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Conference Announcement

Theme: Futures of Indigeneity
Subtitle: Spatiality, Identity Politics and Belonging
Type: International Workshop
Institution: Ruhr University Bochum
Location: Bochum (Germany)
Date: 6.–8.11.2013

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‘Indigeneity’ is a continuously contested concept, and a site of
socio-cultural (re)presentation of self and others linked to social,
cultural and political boundaries and un-boundaries. It is woven
together in an intricate web of ideas such as ethnicity, hybridity,
authenticity, diaspora, nation and homeland, and the ways those ideas
are formed, developed and “owned.” It also concerns territoriality
and ancestral rights over land and hence indigeneity deals with
place, space and time with its respective imagining. Once labeled as
“backwardness” and inferiority, indigeneity has now increasingly
become a source of pride for many of those who claim it as a sign of
resilience and embeddedness. As a sign of deep belonging, desired
more than discouraged, proclaimed more than disguised as attachment
to particular place, culture, social category and nation, it is now
an important source of personal identity. Therefore, the sense of
indigeneity begets paradox of identity as it is an encompassing
concept entailing the cultural survival of individuals, communities,
organizations and nations that ascribe themselves to an idea of
belongingness. The concept of indigeneity and belonging are
intimately entwined, inlaid together in conversations about
attachment to place, about nationalism and love of country whilst at
the same time they are reworked and modified in trans-local and
transnational communicative and interactive processes. Consequently,
these concepts intersect with local, national and global
socio-political realities on the one hand and, on the other hand,
they are confronted with the challenges posed to indigenous
aspirations by the neo-liberal agenda of nation-states and their
concerns with sovereignty.

In the late 1980s, global academia started paying attention to the
interdisciplinary mode of understanding the specialty of spatiality,
politics of identity and belonging in relation to notions of
indigeneity. Social, political, and cultural matters pertaining to
this inter- and trans-disciplinary interest ranging from the micro
level affective nature of individual constructions to macro
structures of international, transnational, and post-national orders
is fundamentally important. Therefore, the idea of indigeneity is at
the center of radical political discourse, serious academic research
and public imaginations of personhood and identity.

This workshop aims to address the theoretical, critical and radical
aspects of indigeneity in relation to spatiality, identity politics
and belonging from cross disciplinary perspectives, bringing together
scholars from different disciplines, e.g. anthropology, sociology,
political science, psychology, history and literary studies. It
intends to engage critically in debates on indigeneity in its
ideological trajectories to determine its theoretical and political
destination. This workshop examines the current state of the idea of
indigeneity in a de-territorialized world by exploring the
multi-dimensional formations of political and national identity and
critically assessing the scalar and temporal dimensions of
indigeneity’s sources, contents, and its connectedness with related
concepts. Thus, the workshop will especially investigate the
inter-relationship of spatiality, identity politics and belongingness
to embark on a deep understanding of the futures of indigeneity.

Organisers

Nasir Uddin (Georg Foster Fellow of Alexander von Humboldt
Foundation, Ruhr University Bochum)

Eva Gerharz (Juniorprofessor, Sociology of Development and
Internationalization, Ruhr University Bochum)

Pradeep Chakkarath (Senior Research Fellow, Social Psychology and
Anthropology, Ruhr University Bochum)


Contact:

Dr. Nasir Uddin
Faculty of Social Sciences
Ruhr University Bochum
Gebäude GC 05/ 711
Universitätsstr. 150
D-44801 Bochum
Germany
Email: nasir.ant...@gmail.com
Web: http://www.sowi.rub.de/sozentint/workshop.html




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