EASA 2014: Conferences belong to the most stimulating moments of academic life

On Thursday, 31 July begins one of the most important conferences for anthropology in Europe and beyond - the 13th Biennial Conference of the European Association of Social Anthropologists. Approximately 1,200 anthropologists from around the world are expected to participate in this major international conference, which will take place in Tallinn until 3 August 2014. The conference theme is “Collaboration, Intimacy and Revolution – Innovation and Continuity in an Interconnected World”.

“Our main expectation for this event is to promote the Baltics, and Estonia in particular, as an inspiring location for international researchers to come and carry out their projects,” said one of the conference organizers, Tallinn University professor of anthropology Patrick Laviolette. "It is fortuitous that a major conference addressing such important issues will take place in Tallinn. This year’s conference, which also celebrates the 25th anniversary of the European Association of Social Anthropologists inaugural meeting, takes place a quarter-century after the end of the Cold War and the events that triggered dramatic changes around the world. Along with other Baltic states, Estonia initiated the Singing Revolution, which has been credited for playing a central role in the country’s move towards independence and post-Soviet reformation." 

The influential American anthropologist Elizabeth Povinelli (Columbia University, New York) will deliver the keynote speech. Professor Povinelli has done research on work, politics, intimacy and media with an aboriginal group in Australia since the 1970s. Povinelli’s keynote, entitled “Downloading the Dreaming - All of it extinguished but none of it dead?” will focus on efforts of this group to make a meaningful living in a political climate that Povinelli calls “late liberalism”.

The President of the European Association of Social Anthropologists, Noel B. Salazar (University of Leuven) will be giving a paper, and founding member Adam Kuper (London School of Economics) will discuss the question, whether the mission set by the organization in 1989 has been completed or not.

President Salazar said: “I am sure that all conference participants will have intellectually stimulating encounters and a great time meeting people and getting to know Estonia. At the same time, I expect the buzz that this major scholarly event will create, both inside and outside academia, to give a huge boost to the Department of Social and Cultural Anthropology at Tallinn University. It is a very young department and by organizing this meeting the faculty members have shown how dynamic they are. This is very promising for the future development of anthropology in Estonia and, by extension, the Baltic region. To be honest, I do not have many fears because the conference has been planned so well.” 

One of the organizers, Tallinn University researcher of anthropology Franz Krause explained: “In my opinion, conferences belong to the most exciting and stimulating moments of academic life. This is where we present and discuss the ideas and insights we have developed, mostly on our own and quietly between book shelves and computer screens, with our peers; this is where our propositions and materials are enlivened and exchanged most vigorously; we meet anthropologists who work on similar issues, but are based in far away places; we always meet new, interesting people whom we had never heard of, but who do fascinating work; and we meet some of those famous, established people whom we only knew from book covers and bibliographies before; we have formal discussions about theories and methods, some of which will fill the pages of forthcoming publications; but we also many informal discussions that may lead to future research projects or other collaborations. Conferences thus become the birthplace and workshops of those insights that will be published and taught a few years later.  At conferences, I feel most vividly that academic work is not only about the empirical materials and theoretical models that we develop, but as much about the people in collaboration with whom we do these things. I find this year's conference theme - "collaboration, intimacy and revolution" - captures not only the directions of a set of fascinating developments in social and cultural theory, but also the essence of a good conference.”

“Academics do not generate and exchange ideas in a vacuum, but the context of their thinking and discussing is very important to the making and development of their ideas. This is especially true for the humanities and social sciences, and in particular for anthropologists, who claim that their professional knowledge grows out of just this immersion into particular social and geographical contexts. Holding the conference in Tallinn, with the opening event in the Estonia Concert Hall, the closing dinner at the formerly Tsarist seaplane harbour, and various excursions, formal and informal, to Tallinn Harbour, Medieval Old Town, Lahemaa National Park, and other local sights, means that this setting will be part of what conference delegates think and talk about at the conference. I hope that some of the spirit of Tallinn and Estonia, as a place with a long history of empires and cultures meeting, of political oppression and struggles for freedom, of wars and reconstructions, of tradition and transformation, of natural beauty and artistic innovation, will leave its mark on the knowledge created during the conference,” said Franz Krause.

The 150 discussion panels, film screenings and laboratories during the conference will provide arenas for discussing current anthropological research and developments in social and cultural theory. The 21st century has provided anthropology with new types of data, new methods for research and collaboration, and new interdisciplinary connections. 

Tallinn University’s Estonian Institute of Humanities will be hosting the conference in collaboration with the European Association of Social Anthropologists, the University of Tartu and Riga Stradins University. 

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See the conference website