Bringing Things to Life: Creative Entanglements in a World of Materials April 1, 2010

Timothy Ingold is the Chair of Social Anthropology at the University of Aberdeen. He has done considerable research on life in the circumpolar region of Northern Europe and Asia, particularly on the ways of life and impacts of migration among the Sami. His current project, funded by a 3-year ESRC Professorial Fellowship (2005-08), is entitled 'Explorations in the comparative anthropology of the line'.

Starting from the premise that what walking, observing and writing all have in common is that they proceed along lines of one kind and another, the project seeks to forge a new approach to understanding the relation, in human social life and experience, between movement, knowledge and description. At the same time, and complementing this study, Ingold is researching and teaching on the connections between anthropology, archaeology, art and architecture (the '4 As'), conceived as ways of exploring the relations between human beings and the environments they inhabit. Taking an approach radically different from the conventional anthropologies and archaeologies 'of' art and of architecture, which treat artworks and buildings as though they were merely objects of analysis, he is looking at ways of bringing together the 4 As on the level of practice, as mutually enhancing ways of engaging with our surroundings.

Paper will be circulated in advance - please contact Bruce Braun (braun038@umn.edu), or Christine Marran (marran@umn.edu) for a copy.

Official Website: http://www.ias.umn.edu/collabs09-10/HumanNonHuman.php