In this presentation, I outline and reposition the entangled histories of certain objects, technologies, and rhetoric, to show how consumption and consumer identity are reflected in their combination and that each category is never far from the other two.

A narrated iteration of a recent presentation. I consider this an interim version as I…[Read more]

This entry investigates the connections between neo-populism and neo-conspiracism in the USA. One central thread is the rhetoric of purity that fosters rigid dichotomies of thought about identities, contributing to both populism and conspiracism, eliciting a neologism: conspirapopulism.

For centuries, the story of Lot’s daughters in Genesis is one which has both abhorred and intrigued countless readers. Utilizing the hermeneutical lenses of Narrative and Feminist Criticism, this paper draws attention to overlooked details in the narrative. The story is also contrasted with that of the Levite’s Concubine in Judges 19. The res…[Read more]

This chapter examines the reception of the American ‘flapper’ model and how it was interpreted and translated into the interwar Romanian fashion and beauty discourse, into the 1920s model termed as the ‘modern girl’, as opposed to the ‘new woman’ of the 1930s. It follows the evolution of 1920s styles, including Jazz and Hollywood cultures, J…[Read more]

This essay derives from a conference paper in Spanish titled Figuras de Epimeteo, which revisited interpretations of the Greek myth of Epimetheus, the forgetful brother of Prometheus and the forgotten husband of Pandora. Ivan Illich (1922-2002) and Bernard Stiegler (1952-2020) borrowed the figure of Epimetheus in the process of elaborating an…[Read more]

Dr Farra “Our models are out reality. But our models are not reality!” That coincides with the immortal philosopher Kant who argue we do not perceive the real world – but “representations” of the real world. Similarly, Bargh – from unconscious research – emphasizes mental categories and norms/stereotypes. Jung emphasizes symbols – which he argues…[Read more]

According to the medical tradition, the temperament of bodies came from the balance of their primary qualities – hot, cold, dry, and moist. However, physicians associated additional sensory properties with temperament in the field of pharmacology. These sensations included taste, color, and odor, which allow an appraisal of the constitution and a…[Read more]

In comics: how ancient rabbis upend “traditional” ideas of reproduction, gender, and humanity. A blog post commissioned by UC Press Blog about the book When a Human Gives Birth to a Raven: Rabbis and the Reproduction of Species.

Link: htt…[Read more]

From 40 years of experience it is clear that spirituality has become entangled in abstractions: powers, perfection, supernatural, unreal, limitless knowledge, crystal ball perceptions, etc.
Dr Stephen Farra agreed with that – and went one better. Dr Farra stated “Our models are out reality. But our models are not reality. That coincides with the…[Read more]

This article examines the conflicting representations of plasticity and epigenetics in the work of philosopher Catherine Malabou and evolutionary theorists Mary Jane West-Eberhard and Eva Jablonka. Malabou effaces the unsettled debates within the life sciences in order to speak of a new biological ‘paradigm’ and to attribute values of novelty or…[Read more]

La publicación académica no ha sido objeto de reflexión filosófica, pese a que en las formas que toma actualmente este artefacto cultural está en juego la posibilidad misma de la filosofía, al menos en tanto práctica profesional en el contexto de una economía capitalista del conocimiento. En este capítulo buscamos ofrecer una aproxima…[Read more]

I co-edited this collection of essays about color order and color ordering systems based on a workshop held at TU-Berlin in 2020.
https://bit.ly/Ordering_Colours

I lay out what I believe ethnographers of AI who engage with large language models (LLMs) might want to pay attention to in the next couple of years.
My starting point is that it would be helpful to explore how people are responding to ChatGPT in terms of genre, that people’s reactions to ChatGPT is to treat it at its core as though it is a g…[Read more]

Tras exponer una de las más influyentes críticas del victimismo en la cultura política tardomoderna, la de Wendy Brown, este capítulo analiza un incidente de confrontación discursiva, en torno al acoso sexual y la victimización, entre «nuevos» y «viejos» feminismos mexicanos, para concluir con una reflexión orientada a des-esencializar la condici…[Read more]

Just how bleak is the academic job market for anthropologists? Job ads over the past twenty years reveal some surprises and point to ways departments are seeking to change themselves and the discipline

Pyramid Scheme. #hautalk

Forget the tut-tutting of politicians: The skills you learn in the humanities are exactly the skills you use in a job search.

The quitting economy

“A Friend of a Friend” Is No Longer the Best Way to Find a Job