Our workshop offers a multi-modal exploration of anthropology in its broadest sense. Set in the beautiful environs of the Dingle peninsula, participants will engage in contemporary theory and method with research-active scholars. The workshop is open to postgraduate students from the social sciences, in particular anthropology and cognate disciplines. We embrace a multi-disciplinary ethos in the workshop. In 2023, our faculty comes from Sacred Heart University, University College Cork, Dublin City University, Queen’s University Belfast, West Chester University, Aalborg University, Maynooth University, and Technological University Dublin.

Mode: 2 x plenary (1.5hrs); 12 x masterclasses (12 hrs);

9 x reading groups (3.5 hrs), 2 x field trips (6 hrs)

Assessment: 1 x written assessment – optional, if credit needed via University College Cork

Faculty: Isabel Bennett SHU, Tom Boland UCC, Alessandra Cenci AU, Paul Clogher SETU, James Cuffe UCC, Keith Egan IS, Billy Mag Fhloinn SHU, Ana Ivasiuc MU, Jon Lanman QUB, Sean O’ Leary TUD, Maria Loftus DCU, Dáithí de Mórdha SHU, Fiona Murphy DCU, Kevin Power SHU, Raluca Roman QUB, Paul Stoller WCU, Maruska Svasek QUB, Ciaran Walsh IS.

We look forward to welcoming you - go n-éirí an bóthar leat

This workshop is a collaboration between University College Cork, Queen’s University Belfast, Dublin City University and Sacred Heart University and was made possible thanks to the following generous sponsors:

Dingle Campus Office at Sacred Heart University

The Department of Sociology & Criminology at University College Cork

The School of History, Anthropology, Philosophy and Politics at Queen's University Belfast

School of Applied Languages and Intercultural Studies, Dublin City University

Welcome to Sacred Heart University in Dingle.

Our Workshop Hosts.

Sacred Heart University, Fairfield, Connecticut has a dedicated Irish campus in Dingle, County Kerry, since 2002. The aim of SHU in Dingle is to engage US students in a broad global understanding of a variety of disciplinary fields of study. Students experience the rich environment surrounding Dingle and discover how engagement with local people and with Irish educational institutions expands their vision of an international community.

Directors: John Roney & Grace Flannery

Friday, 21^st

14:00 Student Gathering on Campus at An Díseart. 2^nd Floor Main Room.

15:00 Coffee/tea

15:30 Welcome to the Atlantic Anthropological Workshop - Orientation - James Cuffe. Fresco Room.

16:00 Opening lecture: Ritual & Ceremony

P1: Old Rituals and New Needs Billy Mag Fhloinn – Fresco Room.

20:00 Optional Sociality – Dick Macks

Please make your own dinner arrangements this evening. Everyone is welcome to meet later in Dick Mack’s pub for a drink and a chat from 8pm onwards. Dick Mack’s is a famous Dingle (and Kerry) institution - a very beautiful bar with snugs and cosy corners to debate the day’s proceedings.

Saturday 22^nd

08:45 Masterclasses

A1: Anthropologies of the Labour Market. Tom Boland. Main Room, 2nd Floor

A2: New Trends for Techno-Anthropology. James Cuffe. POF Room

A3: “Ireland’s Upanishads”. Kevin Power. Fresco Room

10:15 Coffee/tea

10:45 Masterclasses

B1: Ethnographies of (In)security. Ana Ivasiuc. Fresco Room

B2: Techno-anthropology and participation in the co-design of “ethical AI”. Alessandra Cenci. POF Room

B3: Engaging the past. Raluca Roman. Main Room, 2^nd Floor

12:15 Grab a bite

13:00 Keynote lecture: Prof. Paul Stoller

P2: Doing Public Anthropology in Turbulent Times. Fresco Room.

14:30 break

14:40 Directed Small Session: DSS-1 / DSS-2 / DSS-3 / DSS-4

15:45 Ethnographic Excursion by bus with Dáithí de Mórdha

Sunday 23^rd

09:00 Directed Small Sessions: DSS-5 / DSS-6 / DSS-7 /DSS-8

10:00 Coffee/Tea

10.15 Masterclasses

C1: Unlocking the voice. Maria Loftus and Sean O’Leary. Main Room, 2^nd Floor.

C2: Catching Waves. Maruška Svašek. Outdoors weather permitting or Fresco Room

C3: Between ourselves and all the others. Keith Egan. POF Room

11:45 Coffee/tea

12:00 Masterclasses

D1: The Accidental Anthropologist. Ciarán Walsh. Main Room, 2^nd Floor.

D2: Hermeneutics of Seeing. Paul Clogher. Fresco Room

D3: Dissertation writing for MA students. Fiona Murphy. POF Room

13:30 Lunch

14:00 Keynote lecture: Dr. Jon Lanman

P3: What are we doing? Fresco Room

15:30 break

15:45 Archaeological Excursion with Isabel Bennett

19:00 Parting Meal – Geaneys

20:00 Closing Ceremony with Billy Mag Fhloinn

P4: Music, Magic and Gratitude in McCarthy’s Pub

Plenary Sessions

Old Rituals and New Needs

Billy Mag Fhlionn, Sacred Heart University

This presentation explores the role of ritual and ceremony in contemporary culture, specifically focusing on Pagan Rave. This is an ongoing, performance-based project which aims to reimagine and repurpose the folk traditions and calendar customs of Ireland. It will examine the various sources of inspiration for the project, and the interface between art, academia, ceremony, tradition, and community.

Keynote 1

Doing Public Anthropology in Turbulent Times

Prof. Paul Stoller, West Chester University

In his lecture "Doing Public Anthropology in Turbulent Times," Paul Stoller describes what anthropologists can do to contribute to the social and cultural changes that shape a social future of wellbeing and viability. He shows how anthropologists can develop sensuously described ethnographic narratives to communicate powerfully their insights to a wide range of audiences. These insights are filled with wisdom about how respect for nature is central to the future of humankind. Stoller demonstrates how the ethnographic evocation of space and place, the honing of dialogue, and the crafting of character depict the drama of social life, and borrows techniques from film, poetry, and fiction to expand the appeal of anthropological knowledge and heighten its ability to connect the public to the idiosyncrasies of people and place. Ultimately, his recent work underscores the importance of recognizing and applying indigenous wisdom to the social problems that threaten the future.

Keynote 2

What are we doing? Using anthropology and its neighbours to better understand both general trends and specific cases

Dr. Jonathan Lanman, Queen’s University Belfast

Interdisciplinarity has become increasingly important for many researchers, institutions, and funders. There are, however, several obstacles to interdisciplinary cooperation when it comes to human thought and behaviour. One of the most important is that researchers sometimes have different goals. Two broad goals often found in anthropology, sociology, and psychology are to better understand general causal trends (e.g. what are the key causal factors in explaining why people are religious or not?) and particular case studies (e.g. why did a particular religious movement gain popularity in a particular time/place? Why did a particular person become an atheist?). In this talk, Lanman will argue that we need not see these goals as competing, but, instead, as complimentary enterprises in coming to better understand our world. Lanman will then outline how a team of researchers from multiple disciplines on the Explaining Atheism programme is attempting to put this into practice.

Masterclasses

***Choose one from each group of A, B C and D***

Anthropologies of the Labour Market:

From Jobseekers to Career Guidance Counsellors

Tom Boland, University College Cork

Much like the ‘economy’ the ‘labour market’ is a hyper-object, an abstraction which is produced by academic discourses. Nevertheless, ethnographic studies of particular places, spaces and practices of the labour market can yield a more vivid and concrete understanding of these pervasive and powerful processes. Typically, attention has focused on the spaces of the welfare office, (Coleman, Dalyn, Redman, Wright), and the processes of seeking work (Gershon, Lane, Van Oort, Purser, G. & Hennigan), including digital platforms (Ajunwa, Ofer). In this session, the ‘labour market’ is explored ethnographically as a site of ‘neo-liberal governmentality’ (Brady), stretching from jobseekers to career guidance counsellors, the governed and their effective pastors. The policy orientation towards 'labour market transitions' and 'personal transformation' are explored here as negotiated cultural imperatives. Both academic insights and practical reflections are offered in conclusion.

New Trends for Techno-Anthropology

James Cuffe, University College Cork

This lecture will explore perspectives on technological integration with social life, particularly through the frame of ‘Smart Cities’. Economic drivers, through chasing efficiency, extraction of value, rationalisation of workflows, and automation of mundane tasks, present a certain vision for our social futures. All such themes carry clear potential benefits but also potential risks that receive poor attention until these risks are realised once new processes are socially and politically embedded. Once social risks are embedded they are hard to mitigate. Such a scenario is predicted by Collingridge’s methodological quandary in the Dilemma of Control. How to circumvent? How can we mitigate against future unknown social injustices? This talk proposes liberating technology from its slavery to humanity, to reimagine our techno-social assemblages with ethical intent at its base. We will explore the thinking of Simondon and Hui and non-Western modes of thinking to see how they might inform current and future approaches in the social appropriation of technology.

“Ireland’s Upanishads”:

The Native Wisdom of John Moriarty’s Six Stories

Dr. Kevin Power, Sacred Heart University

In Crossing the Kedron Irish writer and philosopher John Moriarty dives into the lived experience of rural Ireland and resurfaces with stories not of poverty and hardship but of wisdom, spiritual and ecological interconnection, and unique reflections on the human condition. This masterclass will demonstrate the intellectual value of reflecting on rural Irish heritage; the stories and lessons encoded within, the comparison with other cultural contexts, and the insights which can be gained from ‘simple’, non-academic storytelling. Moriarty’s vast knowledge of world religions and spiritual traditions created a grounding for the expression of universal concerns through local storytelling. In the absence of a traditional sacred text, Moriarty presents the Six Stories as “Ireland’s Upanishads”, identifying rural Irish life as a context for exploring the search for meaning that is common to all human societies.

Ethnographies of (In)security

Ana Ivasiuc, Maynooth University

Have you ever really thought about security? Have you ever stopped to think about the ways it so often seems to occupy our minds and everyday practices? Contemporary public spaces often contain signs of (in)security. CCTV keeps a techno-eye out – allegedly – for our safety. Signposts warn us about risks and ask us to be vigilant about what feels strange. “If you see something, say something,” we are prompted. Security companies deploy guards wherever you go – from the supermarket to the club, from the university to the train station. Daily, we get security notifications on our multiple devices. In this master class, we will think about the oversaturation of everyday life with security signs, practices, and discourses. We will ask how we got here. We will reflect on the ways in which security is not always – in fact, often not – a given. We will show how security and insecurity are socially and culturally produced. And I will tell you a story or two about my ethnographic research on the securitization of the Roma, or how they are constructed as a threat and subsequently policed in the urban space of the peripheries of the Italian capital. Suggested reading: Ivasiuc, Ana. 2020. ‘Threatening the Social Order: The Security – Morality Nexus in the Crisis of Capitalism’. Journal of Extreme Anthropology 4 (1): 227–49.

Techno-anthropology and participation in the co-design of “ethical AI”

Alessandra Cenci, Aalborg University

The lecture will give an impression on how to combine concepts and methods from different fields (philosophy, social science, techno-anthropology, design and, data science) to engage end users and other stakeholders in the “ethical design” of AI and technological-digital innovation in liberal democracies. The focus is on a “citizen science” project - the “Sammen Om Demens (SOD) (together for dementia)” - developing an AI-based smartphone app targeting citizens with dementia, that is presented as an illustrative case of ethical, applied AI entailing interdisciplinary collaborations and inclusive scientific practices directly involving citizens by means of participatory-deliberative methods. Accordingly, the participatory Value-Sensitive Design of the smartphone app (a tracking device) is explored and explained across all of its phases (conceptual, empirical and, technical). Namely, from value construction and value elicitation to the delivery, after various iterations engaging both expert and non-expert stakeholders, of an embodied prototype built on and tailored to their values. Here, moral dilemmas and value conflicts, often resulting from diverse people’s needs or vested interests, have been resolved in practice to deliver a unique digital artefact with moral imagination that fulfils vital ethical-social-democratic desiderata without undermining technical efficiency. The co-design methodology devised can positively contribute to more “explainable” and “trustworthy AI” (pillars of the EU strategy for a digital future and to enhancing digital rights) since it allows advancing towards digital innovation that is truly human-centred and society-oriented.

Engaging the Past: Anthropology in and of the Archives,

Raluca Roman, Queens University Belfast

How can anthropologists make sense of the past? And how can fieldwork connect to telling stories of those we have not had a chance to meet? In this session, we will look at the role that anthropologists have in the study of archival materials in their field sites and the role that archives themselves can play in the making and re-making of historical, ethnographic and anthropological knowledge. In so doing, we will first explore not only the ways in which archives constitute a pathway of revisiting and reassessing the past (so-called retrospective ethnography) but the benefits and challenges they pose to anthropologists. Secondly, far from being relics of the past, new approaches to archival work emphasise the importance of a more experimental dissemination of their content, often through performative and artistic representations. Looking at ways in which we can use personal and family archives to tell ethnographic stories, we will explore the interconnected relationship between history and anthropology, as well as the use of the past for ethnographic knowledge. Furthermore, looking at two connected sensorial projects concerning the fate and life stories of circus and Jewish families during the Second World War, projects which took so-called ‘forgotten’ archives with an aim to disseminate them to a broader audience, we will explore the ways in which ‘performing the archives’ highlights both the potentiality of crossing disciplinary boundaries and the importance of a sharing anthropological knowledge beyond a traditional academic audience. Some suggested readings: Kaplan, E. 2002. ‘Many paths to partial truths’: archives, anthropology and the power of representation. Archival Science, 2: 209-220 and Zeitlyn, D. 2010. Anthropology in and of the archives: possible futures and contingent pasts. Archives as anthropological surrogates. Annual Review of Anthropology, 41:461-480

Unlocking the Voice: Narrating the Politically Sensitive

Maria Loftus, Dublin City University & Sean O’Leary, Technological University Dublin

Visual anthropology is not immediately associated with a militant form of representation, but several stalwarts of this filmic genre have indeed elaborated some highly innovative and critically engaged films. One such dissident was the Senegalese director Paulin Soumanou Vieyra whose cinematic contribution is often overlooked, remaining in the shadows of his fellow countryman Ousmane Sembène. In the first section of this master class, Maria Loftus will examine two of Vieyra’s works, prior to and post the independence of Senegal in 1960 and look specifically at how he circumvented draconian censorship through formal intervention, particularly through narration and voice-over. How did he allow the voiceless to speak, some of whom were critical of the French colonial regime whilst still reaching a cinematic audience? In the second half of our talk, the focus will shift to the practical and creative through the facilitation of sound researcher and musician Sean O’Leary. Students will analyse a short segment of a visual and audio recording of a Forcibly Displaced participant of the DCU-led Irish Refugee Integration Network project. The musicality of the voice-over testimonial will be celebrated. Musical features including pitch and rhythmic structures will be derived from voice samples and used by workshop participants collectively, creating a musical accompaniment to the visual anthropological extract and thus enabling these marginal voices to soar.

Catching Waves

Maruška Svašek, Queens University Belfast

This workshop acknowledges the challenges we have as ethnographers when translating fieldwork experiences and materials into accessible outcomes. Inspired by the Atlantic environment, we will explore creative approaches to ethnographic production, in particular poetry and painting. Reading a few ethnographic poems and looking at several examples of graphic anthropology, we will consider their sensorial impact and think about their epistemological strengths and limitations. Encouraged by the sound, sight, smell, touch and taste of the sea, you will then be invited to catch waves, sketching movement and writing poetic lines.

Between Ourselves and all the Others: Philosophical Ideas in Ethnographic Inquiry

Keith Egan

While the projects of philosophical and ethnographic inquiry are often read as somewhat antithetical in method and scope, there is a rich heritage of exchange between the two disciplines, and anthropologists in particular have deployed many important philosophical ideas, e.g. lifeworld, intersubjectivity, being, event, embodiment to great effect. This workshop charts important intersections between these traditions of thought and analysis in the works of Michael D. Jackson, Professor Emeritus of Harvard Divinity School, showing how he has helped ground phenomenological and existential thought in ethnographic fieldwork in Sierra Leone and Central Australia over six decades.

The Accidental Anthropologist

Ciarán Walsh

For the past fifteen years I have been working incrementally on a colonial legacies project that deals with visual representation or, put another way, the making of meaning through historical photographs that have been tagged ethnographical, ethnological and anthropological. In the process I have become an anthropologist, or more precisely, I have been tagged as a philosophical anthropologist. That is, I am perceived by other anthropologists to be engaged in the study of anthropology’s past, and investigating what, if anything, that tells us about anthropologies present. At this point post-doc, I find myself involved in the anthropology of restitution and the restitution of anthropology’s radical other as part of a wider colonial legacies movement. That point coincides geographically with a medieval ruin on the small island of Inishbofin, the anthropological other of which is a display case full of stolen skulls in Dublin. In this session, I describe how this dichotomy became the starting point for the reconstruction of a debate between ’culturals’ and ‘physicals’ in the 1890s that is being reenacted between ‘traditionalists’ and ‘practicals’ today. In this context, I ask you to consider the possibility of an original and existential split between the humanities and science - philosophy and function - and how this might affect the process of becoming an anthropologist today.

Hermeneutics of Seeing

Paul Clogher, South Eastern Technological University

While philosophical hermeneutics has been traditionally concerned with written texts, it equally encompasses more than the written word including how we taste, feel and see. This Master Class will consider the varying ways in which visual culture functions as a site of meaning and interpretation, through the prism of both theological and philosophical hermeneutics

Dissertation Writing Masterclass for MA students

Fiona Murphy, Dublin City University

This practical writing workshop is specifically for MA students who are due to research and write their dissertation this summer 2023. Please bring your research question and project brainstorm to this session with you. The workshop will focus on generating a writing schedule, research strategies, dissertation structures, and creating a peer-to-peer support system. No reading is necessary, but please have your relevant project materials ready on your devices. Please note while structures will vary from participating universities, the workshop will endeavour to give a general overview.

Field Excursions

As Irish weather on the wild Atlantic coast can be unpredictable, bring waterproofs.

Ethnographic Excursion

People & Place on the Dingle Peninsula Dáithí de Mórdha

This excursion will bring students on a guided tour of the environs around Dingle. Dáithí will discuss the impact of the landscape on its people and of the people on the landscape.

Archaeological Excursion

Archaeological Highlights of the area with Isabel Bennett

This excursion will introduce students to some of the better-known Early Medieval sites on the peninsula, all National Monuments of importance.

Directed Small Sessions

**Choose one from A group and one from B group**

A-DSS-1. We Have Been Warned: Old Stories, Modern Messages with Paul Clogher, SETU

This session will explore old stories which warn of the hubris of destructive behaviours disguised as civilizational progress. We will read and apply short texts:

The Picture of Dorian Gray (extract) and self-image as represented in the smartphone.
The myth of Icarus and Elon Musk’s extra-terrestrial expansion.
A story of African tribesmen forced to transport a colonial merchant’s goods and globalisation.

All of these stories have direct implications for contemporary issues, so in this group we will ask the questions: “Why, having been repeatedly warned by our ancestors, do we keep making the same mistakes?”

Reading: The Picture of Dorian Gray (extract)

A-DSS-2: GLAM up Anthropology, Katherina Bock, QUB

Galleries, Libraries, Archives, and Museums (GLAM) have developed alongside human societies formally since the times of ancient Greece and Rome. As such their developments have been intertwined with historical, geopolitical, and socio-cultural developments until today. Analyzing these institutions through an anthropological lens reveals the impact they have (had) on our cultural heritage perception. Moreover, this allows us to address issues of decolonization, democratization, digitization and diversifying the representation and preservation of our past. In this workshop, you will join the discussion of key issues at the intersection of anthropology and museum studies, alongside a practical and playful first attempt at curating an object.

Preparation Exercise:

Step 1: Take an object that is important to you, and put it on a blank piece of paper. Create a spider diagram around it, with reasons why it is important to you. Take a picture of your diagram, with the object, and bring it with you to Dingle.

(This is a very personal exercise so please be mindful of yourself – if an object is important to you but loaded with troubled thoughts, consider choosing something more neutral and prioritize your mental health. In the workshop you will be asked to use your work within a group setting, however, you do not have to share the piece of your work directly with the group if you rather like to keep it (or parts of it private)).

Step 2: Think of different contexts your object could be presented in an exhibition, or if you have seen something similar exhibited before. Would it be in an ethnographic collection or part of a science exhibition – or an avant-garde art installation and why?

Readings:

Salvatore, C. (2021) Libraries, Archives and Museums in the Twenty-First Century. In: Stauffer, S. M. edt. (2021) Libraries, Archives, and Museums – An Introduction to Cultural Heritage Institutions through the Ages. Rowman & Littlefield, Lanham, ML.

A-DSS-3: Localising the parish of empiricism with Tom Boland, UCC

Disputing the universalising and positivistic claims of ‘science’ is a quotidian aspect of contemporary anthropological and sociological theorising. Herein, we will attempt to move beyond critique to understanding the culture of empiricism. The localised, parochial construction of ‘science’ in British Empiricism will be traced historically, before examining the practices of ‘producing truth’ by empirical research.

Readings:

Wierzbicka, Anna 2010 Evidence: Words, Ideas, and Cultural Practices

Wierzbicka, Anna 2010 Making the Familiar Look Foreign

A-DSS-4: Displacement with Judith Atwell, QUB

This reading group considers some of the literature on asylum and will provide a discussion space for some of the crisis issues ongoing in the contemporary moment with respect to asylum and refuge.

Readings:

Mountz, The Death of Asylum, 2020 An obituary

Fiddian-Qasmiyeh, The Right and Role of Critiquing the contemporary patchwork of protection, 2021 .https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/imig.12892

Atwell, Judith, 2022 http://qpol.qub.ac.uk/forgive-us-our-trespasses-nationality-and-borders-bill/

B-DSS-5: For the Love of River with Jennifer Ahern, UCC

If a key component to our current environmental situation is a distorted and exploitative relationship with nature, then what it means 'to relate' needs to be examined. In their paper River Relationships: For the Love of River, Aboriginal Traditional Owners Anne Poelina and Len Collard, together with the Martuwarra Fitzroy River and Bilya Collie River, propose that 'deeply understanding place-relationships', in this case the rivers, can help shift the environmental narrative from one of harm to one of aspiration and 'reawaken what it means to be truly human, in the sense of human-in-relation'. Through the lens of Indigenous epistemologies and posthumanism, this session will consider other ways of being in the world beyond the human/nature dualistic epistemologies of modernity and what this might mean for future climate change mitigation and adaptation.

Readings:

Wooltorton, S., Poelina, A. and Collard, L., 2022. River relationships: For the love of rivers. River Research and Applications, 38(3), pp.393-403

B-DSS-6: Future cities, future humans with Ingrid Glen, UCC

“Smart” technologies are increasingly being incorporated into urban renovation projects and new-build cities. While efficiencies in infrastructure and environmental management aim to increase sustainability, economic development and the quality of life for citizens, questions arise: For whom are these future cities being designed? Who will have the rights to inhabit them?

Readings:

Neuhäuser, C. & Stoecker, R. (2014). Human dignity as universal nobility. In Düwell, M. et al (eds.), The Cambridge Handbook of Human Dignity: Interdisciplinary Perspectives (pp 298-309). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Burchardt, M. et al. (2015) The Infrastructures of Diversity: Materiality and Culture in Urban Space. New Diversities 17 (2), pp 1-13. https://newdiversities.mmg.mpg.de/new-diversities-17-2-2015-the-infrastructures-of-diversity-materiality-and-culture-in-urban-space/2015-172-%e2%80%a2-m-burchardt-s-hohne-a-simone-the-infrastructures-of-diversity-materiality-and-culture-in-urban-space/

Jensen, O. (2020) Atmospheres of Rejection. How Dark Design rejects homeless in the city. Proceedings of the 4th International Congress on Ambiances, Alloaesthesia: Senses, Inventions, Worlds, Réseau International Ambiances, Dec 2020, e-conference, France. pp. 326-33. https://hal.science/hal-03220334/document

B-DSS-7: God’s Eye: Perspectival Shifts in the Pursuit of Meaning with Kevin Power SHU

If a crisis of meaning is one of the ailments of contemporary life, then what might a substantial shift in perspective teach us about our individual and collective motivations for how we live? This session constitutes an imaginative reorientation from multiple perspectives: the mass extinctions of Earth’s past which facilitated the development of human life, what it might be like to ‘be’ a non-conscious entity like a virus, and the notion of cosmological extinction in the form of the heat-death of the universe. By momentarily inhabiting these perspectives, how might we recontextualise our priorities as a species once we return to the here-and-now of the human experience?

No Readings!

B-DSS-8: Design Anthropology: Possibilities for Practice with Morgan Mattingly QUB

In any research, the ethics of the research design – considering both positionality and methods — is important to reflect upon. In this reading group, participants will learn about design anthropology and three conceptualizations described in the assigned article: anthropology of design, anthropology for design, and design for anthropology. We will discuss “good design” and how anthropology can play a vital role, not only because ethnography allows for rich qualitative data to be collected but, because the discipline offers ways to critically reflect on societal injustices. Inclusive design, described in the second online reading/presentation, is about the process of design. Together we will reflect on how these concepts could (and perhaps should) become part of anthropological practice.

Readings:

Murphy, K.M. 2016. “Design and Anthropology,” Annual Review of Anthropology 45, pp 433-449. https://escholarship.org/content/qt1xz8c3q7/qt1xz8c3q7.pdf

https://www.cyber-anthro.com/tag/inclusive-design/

Singh, A., Herrera, N.R., van Dijk, H.W., Keyson, D.V. and Strating, A.T., 2021. Envisioning ‘anthropology through design’: A design interventionist approach to generate anthropological knowledge. Design studies, 76, p.101014

Atlantic Anthropological Faculty 2023

Isabel Bennett

Isabel is an archaeologist and former curator of Músaem Chorca Dhuibhne in Baile an Fheirtéaraigh. She has worked on many excavations throughout Ireland and currently teaches a Certificate course in Archaeology for the Kerry Education and Training Board. Isabel, who sits on the Board of an Díseart, edited the Journal of the Kerry Archaeological and Historical Society for many years, and is a Full Member of the Institute of Archaeologists of Ireland. She edits the website, www.excavations.ie, which contains summaries of all archaeological excavations which have taken place in Ireland. She has published articles on a variety of archaeological topics, and was academic editor for In the Vale of Tralee: The Archaeology of the N22 Tralee Bypass (co-editors Patricia Long and Paul O’Keeffe), published 2020.

Dr. Tom Boland

Tom Boland is a Senior Lecturer and Head of Department of Sociology and Criminology at UCC. His main research interests are in critique, culture unemployment and welfare. His work draws on multiple disciplines, from anthropology through to philosophy, and in particular, historical genealogies of the present - particularly the governmentality of welfare and the discourse of critique. Also, he is a cultural sociologist, with interests in literary theory and cultural studies. He is the co-director of the Economy + Society Summer School with Dr. Ray Griffin (WIT), and similarly the WUERC group.

Dr. Alessandra Cenci

Alessandra is an Assistant Professor in the MA in Techno-Anthropology (TAPAR group – Techno Anthropology and Participation) at Aalborg University, Denmark. She has a background (PhD level) in Philosophy (philosophy of science, philosophy of economics, normative ethics, social epistemology) and Social Science (normative economics, econometrics, mixed methods, ethnographies). At present she strives to apply concepts and methods from these fields to investigate questions of agency, trust, fairness and, democracy underlying the ethical design of AI and technological-digital innovation. Her main research interests are in “citizen science”, "AI ethics by design” and, user/stakeholder engagement in the fields of “technological design for wellbeing” and “AI for social good” (by means of participatory and value-sensitive design methods).

Dr. Paul Clogher

Paul is a theologian researching on the interface between theology and cinema and has a particular interest in the philosophical hermeneutics of Hans-Georg Gadamer. He is Lecturer in Religious Studies and Theology at South Eastern Technological Unviersity since 2011 and Course Director for the MA in Social Justice and Public Policy since 2017.

Dr. James Cuffe

James is an anthropologist with the Department of Sociology & Criminology at University College Cork and co-Director on the MA Anthropology. He is a recipient of the Irish Research Council Laureate award in 2022. His IRC funded ethnographic study concerns the social impact of new technologies through a Simondonian lens (technosocial assemblages). James became intrigued by the speed of technological change in China’s cities during his ethnographic fieldwork in China and his research interests now focus on the impact of technology on social and cultural life. James is particularly interested in the philosophy of technology and how such theories can be enriched through ethnographic research and anthropological understanding. His most recent book is “China at a Threshold” (Routledge: 2020) explores the impact of technosocial change in a dictatorship. He is a Fellow of the Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain & Ireland and was General Editor of the Irish Journal of Anthropology from 2014 to 2019.

Dr. Keith Egan

Keith works on European pilgrimage itineraries such as the Camino de Santiago and Medjugorje, and his research interests include philosophical approaches to reading contemporary religious phenomena and practices in the wake of seemingly declining engagement with historically popular religious forms.

Professor Billy Mag Fhloinn

Billy has a Ph.D. in Folkloristics, and a B.A. in Archaeology from University College Dublin. As well as lecturing and tutoring at university level, he also works with Irish television for RTÉ or TG4, but occasionally for international productions, including the BBC, PBS or the National Geographic Channel. He is also an accomplished musician and occasionally works as a tour guide in the Dingle Peninsula. He has taught courses with Sacred Heart University in Dingle in Celtic Religion and Mythology as well as Irish Folklore and History since 2014. Billy’s scholarly interests include pre-Christian religious practices and beliefs, prehistoric archaeology, and folk practices of early modern Ireland. In 2016 he published a book entitled Blood Rite: The Feast of St. Martin in Ireland.

Dr. Ana Ivasiuc

Ana is a Lecturer in the Anthropology of Crime and Security at Maynooth University. She works on urban insecurity, formal and informal policing, security practices of the far-right in Europe, and the securitization of Roma groups. She carried out ethnographic research in the peripheries of Rome, where she observed the racial policing of the Roma, as well as grassroots practices of informal policing. Since 2020, she is a co-convener of the Anthropology of Security network of the European Association of Social Anthropologists. She is currently President of the European Association of Social Anthropologists.

Dr. Jon Lanman

Jon is Senior Lecturer in Cognitive Anthropology and Assistant Director of the Institute of Cognition and Culture at Queen’s University Belfast as well as Principal Investigator of the Explaining Atheism programme (2022-2024). His work on atheism and secularization utilizes both cognitive and social anthropology and aims to provide an account of why some individuals become theists and others become non-theists, why some nations have higher proportions of non-theists than others, and why some non-theists engage in anti-religious social action. While his geographic area of interest is international, his work has focused on the North Atlantic world and, more recently, Japan. In addition to his work on atheism and secularisation, he has also collaborated with Harvey Whitehouse (Oxford) and others to investigate the effects of ritual participation on self-identity, group cohesion, and extreme pro-group action and has written on philosophical challenges in the scientific study of religion.

Dr. Sean O’Leary

Sean is a Lecturer in the school of Computer Science TU Dublin, specialising in sound analysis and synthesis. Before joining TU Dublin he was a member of the analysis/synthesis team in IRCAM, Paris. Previous work includes analysis and synthesis of musical instrument tones, polyphonic pitch analysis and sound texture synthesis.

Dr. Maria Loftus

Maria is an assistant professor in French language and French literature and cinema in the School of Applied Language and Intercultural Studies. She completed her PhD in Sub-Saharan African Documentary Cinema at Université de Strasbourg. Her research interests also pertain to Pocket Cinema and Students as creators of Interactive Video Content in the language learning classroom. She embraces any opportunity to bring the multimodal into her teaching.

Dr. Fiona Murphy

Fiona is an anthropologist based in SALIS in Dublin City University. As an anthropologist of displacement, she works with Stolen Generations in Australia and people seeking asylum and refuge in Ireland, the United Kingdom and Turkey. She has a particular passion for creative and public anthropologies and is always interested in experimenting with new forms and genres. She is co-author of Integration in Ireland: The everyday life of African migrants in Ireland (Manchester Uni Press: 2012) and you can watch her Tedx talk on displacement on youtube.

Professor Dáithí de Mórdha

Dáithí is an ethnologist and historian from Co. Kerry, Ireland. He attained a degree in History & Irish from NUI Galway in 2005, a master’s degree in Ethnology from University College Cork in 2012, and a PhD in Ethnology from UCC in 2019. He is currently adjunct instructor in History & Anthropology in SHU Campus Dingle. His areas of interest includes Folk Memory, Indigenous Knowledge and Verbal Artforms, Oral & Folk History, and Visual Anthropology. He is also interested in ideas and concepts of race, and in how to use folk memory and oral history to inform historical research and teaching. He is a former Director of the Great Blasket Heritage Centre in West Kerry, a Centre dedicated to the memory of the people of the Blasket Islands.

Dr. Kevin Power

Kevin received his PhD in Philosophy from University College Cork in 2015. He has lectured in philosophy of mind, environmental ethics, philosophy of death and dying, as well as writing and delivering a unique module entitled 'The Philosophy of Interdependence' for UCC's Adult Continuing Education programme, and teaching Bioethics at the Dingle campus of Sacred Heart University. His research interests are philosophy of mind (in particular metaphysics of self), ecology, mysticism and the Irish philosopher John Moriarty.

Professor Paul Stoller

Paul, author of 15 books, is Professor of Anthropology at West Chester University, USA and Permanent Fellow at the Center for Advanced Studies in the Humanities and Social Sciences at Friedrich Alexander University (FAU) Erlangen-Nuremberg, Germany. In his more than 35 years of anthropological research and writing. Stoller has conducted ethnographic research on Songhay religion in Niger and the life of West African street traders in New York City. In his most recent work Stoller investigates how indigenous wisdom can not only enhance social well-being but also help to heal a troubled world—a key element in his longstanding practice of public anthropology. He has received many awards for his work including a Guggenheim Fellowship, the Anthropology in Media Award and the Anders Retzius Gold Medal in Anthropology.

Professor Maruška Svašek

Maruška Svašek is Professor of Anthropology in the School of History, Anthropology, Philosophy and Politics at Queen's University, Belfast, and Fellow at the Senator George J. Mitchell Institute for Global Peace, Security and Justice. Recent major publications include Anthropology, Art and Cultural Production (2007), Emotions and Human Mobility: Ethnographies of Movement (2012), Moving Subjects, Moving Objects: Transnationalism, Cultural Production and Emotions (2012), and (with Birgit Meyer) Creativity in Transition. Politics and Aesthetics of Cultural Production Across the Globe (2016).

Dr Raluca Roman

Raluca is a lecturer in Social Anthropology at Queen’s University, Belfast. She is interested in the anthropology of religion, morality, humanitarianism, and migration, and has conducted fieldwork with Roma communities in Finland and Romania. Her more recent research interests include the study of artificial intelligence (including the production and marketisation of sex robots), transhumanism and human enhancement technologies.

Dr. Ciarán Walsh

Ciarán graduated from art college in 1984 and migrated from visual arts to visual anthropology over three decades. In 2010, he curated an internationally acclaimed exhibition of photography by John Millington Synge and this brought the photography of Alfred Cort Haddon into focus. He developed the highly regarded ‘Head-hunter’ project between 2010 and 2015 and his ground-breaking research led to a PhD in 2020. Walsh's work on Haddon's role in the skull measuring business is widely regarded as an original contribution to the current engagement with colonial legacies. He works as a freelance curator and writer, and is working on a book/exhibition that traces the connections between Haddon and Synge.

Additional facilitators

Jennifer Ahern

Jennifer is a practising multi-disciplinary artist with a B.A. in Fine Art from the Crawford College of Art and Design. Since graduating in 2015 she has exhibited both nationally and internationally and is the director and co-founder of Over the Line Studios, an Arts Council supported ceramic and fine art studios in Cork city. Driven by a huge concern for the environment and climate change, she recently received her MA in Anthropology from University College Cork, specialising in environmental anthropology; exploring the intersection between humans and the environment, the relationship between nature and culture and how values shape our landscapes. Jennifer is currently pursuing a PhD with the Environmental Research Institute as part of the University of Plymouth and UCC Doctoral Training Program. Combining her MA research with her artistic practice through arts based community engagement, her current research focuses on sustainability framings for transformative change. A transdisciplinary approach that investigates stories, shared narratives and worldviews to reimagine resilient coastal communities in the face of climate change.

Judith Atwell

Judith is a PhD researcher in HAPP and SSESW, QUB. Her research is on refugee resettlement and integration.

Katherina Bock

Katharina is a PhD student and Horizon 2020 Marie Skłodowska-Curie Fellow in the Department of Film Studies in the School of Arts, English and Languages at Queen’s University Belfast. Within her current research she focuses on strategies and possibilities for the use of digital storytelling in education and outreach projects working within a practice-based research framework.Which particularly aims to promote community development using the Prison Memory Archive (PMA) in Northern Ireland as a case study. Her interdisciplinary academic and professional background is shaped by Physics and Languages in formal and informal education, as well as museum education and outreach with a focus on (natural) science communication.

Ingrid Glen

Ingrid is a PhD Anthropology Candidate researching the intangible importance of choice for humans in future cities. She studied art history at the University of East Anglia and information science at City University, London, before working as a research and knowledge management professional within the financial services industry. She developed her interests in spatial and material culture and the use of walking and artistic methods for research during her MA Anthropology. Her MA dissertation used urban wayfinding as an autoethnographic strategy for understanding language learning in Morocco.

Morgan Mattingly

Morgan is a Horizon 2020 Marie Skłodowska-Curie early stage researcher from Queen's University Belfast (QUB). Her current work explores the education experiences and digital resources of refugees and asylum seekers (RAS) to find ways to address education gaps and the digital divide by working with 16+ RAS to design solutions. An interdisciplinary researcher bridging Anthropology and Education, Morgan also has an academic background in communications, English literature and conflict transformation & social justice. Other interests include ESL, e-learning, inclusion, equity, trauma-informed practices, anthropology of design, the Capabilities Approach, UDL, education policy and the impact of education on civic participation and integration.

Molly McGrath

Molly is a linguistic anthropologist currently working in the academic publishing industry. She is also a research assistant with the IRC funded CyberSocial project at University College Cork and administrator for Atlantic Anthropological Workshop 2023. Her interests include minority languages such as Irish and Basque and informal economies, exploring the multiple cultural contextualisation’s of artefacts across different thematic planes.

Guidance notes:

Please note student housing is self-catering. When you arrive you will be shown to your housing by a member of the workshop team. There are kitchen facilities in each house. Please leave the houses as you find them and ensure you follow house rules. There is a SuperValu and Lidl in Dingle town within walking distance of your houses.

Dingle town is jampacked with cafes, restaurants and bars so plenty of options to eat out https://dingle-peninsula.ie/food-drink.html. If your home university requires you to fill out a risk form before you depart, please do so. Please respect the workshop rules and also Sacred Heart and Dingle community property which has been so generously offered to us.

Food and drinks are at your own cost, with the exception of dinner on Sunday night which is funded by the workshop and will take place in Geaneys https://www.paulgeaneysbar.ie/. If you have any dietary requirements or allergies, please let one of the workshop organisers know in advance, so it can be noted.

The weather in Dingle can be very mixed and often very rainy ! Please ensure you have enough clothing, proper footwear and most importantly, rain gear for our outdoor excursions ! If you wish to book any tours independently, there is a tourist office in Dingle which can advise https://www.dingle-peninsula.ie/visitor-enquiries.html.

Contacts:

Fiona: fiona.b.murphy@dcu.ie

James: jamescuffe@ucc.ie

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