Laboratory: Anthropology of Environment | Human Relations

On Thursday, June 18, 2026, 10 – 12 am CEST, we will meet for a reading & discussion session of Natalia Gutkowski’s amazing book “Struggling for Time: Environmental Governance and Agrarian Resistance in Israel/Palestine” (Stanford University Press, 2024). Struggling for Time examines how time is used as a mechanism of …

In the course of the workshop “Anthropocene Ruptures: Crossing Borders, Building Connections”, Milena Bister (IfEE, IRI THESys & LAEHR) organizes a Field Trip around the Institute for European Ethnology building, connecting Anthropocene debates and colonial legacies. The Workshop is co-organized by the Vienna Anthropocene Network, CTS at Charles University Prague, …

In this presentation, I discuss violence against animals in Mexico as part of a “violent machine.” I argue that by taking a serious look at violence against animals we can gain new insights into how violence in Mexico operates by analyzing how it is connected to other forms of violence …

LAEHR warmly invites to our event series in the current summer term of 2026! Everybody is very welcome to join! —— “A cog in the machine: violence against animals in Mexico”, Iván Sandoval-Cervantes (University of Nevada, Las Vegas) —— In this presentation, I discuss violence against animals in Mexico as part of …

Once a major centre of heavy industries in Europe, Germany’s Ruhr Valley is transitioning into a postcarbon, climate-adjusted ecology and economy. Scholars studying the Ruhr’s “great transformation” as well as key actors in this transformation readily acknowledge that the return of nature above ground depends on the high-tech management of …

In this public session of the Lab, we will be discussing Melanie Garland’s ideas for her upcoming research project. The project reimagines maritime heritage by tracing the colonial, ecological, and cultural resonances of the German–Chilean saltpeter trade, carried by German sailing ships across the 19th century, and its links to …

In this public guest lecture, Marisol Marini (University of São Paulo) will discuss and illuminate the foundations that led to the development of the idea of the Common Body as a diagnostic and fabulative tool in the face of socio-environmental conflicts. The proposition of the Common Body aims to highlight …

Tülin Fidan, a research associate at the German Maritime Museum in Bremerhaven and member of the Lab, will be talking about: Tracing dumped munitions in the North Sea In this talk, I will follow the traces of dumped munitions in the North Sea. After WWII, it is estimated that around …