Academic CentreConference timetable
'Towards a non-violent anthropology'
Where: Online via Zoom https://us02web.zoom.us/j/85004436868
When: 12 November 2021 Friday
Time: 10:00 - 15:30
10:00
Introduction and welcome, Aivita Putniņa
10:20
Aivita Putniņa, PhD, University of Latvia
Methods of raising children in Latvia
10:40
Māra Neikena, University of Latvia
Non-violence, socialization and identity: qualitative and quantitative data review
11:00
Zane Linde-Ozola, PhD, University of Latvia
Seeking non-violence: practices of care and commitment to the welfare of other in Latvia
Lunch 11:30-12:30
Chair Gareth Hamilton, PhD
12:30
Artūrs Pokšāns, University of Tartu, University of Latvia
Autoethnographical healing: anthropological methods for living the aftermath of violence
12:50
Emmanuel Uchenna Chidozie, Leuven University
Towards a non-violent Anthropology: Evidence from the International Christian Centre, Nigeria
13:10
Knut Graw, PhD, Leuven University
Anthropology's Violence: Notes from Nonviolent Communication
13:30 - 13:40 Coffee break
13:40
Kārlis Lakševics, University of Latvia
Beyond ethnographic sentimentalism: situating care in anthropologies against violence
14:00
Kristians Zalāns, University of Latvia
Similarities between anthropologist and pensioner: A non-violent anthropological practice as a question of precarity
14:20-14:30 Coffee break
14:30-15:30 Colloquium (guided by Zane Linde-Ozola and Māra Neikena)
Conference abstracts can be accessed here
A recording of the conference is going to be available on our Facebook page.
Conference description
We live in an era when societal events and movements focus on violence and the value of relationships (#Metoo, COVID-19 isolation, also #metooanthro, #anthrosowhite, #precanthro in anthropology) inviting us to not only take a stance but evaluate our position(s) in relation to those events. In 2020, Judith Butler published her input entitled The Force of Nonviolence: An Ethico-Political Bind, attempting to theorize non-violence in Western political philosophy. Butler offers a metaphor of grievability – a crosscutting concept which allows for the measuring of our relationship to others, simultaneously affective, embodied and structural when looking at its global distribution. Anthropologists have long been able to grieve for the Other and this sensitivity has laid the foundations of the discipline. In recent years, suffering (Asad, 2015, Kleinman et al., 1997; Das et al., 2000; 2001), the Good (Robbins, 2013, Knauft, 2019) and the obligation towards engagement (Low and Merry, 2010, Scheper-Hughes, 2009) have been re-examined and used to find new paths within the discipline. Changes go beyond the field practice of anthropology, and touch upon academic practice – among them professional relationships in and between anthropology departments, and the training of anthropologists and of publishing.
This conference invites contributions on the active practice of non-violence and its impacts towards change in anthropological knowledge production and practice at all levels – teaching, professional communication, fieldwork, and publishing. While anthropology is a ‘moral science of possibilities’ (Carrithers, 2005), its practice, on one hand, requires the acknowledging of inequalities, privileges and, on the other, the courage to speak out and make change. What different futures can be envisaged for anthropology? How do we deal with our privileges and disadvantages as professionals? Is equality and solidarity essential in practicing the discipline? What inequalities do anthropologists experience globally? What are the limits of our professional and personal responsibility towards Others, including our colleagues?