What happened to the study of technology in Africa?
Technology Studies in Africa Mellon Workshop July 11-14, 2016 • Durban, South Africa
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Technology Studies in Africa
Mellon Workshop
July 10-15, 2016 • Durban, South Africa
Sunday, 10 July
Monday, 11 July
Introduction (1- 2 pm)
Gabrielle Hecht, Keith Breckenridge and Paul Edwards
Session 1: Infrastructure (2:30- 4:30 pm)
Pre-circulated papers
Claudia Gastrow (University of the Witwatersrand): Infrastructure and class distinction in the African city
Keith Breckenridge (University of the Witwatersrand): Biometric Capitalism: Debt, demography and African states in the 21st century
Paul Edwards (University of Michigan): Architecture, Violence, Routine: Infrastructural Legacies of Apartheid
Bernard Dubbeld (University of Stellenbosch): Administering Infrastructure: Technopolitical Futures in the South African countryside
Discussant: Gabrielle Hecht (University of Michigan)
Session 2: Water (5- 6.30 pm)
Pecha Kucha
Pamila Gupta (University of the Witwatersrand): Ruminations on Renovation in Postcolonial Beira
Jatin Dua (University of Michigan): Bodies at Sea: Technologies of navigation in the Indian Ocean
Jennifer Johnson (Purdue University): A Paradox Otherwise: Ontological Problems and Possibilities around an Inland African Sea
Discussant: Ngaka Mosiane (University of the Witwatersrand and MISTRA)
Tuesday, 12 July
Infrastructure field trip (8- 2 pm)
Session 3: Coal (4- 6 pm)
Pre-circulated papers
Faeeza Ballim (University of the Witwatersrand): The fickleness of coal: Risk and electricity generation in South Africa
Stephen Sparks (University of Johannesburg): ‘Tailor made for South African Conditions’: Technological Momentum and Apartheid South Africa’s Oil-From-Coal Project
Discussant: Robyn d’Avignon (University of Michigan)
Wednesday, 13 July
Session 4: Evacuation (1- 4 pm)
Installation (explanation/exploration 1-1:45)
Brenda Chalfin (University of Florida): Digi-Potty|Tema, Ghana: Public Toilets, Urban Technology, and Popular Politics
Pre-circulated papers (2- 4pm)
Josh Grace (University of South Carolina): Savage Relief: Poop(ing) and Infrastructural Order in East Africa, 1870s to Present
Tasha Rijke-Epstein (University of Michigan): Contested Logics and Scatological Dilemmas: Unfolding sanitation infrastructures in colonial and postcolonial Mahajanga, Madagascar
Peter Redfield (University of North Carolina) and Steven Robins (University of Stellenbosch): An Index of Waste: Humanitarian Design, ‘Dignified Living’ and Sanitation Politics in Cape Town
Discussant: Nick Caverly (University of Michigan)
Session 5: Transforming Bodies (5- 6:30 pm)
Pecha Kucha
Divine Fuh (University of Cape Town) and Lynn Thomas (University of Washington), double PK: Technologies of bodily self-fashioning?
Hlonipha Mokoena (University of the Witwatersrand): Armed and Disciplined Natives: The Zulu Policeman as a Product of Colonial Technologies
Discussant: Rachel Ceasar (University of the Witwatersrand)
Thursday, 14 July
Session 6: Rethinking Africa’s past through technology (1- 2:30 pm)
Pre-circulated papers
Emma Park (University of Michigan): ‘Tropicalising’ Technologies: Enacting Radio in Colonial Kenya
Seyram Avle (University of Michigan): Technology discourse in contemporary Africa: Narratives, materials and activities.
Discussant: Keith Breckenridge (University of the Witwatersrand)
Session 7: Wrap-up (3- 6 pm)
Discussion
Rachel Ceasar (University of the Witwatersrand)
Cosmas Ochieng (African Centre for Technology Studies)
Daniel Williford (University of Michigan)
Iginio Gagliardone (University of the Witwatersrand, Oxford University)
Closing dinner (7pm--)
Ile Maurice, Umhlanga Rocks