In 1687, after he graduated in Medicine, young Antonio Vallisneri (1661-1730) returned in the Duchy of Modena and Reggio. In those years he mainly served as general practitioner; nevertheless, he also devoted many studies to various aspects of the natural sciences. He performed many observations, accurately reporting them in seven “Quaderni”…[Read more]

In 1687, after he graduated in Medicine, young Antonio Vallisneri (1661-1730) returned in the Duchy of Modena and Reggio. In those years he mainly served as general practitioner; nevertheless, he also devoted many studies to various aspects of the natural sciences. He performed many observations, accurately reporting them in seven “Quaderni”…[Read more]

Since the beginning of his scientific activity the physician and naturalist Antonio Vallisneri
(1661-1730) devoted many studies to the Earth sciences. In those years his interest focused
particularly on the features of mineral kingdom and its relationship with spring water. The first
observations date back to the last decade of XVII century,…[Read more]

The scientific studies of the Italian physician and naturalist Antonio Vallisneri
(1661–1730) were concerned with the cultural and religious implications of the debate on
fossils in the early decades of the eighteenth century. In De’ Corpi Marini he summarized the
main diluvial theories but declined to support them. He explained the pre…[Read more]

This paper deals with the identification of the microscope used by the Italian physician and naturalist Antonio Vallisneri (1661-1730) during his research activity. The investigation was structured in three phases: a) a first text analysis on published and manuscript sources, looking for information about the microscope(s) used by Vallisneri; b)…[Read more]

Anton Pannekoek (1873-1960) was both an innovative astronomer and an influential Marxist. In this article we will investigate both his Milky Way research and Marxist philosophy, with special focus on his ideal scholarly persona and the epistemic virtues he advocated in his research. This focus allows us to place Pannekoek in the larger development…[Read more]

Anton Pannekoek (1873–60) was both an influential Marxist and an innovative astronomer. This paper will analyze the various innovative methods that he developed to represent the visual aspect of the Milky Way and the statistical distribution of stars in the galaxy through a framework of epistemic virtues. Doing so will not only emphasize the u…[Read more]

Users of contemporary media technology in religious settings often oscillate between immediacy in spiritual interaction and the increasing complexity and visibility of media technology as human artifacts. Drawing on approaches to mediation from philosophy and media theory, I examine Mauritian Muslims’ uses of sound reproduction in performing a d…[Read more]

This essay discusses anthropological approaches to the study of media interacting with contexts of ethnic and religious diversity. The main argument is that not only issues of access to and exclusion from public spheres are relevant for an understanding of media and pluralism. Background assumptions and ideologies about media technologies and…[Read more]

In this article I suggest that the rapidly growing interest in the intersection of linguistic anthropology and media needs to be accompanied by a deeper investigation of the mediality of language. Discussing Mauritian Muslims’ uses of sound reproduction in religious events revolving around the recitation of devotional poetry, this paper explores h…[Read more]

This review addresses recent work on media practices in situations of religious diversity. I hereby distinguish three approaches in this literature: the media politics of diversity, religious diversity and the public sphere, and the diversity of religious mediations. Whereas the first focuses on the control of representations of religious…[Read more]

Die massenmediale Durchdringung des Alltagslebens ist ein globales Phänomen und stellt die sozialwissenschaftliche Forschung vor wichtige Fragen. Wie beeinflussen Technologien von Film und Fernsehen die Wahrnehmung der uns umgebenden Welt? Oder bestimmt umgekehrt unsere soziokulturelle Wirklichkeit diese Technologien? Welche Akteure sind bei der…[Read more]

In this article, I argue that the groundlessness associated with postmodernism is not as entrenched within its discourse as it may appear. Graham Swift’s Waterland (1992) and Margaret Atwood’s Oryx and Crake (2003), while conforming to many of the aesthetic values of postmodernism, share an ecopostmodernist platform that raises questions and con…[Read more]

Introductory article to a section on changing media and religious renegotiations

In this contribution, I critically engage with the notion of the postsecular through the lens of religious mobilizations among Muslims in Mauritius and in Mumbai. Religious activism among Sunnis in Mauritius and Shi‘ites in Mumbai conforms to a trend of increasingly salient public religion in the world today that has led to widespread doubting o…[Read more]

In this article, I approach regimes of time as a medial question, examining the interplay of different temporalities in ritual and media practices among Hindus in Mauritius and Twelver Shi’ite Muslims in Mumbai. These interactions consist of fluctuations between modernist linear modes of time and suspensions of the distinctions of past, present, a…[Read more]

This paper develops an analysis of documentary sources of chilean’s Public Health Policy of Indigenous Peoples from a critical medical anthropology standpoint. Understanding public policy as ideological productions, it analyses the axis of interculturality, equity and participation in the context of Chile’s governmental “Neoliberal multi…[Read more]

An introductory survey of climate fiction (a.k.a. “cli-fi”) in English. Written with an international readership in mind.

In response to perceived valuation problems giving rise to global environmental crisis, ‘nature’ is being qualified, quantified and materialised as the new external(ised) ‘Nature-whole’ of ‘natural capital’. This paper problematises the increasing legibility, through numbering and (ac)counting practices, of natural capital as an apparently…[Read more]

This engagement highlights the antagonism between wealth and the commodity value form posed at the heart of Marx’s work. In doing so, it considers methodological possibilities for both understanding and intervening in the fabricating of new alienated capitalist values from beyond-human natures.