anna Swierczynska, thesis chapter
Chair: Jan-Åke Alvarsson
Discussant: TBA
 
March 22 (guest seminar, more information below)
Antu Sorainen, Un. of Helsinki, “Queering Inheritance and Kinship in the Margins”
Host/chair: Annika Teppo
 
March 29
Anett Sasvari, final seminar, note time: 14.15-17.00
Chair: Sverker Finnström
Discussant: Ivar Björklund, Un. of Tromsö

April 5 (gästeminarium, mer information nedan)
Jakob Lövgren, Åbo Akademi, ”’It was the night before Hogswatch’ – appliceringen av folkloristiska teorier på ett fandom-material”
Ordf./värd/mer information: Birgitta Meurling
 
April 12
Fernando Manjate, thesis chapter
Chair: Sten Hagberg
Discussant: Charlotta Widmark
 
April 26
Göran Nygren, avhandlingskapitel
Ordf.: Oscar Pripp
Opponent: TBA
 
May 3 (guest seminar, more information below)
Carina Green et al, Green washing and political ecology: a text seminar on Dan Brockington
Host/chair/contact/more information: Carina Green
 
May 10
No seminar: KoF17 evaluation interviews with department staff
 
May 24
Nika Rasmussen, thesis chapter
Chair: Charlotta Widmark
Discussant: Eric Trovalla

Maj 31 The seminar on Wednesday May 31 has been cancelled/postponed until further notice.

June 7
Clementina Amankwaah, “A Fallacy in Socio-Cultural Reproductive Theories: Friendship and Peers among elite University Students in Sierra Leone” (thesis chapter)
Chair: Sten Hagberg
Discussant: Molly Sundberg

Guest Seminar Wednesdays, more information
 
March 22
Antu Sorainen, Un. of Helsinki, “Queering Inheritance and Kinship in the Margins”
Host/chair/contact/more information: Annika Teppo
 
Bio:
Antu Sorainen, PhD, is an Academy Fellow at the Academy of Finland and Docent in Gender Studies, working at the University of Helsinki. She has conducted empirical studies in the area of queer history in the legal field. She is the co-author of a book on the conceptual history of “Sittlichkeit”, and has published recently on queer inheritance practices. Sorainen holds an Academy of Finland Fellowship for a 5-year project titled “Wills and Inheritance Practices in Sexually Marginalised Groups” (2014-2019), and is a PI of the Academy of Finland funded 4-year project “CoreKin – Contrasting and Re-Imagining Margins of Kinship” (2016-2020). Websites: antusorainen.com / corekin.fi Email: antu.sorainen@helsinki.fi
 
Abstract:
My paper is, in part, an ethnographic study of inheritance and queer kinship via Marilyn Strathern, discussing to what extent do inheritance practices impact queer support relations. Based on a long-term observation of four gay men in Helsinki, I investigate how dominant legal and cultural commitments to kinship relate to queer configurations of care in a diminishing welfare state. I do this by drawing on Strathern’s intellectual work combining legal thinking with gender and sexuality in looking at kinship ties. Strathern discusses briefly the impact of inheritance in her study on English kinship, noting that the extent of “proper family feelings” (1981, 104) is likely to be evaluated and very significant where sums of money are being passed down. Inspired by her notion, I look at how family wealth distribution histories and inheritance perspectives affect non-normative gay male support relations. Support networks are constructed in contingent political and legal landscapes. Since becoming EU member state in the mid-1990s, a strike upon individuality has been increasing in the Finnish legislative and policy debates. The current legal landscape in the country – formerly governed by a Hegelian tradition in which the state is seen as a protective friend of vulnerable social groups rather than an enemy of the individual who needs to form interest groups against it – has been rapidly transforming in terms of individual “rights”. At the same time, conservative and populist right-wing parties feed on fears about whether family is dispersing. The explicit aim of these parties is to preserve the “naturalness” of heterosexual family and kinship ties. In this situation, the internal structuring, as well as external relations of non-normative care networks (in terms of sexuality and gender) rely not only on constant negotiations between the different spheres, but also on material and intellectual resources for re-imaginations.
 
April 5
Jakob Lövgren, Åbo Akademi, ”’It was the night before Hogswatch’ – appliceringen av folkloristiska teorier på ett fandom-material”
Ordf./värd/mer information: Birgitta Meurling

Sammanfattning:
"I den engelska staden Wincanton samlas årligen i november fans av den engelska författaren Terry Pratchett för att fira Hogswatch. Hogswatch är en ”midvinterfest” som presenteras i Pratchetts verk The Hogfather (Pratchett 1999). Hogswatch-firandet kan ses som ett exempel på en fest som förflyttats från en litterär kontext till en social kontext, en process som kallas för ”re-situation” (de Caro & Jordan 2004). Denna midvinterfest re-situeras och iscensätts i Wincanton genom att fansen plockar scenarion från Pratchetts verk och firar dem som om man var del av den fiktionella världen. Ca 200 fans reser till Wincanton för att fira Hogswatch och för att befästa sin fandom och sin gemenskap. Firandet tar plats i på Wincantons olika pubar och innehåller många olika komponenter såsom gåvor, speciellt tillredd mat och olika program (musik, sagoberättande osv.) Mitt föredrag kommer att presentera dispositionen för min avhandling. Mitt avhandlingsprojekt går under arbetsnamnet It was the night before Hogswatch – folklore, intertext and fandom in the Wincanton Hogswatch celebration och är en sammanläggningsavhandling bestående av ca fyra artiklar. Syftet med min avhandling är att visa hur intertext, fandom och identitet hänger ihop. Frågan jag vill ställa mig är: ”På vilka olika sätt manifesteras fandom i en situation som den i Wincanton?”
 
May 3
Carina Green et al, Green washing and political ecology: a text seminar on Dan Brockington
Host/chair/contact/more information: Carina Green
 
Description (from Carina G):
Ett "artikel-seminarium" där vi innan läser en artikel av Dan Brockington och sedan diskuterar hans forskning. Temat är miljöantropologi, med geografisk fokus på (framförallt) Östafrika. Brockington har också blivit uppmärksammad för att kritisera kändisar som lånar ut sitt namn till olika "green-washing"-projekt. Tillsammans med Forum för afrikastudier har jag bjudit in honom som gästföreläsare i maj. Därför skulle det passa bra att vi tillsammans läser på lite om hans forskning innan han kommer. Dessutom är det bra att få in miljöantropologi/political ecology som tema på ett av forskningsseminarierna, tycker jag. 

31 maj
The seminar on Wednesday May 31 has been cancelled/postponed until further notice.