The Country of Anthropologists: Creativity, Imagination, and Nation-State Power

This keynote speech kicks off the conference: No country for anthropologists? Contemporary ethnographic research in the Middle East (1–3 November 2018). Many parts of the contemporary Middle East are confronted with war, sectarianism, transnational interferences, uprisings, and a comeback of authoritarian regimes. This brings about difficulties for ethnographic research as a practice of knowledge production based on the immersion of researchers in local communities and the subsequent writing up, publishing, and circulation of texts. Bringing together anthropologists from Egypt, Europe, Iran, Lebanon, Pakistan, Turkey, the United States, and other countries, this conference debates the following questions: What are the obstacles to do ethnography in the contemporary Middle East? What do they teach us about the current role and the future possibilities of anthropology? Full programme here: www.isek.uzh.ch/en/anthropology/ nocountryforanthropologists.