Camthropod

Episode 25. The Future of the Anthropological Journal. by Cambridge Anthropology

Who is responsible for making a work of art? In each episode of this collaborative podcast series, one anthropologist, specialising in a particular cultural context, has a conversation with an artist of their choosing, exploring issues of authorship and responsibility in art. Ranging across geographical locations and creative practices, discussions address and unpack the conceptualisation of the artistic person, authorship as centred upon an individual or bounded group, and the development of responsibility for artworks during and after their making. Each episode brings a fresh perspective on where ideas come from, what agency an artist feels in the creation of their work, and how, and in which contexts, ownership and responsibility for the artwork are claimed. Ultimately, as a collection, the series encourages listeners to think about ‘the artist’ and ‘the artwork’ as dynamic processes in a relationship of authoring. Maree Clarke is a Mutti Mutti/Wemba Wemba/Boonwurrung/Yorta Yorta artist, from Mildura in n

With the arrival of home recording technology in the early 1980s, many Shi’i Muslims in Pakistan started to record the majlis mourning assemblies and processions that are central to their faith. Soon after, some established family-run religious media stores beside Muslim shrines or in Shi’a-majority neighbourhoods. In this episode, Dr Timothy Cooper (Research Fellow at the Department of Social Anthropology) examines the distinct sonic aesthetic of Shi’i religious media in Pakistan through interviews with his interlocutors in Lahore, as well as through extracts from their personal archives of Shi’i majlis assemblies, rituals, and recitations. He is joined by Karen Ruffle from the University of Toronto and Charles Hirschkind from the University of California, Berkeley, who help to put Shi’i relationships with sound in a wider geographic and disciplinary context. This podcast forms the final part of a three-part multi-platform sound essay titled The Recorded and the Live that examines Shi’i faith, ritual, and r

On the 9th of November 2019, Germany celebrated the 30th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall. Yet, the country appeared to be once more divided along political lines as the far-right party Alternative for Germany gained enormous success in the Eastern regions. Laura Tradii was on fieldwork in rural Brandenburg as the electoral campaign unfolded, and she discusses the debates that emerged around the failures and successes of the German Reunification.

In November 2019, Max Bolt came to the department of Social Anthropology at Cambridge to deliver the weekly senior seminar. Kevin Yildirim spoke with him beforehand to learn more about his recent work in Johannesburg, which concerns inheritance laws and custom in post-apartheid South Africa. The interview was recorded by Javier Ruiz. Max Bolt is Reader in Anthropology and African Studies at the University of Birmingham. He is the author of the book Zimbabwe's Migrants and South Africa's Border Farms: The Roots of Impermanence, published by Cambridge University Press in 2015.

Alisi Mekatoa and Nina Fudge are health researchers. They came to Cambridge to speak about how their undergraduate anthropology degree has informed their careers in and outside of academia. They spoke with Sian Lazar about general practice and primary health care in the UK, and the role of anthropological approaches in health research.

Gareth Ward visited Cambridge just before he began his appointment as British Ambassador to Vietnam. He spoke with David Sneath about how anthropology has informed his career in the diplomatic service. (We are sorry that the recording quality of this interview is not as good as we would usually aim for.)

Tropes of 'running away' abound in popular notions of the circus, but how true is this to the lived experiences of circus folk? In this episode of the podcast, Laura Byng uses interviews with different members of a contemporary UK circus to explore they ways in which they came to work in the circus, and, once there, why they stayed. What emerges is a varied set of relationships to the circus, but a shared passion for this way of life.

In November 2017, Michael Puett, Professor of Chinese History and Anthropology at Harvard University, gave two talks at the Centre for Research in the Arts, Social Sciences and Humanities (CRASSH) at Cambridge on the subject of neoliberalism in China. Beth met with Professor Puett after his talks to discuss Puett’s critical stance on the naturalness of neoliberalism, and his assertion that comparative analysis can help us create alternative models by which to organize our world. They also talked about how to contextualize the particular version of neoliberalism found in China today.

David MacDougall visited Cambridge University this year for a series of talks and screenings and to open an exhibition of stills from his films at King's College. After the opening Rafael Dernbach met MacDougall to talk about the particular knowledge visual anthropology can produce and his practice as a filmmaker. David MacDougall is one of the world’s leading ethnographic filmmakers. He also writes regularly on documentary and ethnographic cinema and is the author of Transcultural Cinema (Princeton University Press, 1998) and The Corporeal Image: Film, Ethnography, and the Senses (Princeton, 2006). He is presently Adjunct Professor at the Research School of Humanities, Australian National University, Canberra.

Ilana Gershon visited Cambridge University this summer, and after her Senior Research seminar at the department, Oliver Balch caught up with her to talk about her research on new media and the contemporary world of work, and her latest book Down and Out in the New Economy: How People Find (or Don't Find) Work Today. Ilana is Associate Professor of Anthropology at Indiana University. Her intellectual interests range from linguistic anthropology, science studies, media studies, legal anthropology, anthropology of democracy, and anthropology of work.

This podcast asks what vision means to those who describe theatre for blind and partially-sighted audiences. Harsha Balasubramanian shares some of the findings from her undergraduate dissertation, and argues that these audio describers' understandings of vision are revealed through their practices. These shape the experiences of sight-impaired theatre-goers. With editing by Christina Woolner and voice acting from Rebecca Vaa, Francesca Firth, and Sian Lazar. I am hugely indebted to everyone who has helped with this podcast: all its participants and my friends and former teachers from university.

The processing and storage of data underpins the digital economy. With 2.5 exabytes of data being produced every day, storing and securing this highly valuable asset is an increasingly challenging task. But where exactly is all this data stored and how is it secured? In this episode, Alexander Taylor visits The Bunker, a subterranean data centre in south-east England and talks with Al Webb, the Head of Physical Security, about the increasingly extreme measures being taken to store and secure data within ‘the cloud’.

When credit is an essential means of getting by, how can debt advice organisations help those who are struggling to repay? This episode of the podcast considers some of the conundrums that debt advisers face in Britain today, as a result of credit having become a vital means of subsistence for millions of people. It is an attempt to explore the normative implications of anthropological research for this particular field of social practice, and considers the viability of advocating debt refusal and debt cancellation. The episode comprises a conversation between Carl Packman, Research and Good Practice Manager at the anti-poverty charity Toynbee Hall, and Ryan Davey, a researcher in the Anthropology Department at the London School of Economics. The presenters would love to hear from any debt advisers who listen to the podcast, to find out your views about what’s being discussed. Please contact Ryan at r.davey@lse.ac.uk or Carl at carl.packman@toynbeehall.org.uk. Further information about the research can b

Birdsong is a ubiquitous feature of the British countryside. But what is the cultural significance of this much-loved part of our landscape? Jonathan Woolley reflects upon the meanings made by birds - as omens, as signs, as proxies, and as music - from the Norfolk Broads, to Bosavi in Papua New Guinea. This podcast uses audio from freesound.org: Lapwing.wav by Juskiddink (http://freesound.org/people/juskiddink/sounds/72560/) 120319_001_L4 Rooks and some magpies.mp3 by Nemark (http://freesound.org/people/nemark/sounds/150176/) Blackcap01_13-03-2016.wav by Tim_Lomas (http://freesound.org/people/Tim_Lomas/sounds/342098/) 20080321.warbler.wav by dobroide (http://freesound.org/people/dobroide/sounds/51028/) The full version of Hanna Tuulikki’s ‘At Sing, Two Birds’ is available here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pKcETcbf8Es

Earlier this year Professor Richard Werbner gave a senior research seminar in the Department entitled 'The Poetics of Wisdom Divination: Renewing the Moral Imagination'. PhD student Joe Philp caught up with Professor Werbner afterwards to ask him more about his recent book, Divination's Grasp: African Encounters with the Almost Said (Indiana University Press: 2015). In the interview, Professor Werbner explains what divination can reveal about moral peril and the moral imagination in contemporary Botswana.

Camthropod welcomes you to the new academic year with an episode dedicated to the Mongolia and Inner Asia Studies Unit, which is celebrating its 30th anniversary this term. Sian Lazar spoke with several members of the unit to find out just what makes it so distinctive.

On April 8th 2015, in North West London, without any warning or permission a buzzing local pub was torn down by developers hoping to erect luxury flats in its place. The resulting scandal made national headlines, feeding into an intense debate around gentrification and property speculation in London. But what exactly was lost? This episode looks at the demolition of the Carlton Tavern through the eyes of those who used to frequent it, uncovering the value of spaces like pubs in bringing communities together in rich and often unexpected ways.

Tanya Luhrmann gave the 2016 W.H.R. Rivers Memorial Lecture in Cambridge, and during her visit she discussed with Rupert Stasch the larger research project she is currently engaged in, about contrasts in the psychological experience of “hearing voices” in the United States, Ghana, and India. Both in a study of how certain Christians experience hearing the voice of God, and in a study of the auditory experiences of diagnosed schizophrenics, Luhrmann and her collaborators have discovered correlations between the kinds of voices people hear in each of these countries and main wider understandings in those countries of the nature of “mind.”

In this episode, Sian Lazar discusses two sounds of different kinds of street mobilisation in Argentina: the bombos, or drums, which are associated with organised social forces, and the cacerolazo, or pots and pans demo, associated with the ‘middle classes’. She relates these different political soundscapes to the politics of the ‘Pink Tide’ and the recent turn back to the right in the country.