This seminar is an introduction to qualitative research methods, particularly ethnography. We undertake a rigorous engagement with the history and the concepts shaping ethnographic research, with the practices of research design and fieldwork, and with critical and creative efforts to reimagine ethnography (decolonial, experimental, public, etc.). Crucially, we will not only read about and discuss the fundamentals of ethnography, but also try them out. A central component of the seminar is practical—namely, conducting ethnographic research by experimenting with specific research methods (interview techniques, participant-observation, archival, interaction and talk analysis, collaborative and activist approaches, etc.). The primary assignments for the seminar will be a series of activities and exercises that culminate in a final research portfolio. As part of this portfolio, students will also read and review an ethnography of their choice. Contributions welcome in German or English.

Communities that form around digital games and gaming have become increasingly significant. We may have heard of the ‘toxic’ communities of competitive games like League of Legends, the very young community of Roblox or Minecraft, the friendly history nerds of the Total War series, and so on. Perhaps most impactfully, GamerGate showed us that gaming communities can have very serious and far-reaching consequences. On the other hand, game communities formed around games like Animal Crossing: New Horizons and Among Us at the beginning of the pandemic demonstrated that they can also be a lifeline in difficult and uncertain times. In this seminar, we will focus on how these communities are formed and maintained. We will examine three crucial aspects of community formation: the affordances of particular games, the strategies developers use to create and engage with communities (or not), and the players themselves.

4 SWS
wöchentliche Termine plus Blöcke im Juni 2023

Since the recent uprisings in Iran the slogan Jin - Jiyan - Azadi (Women - Life - Freedom) has spread around the world. Women in the Middle East and beyond use this slogan in solidarity, but also because it speaks to their own struggles. It has been mentioned e.g. in the declaration of solidarity signed by all fractions of the German Parliament and projected on the Brandenburg Gate. But, not all know that this slogan originates from the Kurdish Women's Movement.

In this joint seminar with the University of Rojava, we aim to take a closer look at what we call "epistemologies of struggle" by which we mean the ways in which movements frame their understandings of the world, their goals and strategies.

The autonomous University of Rojava is based in Qamishlo in the North-Eastern Syria – also often referred to as Rojava – which is the site of one of the most interesting current attempts to establish a new form of living together. Despite the war and constant attacks by Turkey, the people in Rojava are trying to build a society based on ideas of grassroots democracy, feminism, ecologically sustainability, and a model of autonomy that aims to be an alternative to national independence in the struggle against – what Kurdish movements have framed as – “internal colonialism” by the states Turkey, Syria, Iraq and Iran.

This seminar aims at discussing the epistemologies of the Kurdish Movement in the light of a broader history of struggles for and debates on self-determination, independence and statelessness, radical democracy, anarchism and anti-capitalism, eco-municipalism and intersectional feminist critique. We want to bring the specific concepts of the Kurdish Movement in dialogue with those of movements in Germany, e.g. the current climate justice movement in Germany (and beyond). What understandings of life, urgency, colonialism, equality, justice, capitalism and its alternatives do these movements envisage? These are some of the questions that we want to research and discuss collectively in the joint seminar.

The seminar is divided into three parts: one preparational and one joint part, followed by reflection sessions. The first part has the aim to give some background knowledge to the situation in Rojava, the history of the Kurdish Question, and to discuss key issues on collaborative learning, as well as to prepare presentations you will hold in the joint sessions. As this seminar is research-based, we do not provide a finished syllabus. Instead, together with the participants, we will decide which topics to address. We therefore ask the participants to actively engage in the shaping of the seminar.

The Bremen-only sessions will take place on Monday afternoons. While the five joint sessions will take place on the following block-dates in June: Sunday, 11.06.2023, Monday, 12.06.2023, Sunday, 18.06.2023, Monday, 19.06.2023, Monday, 26.06.2023, each 12:00 - 16:00.

The seminar will be held in a combination of English and Kurdish. Knowledge of Kurdish, Turkish, Arabic or Farsi is helpful, but not a requirement for this seminar. Simultaneous translation English/Kurdish will be provided in the collaborative sessions. No specific level of English proficiency is required.

Literature:
Akkaya A. H. and Jongerden, J. (2012). Reassembling the Political: The PKK and the Project of Radical Democracy. European Journal of Turkish Studies (14) [Online], http://journals.openedition.org/ejts/4615
Çağlayan, H. (2020). Women in the Kurdish Movement: Mothers, Comrades, Goddesses, Palgrave Macmillian
Flader, U. & Gürer, Ç. (2019). Building Alternative Communities within the State: The Kurdish Movement, Local Municipalities and Democratic Autonomy. In: Niamh McCrea/Fergal Finnegan Funding, Power and Community Development. Policy Press
Flach, A, Ayboğa, E und Knapp, M: Anja Flach (2016): Revolution in Rojava. Democratic Autonomy and Women’s Liberation in Syrian Kurdistan.
McDowall, D. (2004). A Modern History of the Kurds. I.B. Tauris.
Welat Zeydanlıoğlu. 2008.“The White Turkish Man’s Burden”: Orientalism,Kemalism and the Kurds in Turkey, in: Neo-colonial Mentalities in Contemporary Europe? Language and Discourse inthe Construction of Identities, edited by Guido Rings and Anne Ife, Newcastle upon Tyne,UK: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2008, pp.155-174.
Schmidinger T: Rojava: Revolution, War and the Future of Syria’s Kurds.
Film by Mylene Sauloy / ARTE: Syria stellt Frauen gleich, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yEpXUCMSDqA