C-Urge Final Event

From 14th to 20th September 2026, the C-Urge Doctoral Network will gather in Halle (Saale) for its Final Event: “Time to Talk: Urging Climate Science and Communication”. The week-long programme will bring together researchers, experts and project partners to reflect on the project’s results and its potential future applications. It will also provide an opportunity to explore how qualitative research can contribute to understanding and communicating climate urgency across different fields and scales.

Students, colleagues and interested members of the public are warmly invited to join the opening conference, “Qualitative Approaches to Urgent Climate Science”, on Monday, 14th September, at the Institute for Social and Cultural Anthropology, MLU Halle-Wittenberg. For registration please contact us at c-urge@ethnologie.uni-halle.de.

Visit the C-Urge website for more information about the project and the event.

The keynote on the 19th Halle Day of Sociology (Tag der Halleschen Soziologie) delivered by Ilkhom Soliev

ZIRS Member and Member of the ZIRS Board of Directors Ilkhom Soliev delivered the keynote entitled “Response-Able Social-Environmental Transformations: Why and How?”. He introduced examples from Horizon Europe Projects PLANET4B and DAISY as well as iDiv Flexpool Project PrioDiv arguing for 1) the need to take the term “transformations” seriously; 2) being concsious about what kind of transformations we want as a society; and 3) the importance of seeing intrapersonal, interpersonal, and institutional change as integral parts of response-able transformations.

European Research Executive Agency showcases PLANET4B and sister projects

Discover 16 projects making an impact in the conservation, restoration, and wise use of biodiversity, while considering broader social and economic sustainable goals. Read the full article here.

New publication: kritisk etnografi – Swedish Journal of Anthropology, 2024, Vol. 7, Issue 1 “Infrastructures and Environments in Late Industrialism”

The issue includes contributions from ZIRS director Asta Vonderau and ZIRS member Mareike Pampus, available here.

The travel diaries of the botanist Carl Hausknecht

We are pleased to present this recently released publication. The ZIRS is a cooperation partner of the project The Botanist Karl Haussknecht. As part of the project, Christine Kämpfer, Stefan Knost, Kristin Victor, Frank H. Hellwig, Hanne Schönig and Christoph U. Werner have published an abridged “reading version” of the diary texts of Carl Hausknecht. Further information and websites for downloading the two volumes can be found here.

Podcast "Nach der Kohle": Interview mit Felix Schiedlowski

ZIRS-Mitarbeiter Felix Schiedlowski war zu Gast im Podcast “Nach der Kohle”, eine zwölfteilige Reportage-Serie von detektor.fm über den Strukturwandel im Mitteldeutschen Braunkohlerevier. In Folge sieben, “Let’s Talk About Strukturwandel” , berichtet Schiedlowski aus seiner ethnologischen Forschung im Mitteldeutschen Revier. Er äußert sich zu den Hintergründen von Bürgerbeteiligung im Strukturwandel und adressiert Chancen und Fallstricke von Zukunftswerkstätten und einem Bürgerrat zum Kohleausstieg.