The UrbAn network for urban anthropology at EASA (brief description below) has recently been launched. The deadline is a bit tight, but if you are organizing a panel for the next EASA conference and you would like to do that under the banner of this new urban anthropology network, please drop us a line.
The web page on the EASA website has not been created yet, so for the moment, you can only contact us via email. It will be online soon though, so check it out once in a while if you want to register for the network.
The UrbAn network was initiated in 2019 by Roos Gerritsen, Ferne Edwards, Aylin Yildirim Tschoepe and Lukas Ley. It aims to become a platform to think theoretically as well as methodologically about the urban in anthropology. Understanding the urban as both a place and imaginary, the network is specifically interested in debating and creating experimental and unconventional ethnographic knowledge. It is interested in the methodological questions put forward by urban field research and specifically in experimenting with and designing new (multimodal) methodologies. Moreover, it seeks to inspire critical theoretical thinking on topics related to the city: everyday cities, affect, infrastructures, inequalities, media, sustainability, shrinking cities to name a few.
The objectives of the network are mainly to initiate debate and momentum among members whose ethnographic and conceptual work centers on the urban. Moreover, it seeks to exchange information on and initiate collaboration in conferences, publications and teaching projects. The network stimulates collaborations among network members as well as within other domains like those working on and in urban contexts, seeking ways to think through their work. The network is of interest to everyone who works in urban contexts or who finds the urban a useful concept to work with.