The Multispecies Network is an initiative of scholars based at the Global South Studies Centre at the University of Cologne. The network was initiated by anthropologists from the Institute of Social and Cultural Anthropology that are dedicated to study multispecies assemblages, entanglements and networks and who would like to explore multispecies relations on a multi- and interdisciplinary level. In two major projects – the Collaborative Research Centre 228 and the REWILDING programs – we look at multispecies relations in Eastern and Southern Africa over the next years and engage with questions such as:
What are the characters of multispecies relations in different contexts, what kinds of transformation processes do these relations experience, and how are multispecies futures envisioned, proposed and created?
Multispecies Reading Group
The Multispecies Reading Group engages in the exploration and reading of texts that deal with multispecies relations in the humanities. Inspired by the works in the field of multispecies ethnography, we engage with materials that offer new perspectives on animal-human relations and emphasise a more-than-human perspective.
| Date | Topic | Reading |
|---|---|---|
| 30 June 2021 | Multispecies Ethnography | Kirksey and Helmreich (2010): The Emergence Of Multispecies Ethnography |
| 7 July 2021 | Feral Atlas | Tsing et al. (2020): Feral Atlas – The more-than-human Anthropocene |
| 14 July 2021 | Patchy Anthropocene | Tsing et al. (2019): Patchy Anthropocene: Landscape Structure, Multispecies History, and the Retooling of Anthropology |
| 21 July 2021 | Critique towards the anthropocene concept and multispecies ethnography | Smart (2014): Critical perspectives on multispecies ethnography Hornborg (2017): Dithering while the planet burns: Anthropologists’ approaches to the Anthropocene |
| 1 September 2021 | Discussion of our own projects (how to locate ourselves in and make use of MSE) | – |
| 8 September 2021 | Discussion of our own projects (how to locate ourselves in and make use of MSE) | – |
| 6 October 2021 | REWILDING | Presentation of the REWILDING project by Michael Bollig and Léa Lacan |
| 13 October 2021 | The Etosha National Park and the Haiǁom | Ute Dieckmann presents her work |
| 20 October 2021 | Multispecies ethnography or “Anthropology beyond the human” | Ingold (2013): Anthropology beyond Humanity |
| 10 November 2021 | Conservation and Anthropology | Discussion of the impressions and a way forward after the RAI conference. |
| 24 November 2021 | Plurispecies communities of local beings | Bird-David (2018): Size matters! The scalability of modern hunter-gatherer animism |
| 1 December 2021 | Assemblage terminology I | Critical examination of the assemblage concept in multispecies ethnograpyh |
| 8 December | Assemblage terminology II | Ingold (2021): In the gathering shadows of material things. In: Imagining for Real: Essays on Creation, Attention and Correspondence. Pp. 256-272. |
| 15 December | Year-end meeting | Elaborating on planned activities in 2022 |
Contact
Hauke-Peter Vehrs
Department of Social and Cultural Anthropoogy
University of Cologne
Global South Studies Centre
Classen-Kappelmann Straße 24
50931 Cologne