Haidy Geismar, UCL Anthropology As the incoming co-editor of the Journal of Material Culture, as well as one of the editors here at Material World Blog, I have been involved in many conversations regarding the politics, economics, and materiality of Open Access. It is clear that there is great concernContinue Reading
Blanca Callén Lancaster University, Email: bcallenm@gmail.com Behind the images and narratives of progress, effectiveness and innovation of electronics that make us believe in dematerialized technology without consequences (Gabrys, 2011:57), there is something dirty and ‘forgettable’ (Hird, forthcoming). That is electronic waste (e-waste). Over the past November and December, I followedContinue Reading
The computer that you have in front of you right now will die sooner or later. And when it does you will get rid of it, perhaps, if you are well-behaved citizen, in one of the designated recycling drop-offs points your city council has created for technological equipment. That, however, won’t markContinue Reading
Interview by Francisco Martínez (EHI, Tallinn Univ) & Larissa Vanamo (Dept of History, Univ. of Helsinki). “A democracy where there is freedom of consumption is the worst thing possible” “The worth of an individual is smaller when there are a lot of humans” “Force and oppression are needed becauseContinue Reading
Elad Ben Elul, Department of Anthropology, UCL Photos from Ghanaian family reunions are distributed through Facebook. The elders are often recorded telling family tales. Recent debates around the motivations for taking digital photos ask whether people document for memory or as tools for communication (Dijck 2008:58). However, this debateContinue Reading
Ana Gross, Centre for Interdisciplinary Methodologies, University of Warwick anagross@me.com A number of years ago I conducted research amongst infrequent audiences to the Opera, Ballet and Theatre in London. I was working within the cultural policy arena, looking at identifying the dispositions, gestures and mechanisms which perpetuate infrequent and erratic patternsContinue Reading
Christopher Pinney, UCL Sherlock Holmes was many things: cocaine addict, violinist extraordinaire, expert on Ceylonese Buddhism, master consulting detective, and accomplished amateur boxer. He was also a published anthropologist of sorts having (as is revealed in The Adventure of the Cardboard Box [1889]) published two short articles on the outerContinue Reading
Haidy Geismar, UCL and NYU In 2006, the New Economics Foundation (nef) published the Happy Planet Index, a quantification of the “happiness quotients” of the world’s nations which considered life expectancy, the experience of wellbeing and, most importantly, ecological footprint as indicators of happiness, displacing the usual measure of happiness:Continue Reading
Graeme Were, University of Queensland The stores of Queensland museums are laden with ethnographic collections from Papua New Guinea, many of which originate from northern New Ireland. Few people there are able to gain access to these treasures even though New Irelanders hold great interest in learning more about theirContinue Reading
Haidy Geismar, NYU and UCL I was interested to read a very brief, rather parochial, account of the world of anthropology blogging over at the site of Anthropology News, the journal of the American Anthropological Association, . Material World was singled out as an example of a “team blog” butContinue Reading
Danny Miller, UCL Although this site was started as a collaboration between Haidy in New York and Danny in London, from the beginning we were hoping to attract postings from a global interest in this genre of academic work. We do pretty well in this regard, with contributions from academics,Continue Reading