This interdisciplinary and international Ringvorlesung at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin examines the role of animals in institutional and infrastructural arrangements, past and present. It investigates the processes by which animals are turned into objects, living zoo attractions, museum exhibits, diplomatic tokens, commodities, laboratory tools, data sets, and more. The aim is to understand the trajectories, traffics and transformations of animal-objects within and between different sites in their global, political, scientific and cultural context.

Languages: English and German. 

Mondays, from 16:15 to 17:45 (live digital format)

The Ringvorlesung is free and open to all. Please register by emailing Gloria.Baur(at)mfn.berlin to receive the zoom link, and further technical information.

Organized by the joint research project „Animals as Objects“, Museum für Naturkunde Berlin, Humboldt-Universität Berlin, Zoologischer Garten Berlin AG; in cooperation with the research group „The Body of Animals“, Max-Planck-Institut für Wissenschaftsgeschichte.

Programme

• 09.11.20 Mareike Vennen (HU)
  Introduction: Animals as Objects
   
• 16.11.20 Therese Kienemund (MfN)
  Alfred Keller's Insect Models and the Museum für Naturkunde Berlin
   
• 23.11.20 Lisa Onaga (MPIWG)
  Cocoon Cultures and Life Histories
   
• 30.11.20 Filippo Bertoni (MfN)
  Oozing Objectivities: Knowing Radiolarians, Fuelling Fossil Capital
   
• 07.12.20 Christian Kassung (HU)
  Restlos: Von der Unmöglichkeit, Schweine aufzuessen
   
• 14.12.20 Wilko Graf von Hardenberg (MPIWG)
  Counting Animals: Surveys, Baselines and Models in Nature Conservation
   
• 04.01.21 Clemens Maier-Wolthausen (Zool. Garten)
  ‘Heia Safari!’: Fangexpeditionen des Berliner Zoos in Ostafrika und koloniale Vermarktung
   
• 11.01.21 Marianna Szczygielska (MPIWG)
  Animating Capture: An Elephant Micro-History
   
• 18.01.21 Bernhard Gißibl (IEG)
  The Other Serengeti: Discussing the Naturalness of Elephants in postcolonial Tanzania
   
• 25.01.21 Kerstin Pannhorst (MPIWG)
  „Aus Vergnügen am Wehthun“: Nietzsches Genealogie der Askese
   
• 01.02.21 Lektürewoche
   
• 08.02.21 Britta Lange (HU)
  Die Seidenraupe: Ein (Clastique-)Modell und seine Modellhaftigkeit
   
• 15.02.21 Tamar Novick (MPIWG)
  Bodily Waste as Animal: The Case of Urine
   
• 22.02.21 Tahani Nadim (HU/MfN)
  Reproducing Species in and with Data