Research group for the ethnographic inquiry into ecologies, infrastructures, bodies and knowledges
Guest Lecture: Hilal Alkan:  Plant Companions: Affordances of anthropomorphism in migrants’ lives

Guest Lecture: Hilal Alkan: Plant Companions: Affordances of anthropomorphism in migrants’ lives

03 July, 2025, 10:15 – 11:45 a.m., hybrid @IfEE, room 408 & on Zoom

The Lab welcomes Hilal Alkan, a research fellow at Leibniz-Zentrum Moderner Orient (Berlin), for her talk:

Plant Companions: Affordances of anthropomorphism in migrants’ lives

Based on ethnographic research with Turkish migrants in Berlin, this talk focuses on the affordances of plants in migrants’ experiences of emplacement. I ask under which conditions plants become persons and what they offer to their human carers. Putting strands of ontological anthropology in conversation with migration studies, I raise questions about how to approach the materialities of plants and people when they encounter each other under the unsettling conditions of making new homes.

Thursday, 3 July 2025, 10:15 – 11:45.
The session takes place at the Institute for European Ethnology, HU Berlin, room 408 
& on Zoom

Everybody is very welcome!

Optional and additional reading to accompany the talk is available and can be circulated upon request!
For further information, the optional reading, and the Zoom link, please write elisabeth.luggauer@hu-berlin.de