Events Archive
On February 13, 2023, Dr. Viola Müller will represent the BCDSS at the Kinderuni, where she will give a lecture on the History of Sugar. Abstract: Sugar is in chocolate, cola, gummy bears, and adults use it to sweeten their coffee. It also hides in yogurt, tomato sauce, and chips. Sugar is everywhere. But has it always been around? Where does it come from? Did it always look the same? Who made it in the past, and who is making it today? Dive into the history of sugar!
This week, Christian Laes is looking forward to a lively discussion of and feedback on his presentation “Writing the histories of slavery in Antiquity. How to go forward?” After a brief overview of the study of slavery in the ancient world, he will point out possible paths for the future: renewed attention to Late Antiquity and the transition period between Antiquity and the Middle Ages, and the promising topic of agency.
This time, PhD Guest Researcher (University of California, Berkeley) Sara Eriksson will present her research project "The Average Person – Looking for Enslaved Labor at Hellenistic Kalaureia".
For this week's Friday Seminar, Heinrich Heinen Kolleg Fellow Hillary Taylor discusses her project “Violence at Work in Early Modern Britain and its Overseas Territories”. This presentation will consider violence and labour discipline in Britain and the British Atlantic, c. 1550-1800. Among other topics, it will examine ‘employers’ commentaries on the relative utility of using violence to manage and discipline workers; how various categories of workers responded to such violence; and how the legal system mediated these aspects of labour relations.
In this Friday Seminar, Heinz Heinen Kolleg Fellow John Agbonifo will speak on his research project “Neither Slave nor Free Labour? Understanding Labour Relations between Monarchy and the Bronze Guild in Ancient Benin Empire”. More information tba.
This week, Julie Miller is looking forward to a lively discussion of and feedback on her presentation, “A History of the Person in America.” Her book-in-progress explores expressions of the idea of a "person" in American politics from the drafting of the U.S. Constitution to the Civil War. This presentation will offer a brief introduction to the project while lingering a bit on the questions, historiographies, and sources that inspired it. Event registration via email (s. below)
This week, Carolina González is looking forward to a lively discussion of and feedback on her presentation, "’With her personal service’: Domestic work, manumission and judicial records. Enslaved and freed women in colonial Chile". This presentation describes the uses of justice by enslaved people in colonial Chile and focuses on the relationship between the so-called “domestic work- affective labor” and the forms of self manumission of enslaved-freed women, especially in Santiago city between 1770-1823.
In this week’s seminar, Stephan Conermann will throw some light on the question “How and Where to Apply for Funding?” and talk about the German funding systems and opportunities.
This week, Raquel R. Sirotti, BCDSS research group leader and postdoctoral researcher at the Max Planck Institute for Legal History and Legal Theory in Frankfurt, Germany, discusses her project "Mutual Dependencies and Normative Production in Africa." The presentation will approach the concept of mutual dependencies and argue that it can be a useful tool for understanding the production of law in colonial contexts. Using as examples the case studies developed in the junior research group Mutual Dependencies and Normative Production in Africa, I will suggest that the interaction, recognition, and even creation of local intermediaries by colonial agents implied mutual transformations of traditional and state authorities. The actions of these individuals not only contributed to the construction of hybrid models of colonial rule in Africa, but also shaped the regulation of indigenous labour exploitation and the mechanisms of punishment and social control of local populations.
In our panel discussion “Diversity in German Academia - A Reflective Look at the Current State”, scholars and activists will take stock of how German universities and research institutions currently attend to the matter of equal opportunities and diversity. The panel discussion is designed to provide a space for the exchange of experience and knowledge: panelists will critically consider measures and processes of change within institutions and reflect on how to further strengthen diversity awareness. The discussion will also be opened up to address questions from the audience. The panel is organized by the Equal Opportunity and Diversity Unit and the BCDSS; it is part of this year’s Germany-wide Diversity Days (23-24 May 2023) at Bonn University, organized for the second time by the Pro-Rectorate for Equal Opportunities and Diversity.
Join us for the book launch of Prof. Dr. Christoph Witzenrath's latest publication "The Russian Empire, Slaving and Liberation, 1480-1725", followed by a discussion with Prof. Dr. Martin Aust regarding the book's content. The De Gruyter book series of the Bonn Center for Dependency and Slavery Studies holds publications that examine different phenomena of slavery and other forms of strong asymmetrical dependencies in societies. The series follows the BCDSS research agenda in going beyond the dichotomy of slavery versus freedom. It proposes a new key concept, strong asymmetrical dependency, which covers all forms of bondage across time and space. This includes debt bondage, convict labor, tributary labor, servitude, serfdom, and domestic work, as well as forms of wage labor and various types of patronage. To register, please send a mail to events@dependency.uni-bonn.de.
This week, Stephan Conermann is looking forward to a lively general discussion of labor-related asymmetrical dependencies and mobility. Research Area D explores workers’ practices for coping with dependency, for reducing the degree of coercion and for expanding their own autonomy. By looking at (a) individual and collective everyday practices, (b) organizations, (c) relationships with institutions (e.g. the use of laws and norms), and (d) anti-systemic practices, Research Area D will make it possible to map dependency on an alternative scale, between autonomy and coercion, and to increase the awareness of the dependents’ scope of action and their options for social mobility. Against this backdrop, the two attached texts will be discussed.
In this Friday Seminar session, Marçal de Menezes Paredes, Associate Professor at the Pontifícia Universidade Católica do Rio Grande do Sul (PUCRS), Brazil, is looking forward to a lively discussion of and feedback on his project “From Supporters to Cooperants: regarding the Canadian Toronto Committee for the Liberation of Southern Africa (TCLSAC) in its relationship with FRELIMO in Mozambique in the 1970s.” The presentation will present a historical overview of this transnational activity that connected the Global North and South and fostered commitment among comrades and cooperants. For a more detailed description, please see the abstract attached. To register, please drop an email entitled "Friday Fellows Seminar" with your name and the date of the seminar to Laura Hartmann.
This week, Mònica Ginés-Blasi, Marie Sklodowska Curie Action Fellow at the Institut d’Asie Orientale of the École Normale Supérieure in Lyon (2022-24) and former BCDSS Fellow, will discuss her project “Trading Chinese Migrants: Networks of Human Trafficking in Treaty Port China (1830-1930s).” This presentation will suggest a comprehensive view of the so-called “coolie trade”, which was an international imperial enterprise central to the Western incursion in China, and it involved strong and peripheral Western nations alike, becoming the single most transversal item of interest of Western imperial colonialism in the nineteenth century. To support this wide understanding of the coolie trade, Mònica will focus on four case studies to challenge the established views in the historiography which situate the trade mostly in Latin America and the Caribbean, within a defined chronology – from 1847 to 1874 – and which portray “coolies” as mostly male and adult, as well as generically Chinese.
This week, Roberto Hofmeister Pich (Pontifícia Universidade Católica do Rio Grande do Sul (PUCRS), Brazil) is looking forward to a lively discussion of and feedback on his talk “Restitution of What? Characterizing Discourses on Abolition of Black Slavery, Guilt, and Reparation in Latin American History”. The lecture focuses on philosophical and theological literature, by Iberian and Latin American authors, from the 17th to the 19th century, that provide normative evaluations of transatlantic slave trade and slavery in colonial societies. The main idea is to characterize the initial perception of guilt and the need of reparation towards enslaved Africans in 17th-century literature on the subject and how in 19th-century discourses on abolition, especially in Brazil, an articulated account of "restitution" is basically a missing item.
This week, our guests Emma Christopher (University of New South Wales, Australia) and Bryce Beemer (Duke Kunshan University, China) are looking forward to a lively discussion of and feedback on their respective projects. (1) Emma Christopher, “’The Territory is Life’: Slavery, Freedom and the Fight for Survival in the Río Yurumanguí, Colombia”: This paper explores a community that has fought for its territory for 400 years through slavery and into legal freedom, eventually gaining collective land rights in May 2000, but remains in an often deadly fight over it. (2) Bryce Beemer, “Creolization Theory and Southeast Asia: Slavery and Cultural Exchange in Precolonial Burma, c. 1750-1850”: Creolization theory beneficially illuminates the agentive power of the enslaved in processes of culture building and community reinvention. This discussion will engage the potential benefits and pitfalls of adapting creolization theory to the Southeast Asian context.
Karolyne M. Moreira, “Incarnated spirits: ’sorcery’, mutual dependencies and normative production in southern Mozambique (1890–1940)”: In this talk, Karolyne focuses on presenting the normativity of sorcery as a language of power. She seeks to demonstrate how Portuguese colonial policies around ‘sorcery’ and local social discourses around belief in spells both resulted in the establishment of mutual, yet deeply asymmetrical, dependencies. Mauro Manhanguele, “Language, power and mutual dependencies: Interpreters and justice administration in Colonial Mozambique, 1895-1974”: This study seeks to understand the role played by African interpreters in the colonial administration and justice system. By focusing on the case of Mozambique, it assumes that these agents not only participated in the creation of colonial law but also produced it.
Join us for this year’s Wissenschaftsfestival, the University of Bonn's Science Festival! With a diverse program for all ages, the university's vice-rectorates, six transdisciplinary research areas, and excellence clusters will showcase their work. All students, university members, and citizens of the region are invited to come together and enjoy this day while experiencing science up close! In addition to an exciting stage program, there will be a family science rally, and many exciting hands-on activities for all age groups. The BCDSS will offer a “pop-up lesson” on child labor, its history and engaging activities like weaving against the clock. We look forward to seeing you, your families, and friends!
This week, our fellow Matthew Dziennik is looking forward to a lively discussion of and feedback on his project “Soldiers, Slavery, and Dependence in West Africa, c. 1750‒1850.” Between c. 1750 and c. 1850, British authority in West Africa and the wider Atlantic World rested on the labor of enslaved African soldiers. This presentation analyzes British efforts to recruit manpower as a window into slavery, dependence, and imperialism in the Age of Revolutions. It reveals the often counterintuitive ways in which assumptions about slavery and dependence were inverted by efforts to recruit and deploy soldiers.
Join the panel discussion "Colonial Traces in Bonn - the Long Road to a New Culture of Remembrance?" organized by Fernuni Hagen. Prof. Dr. Stephan Conermann will be speaking on behalf of the BCDSS and University of Bonn. The event will be held in German. What is colonial in the city of Bonn? Which traces can still be found today, how are they dealt with in society, politics, media and research? Especially recently, civil society, the university and municipal institutions have formulated more advanced approaches and debates that challenge familiar images of history. Does this only add to the generally known urban history or does it lay a completely new, postcolonial foundation for an inclusive culture of memory? Please register by July 11, 2023 at: campus.bonn@fernuni-hagen.de
Join us on Monday, October 30, 2023, at 18:15 CET for a reading and discussion evening with Mareice Kaiser, BCDSS Principal Investigator Karoline Noack and Jean-Pierre Schneider, Director of Caritas Bonn, about the dependency relationships behind the unjust distribution of money and how this could be overcome. The event is a cooperation between the BCDSS and the Adult Education Center (VHS) Bonn.
This week, our fellow Justin Roberts is looking forward to a lively discussion of and feedback on his project “Fragile Empire: Slavery in the Early English Tropics, 1645-1720.” As a framework, the global tropics offers us a new way of thinking about the origins of slavery in the English empire. The English took advantage of a wide variety of bondage systems to support their commercial and territorial expansion in the global tropics. By the 1680s, one variant of racial slavery had outcompeted other forms of bondage within the empire. It was marked by its permanence, its heritability, its impermeable boundaries, and its distinct brutality. It was associated with the tropical zone. The dominance of this genus of bondage shaped the ongoing threats of insurrection and invasion in England’s expanding tropical empire.
This week, our fellow Thiago Sapede is looking forward to a lively discussion of and feedback on his project "The muleke (“Church slaves”) in the 18th and 19th Centuries Kingdom of Kongo”. This presentation analyzes the complex role and status of the mulekes (“Church slaves”) in 18th and 19th century Kingdom of Kongo. The mulekes played a prominent role in Kongo catholic missions, working in the catholic convents in mbanzas (towns) and following European missionaries to the voyages throughout the country. These characters will reveal interesting clues to Central African forms of slavery and their intersection with European-colonial forms of dependency. PS: Please note that the seminar will be from 13:00 - 14:30 CET instead of the usual 16:00 - 17:30 CET. Please make sure to adjust your schedule accordingly.
"Workingman's Death" is a visually stunning and emotionally resonant documentary that delves into the lives of laborers from different corners of the world. Directed by the Austrian filmmaker Michael Glawogger, the unique approach to storytelling, masterful cinematography, and commitment to capturing the essence of humanity have made "Workingman's Death" an enduring and thought-provoking piece of cinema. Glawogger takes viewers on an odyssey that exposes the harsh realities faced by laborers in five distinct locations: the coal mines of Ukraine, the sulfur mines in Indonesia, the ship-breaking yards in Pakistan, the slaughterhouses in Nigeria, and the steelworks in China. The film confronts the disturbing aspects of these workers' lives, exploring human perseverance in the face of extreme hardship. Don't miss the after-screening discussion & reception with BCDSS PhD researcher Ayesha Hussain, led by Cécile Jeblawei (BCDSS) and Sigrid Limprecht (Kino in der Brotfabrik).
This week, guest lecturer Peter Marx (University of Cologne) is looking forward to a lively discussion of and feedback on his project "'Unehrlich' [Insincere] and marginalized: On the precarious status of performers in the Early Modern period." The legal status of performers – actors, dancers, musicians, media performers – was highly precarious throughout the Early Modern period. Looking more closely into the field, it becomes obvious that this status reflects more general questions of freedom, social status and a field of arts that was an intrinsic part of the social fabric, yet always confined to the margins. The paper tries to sketch some outlines for future research in this field in the perspective of a connected history (Subrahmanyam).
"Tori and Lokita" depicts multiple forms of strong asymmetrical dependencies connected to migration from Africa to Europe. Two young refugees from Benin and Cameroon form a makeshift safety net for one another in the absence of blood relatives while they are facing marginalization, coerced labor, child labor, sexual exploitation, criminilization and further forms of oppression in Belgium. The film screening will start at 18:30 CET, followed by a discussion at 20:00 CET. The dicussion will be kick-started with input from BCDSS Professor Claudia Jarzebowski and PhD Researcher Boluwatife Akinro, as well as Professor Britta Hartmann and Lucas Curstädt of the Media Studies Department, University of Bonn. The discussion will be held mainly in German, however, contributions in English are welcome, and we will translate where necessary. The entire event is free of charge for everyone. Please REGISTER BY 27 September, 5 pm, via: pr@dependency.uni-bonn.de.
This week, we'll have a Fellows Block Seminar, including book and project presentations, which will also be the last one for this academic year (2022/23)! We're looking forward to the following presentations: 1) 11:00-12:00 Katja Makhotina, HHK Fellow (book presentation) Title: “Monastery and prison. Places of Confinement in Western Europe and Russia from the Middle Ages to the Modern Age”, edited by Katja Makhotina, Falk Bretschneider, Natalia Muchnik, Martin Aust. Moscow 2022 2) 12:30-13:15 Ulbe Bosma, IISH Amsterdam (project presentation) Title: “The Global South in the Age of Early Industrial Capitalism: Commodity Frontiers and Social Transformations (1816-1870)” 3) 13:30-14:15 Emmanuel Saboro, University of Cape Coast (project presentation) Title: “Sites of Memory: Visuality and Metaphors of Slavery in Ghana” decades of the twentieth century. 5) 15:15-15:30 Stephan Conermann (wrap up) For more info, check the link below.
We are very pleased that Trevor Burnard and Damian Pargas have offered to present and discuss their new books with us! Trevor Burnard, Writing the History of Global Slavery (Cambridge Elements, Cambridge University Press), forthcoming (November 2023) Damian Pargas (ed., together with Juliane Schiel), The Palgrave Handbook of Global Slavery throughout History (Palgrave MacMillan), June 2023 The discussion is moderated by BCDSS postdoctoral researcher Viola Müller and is followed by a reception.
Over the past five years, a project team based at the International Institute of Social History (IISH), Amsterdam has developed the ESTA Database structure in collaboration with international partners. The ESTA project has established a relational database model that is able to accommodate structural differences in source material and (existing) datasets relating to different parts of the Indian Ocean and maritime Asia region. Currently (2023), the database contains over 4,000 slave trade voyages across the maritime Asia region between roughly 1600 and 1850. The number of enslaved persons transported during these voyages range from at least 340,000–342,500 to 600,000 individuals. IISH and BCDSS are closely linked not only by their collaboration on this project but also by an international partnership. 13:30 Welcome 13:45 Launch of ESTA Database 14:30 Comments 15:00 Open Discussion and Q&A 16:30 Reception Registration required due to limited seating!
"Ecological Transition and the Dependency Trap: Challenging Old Approaches to Sovereignty". Sabrina Fernandes is a Brazilian sociologist and political economist with a PhD from Carleton University, Canada. She has researched transitions and ecology for over a decade, with expertise on Latin America. Formerly a postdoctoral fellow with the Rosa Luxemburg Stiftung, with research appointments at the University of Vienna, Freie Universität Berlin, and University of Brasília, she has recently completed a fellowship with the Centre of Advanced Latin American Studies at the University of Guadalajara focused on the Anthropocene and the topic of sacrifice zones. She was also a contributing editor at Jacobin Magazine and chief editor of Jacobin Brazil. Her books and articles cover various fields and her publications can be found in English, Portuguese, Spanish and other languages. Currently, she is Head of Research at the Alameda Institute.
Join the Facebook Live discussion and Q&A featuring the former BCDSS Bonn-Yale-Anton-Wilhelm-Amo-Fellow Dr. Frank J. Cirillo and his new LSU Press book, "The Abolitionist Civil War: Immediatists and the Struggle to Transform the Union." The presentation will take place from 2–2:30pm, followed by a 10-minute Q&A.
Join the book presentation and discussion with Dr. Jeroen Wijnendaele, postdoctoral researcher in Prof. Dr. Julia Hillner's project "Connecting Late Antiquities". This book delves into the significant political, social, economic, religious, and cultural changes that shaped a crucial region of the Roman world during the second quarter of the first millennium CE. Key features include its status as the first modern research volume on Late Antiquity's core region, a tight chronological focus on the transformation of Late Roman Italy, and a balanced exploration of topics like gender and environmental history. The volume reevaluates the pivotal transition in Late Antiquity, specifically the shift from the Roman Empire to autonomous kingdoms in Italy between 250 and 500 CE.
Join us as historian Ana Lucia Araujo discusses her latest book, 'The Gift: Exploring the Influence of Prestigious Objects in the Atlantic Slave Trade and Colonialism' in an engaging reading and discussion session. The book explores how objects of prestige contributed to cross-cultural exchanges between Africans and Europeans during the Atlantic slave trade. Drawing on a rich set of sources in French, English, and Portuguese, as well as artifacts housed in museums across Europe and the Americas, Ana Lucia Araujo illuminates how luxury objects impacted European–African relations, and how these economic, cultural, and social interactions paved the way for the European conquest and colonization of West Africa and West Central Africa.
This week, BCDSS fellow Rafaël Thiébaut is looking forward to a lively discussion and feedback on his project “Unfree Labour in the Southwest Indian Ocean (17th-19th Centuries).” This talk analyses different forms of bondage labor through the case study of the Southwestern Indian Ocean: Madagascar with Comoros & Mascarenes. Thanks to the use of quantitative and qualitative archival material, Rafaël will place the micro-histories of the individual slave in the larger context of the developments in the Modern Age, especially in relation to a European interference over time and space. This will pave the way to a better understanding of the phenomenon and make it possible to place it in a larger global context.
Don’t miss our third and last film screening this year in cooperation with Kino in der Brotfabrik: PARIS IS BURNING, a landmark documentary from 1990 by Jennie Livingston (USA). Documenting the queer “Ballroom Culture” in New York City in the 1980s, this groundbreaking movie depicts Latinx and Black queer and transgender communities. It explores their struggles with multiple forms of discrimination regarding their race, class, gender, sexual identity long before concepts such as gender fluidity or intersectionality were discussed in society. Stay on after the screening and join the conversion and get-together with free drinks/nibbles! BCDSS Professor Julia Hillner will give a short introduction on the BCDSS’ thematic year with a research focus on Gender (and Intersectionality). Förderverein Filmkultur, the Queer-Referat (AStA Uni Bonn) and BCDSS Professor Pia Wiegmink will kickstart the post-screening conversation.
"One is not born, but rather becomes, a woman," Simone de Beauvoir argues in her famous book The Second Sex, published in 1949. This has come as no surprise to historians since the 1990s, as women's and gender studies have identified numerous examples that argue against historically defined, biological gender roles. In this light, we ask what historically characterized a man or a woman and how were gender identities defined, for which there are long abbreviations today? What definitions and ideas of ‘woman’ and ‘man’ were there in the first place? And: Did this broad variance in gender identities also exist in historical and transcultural comparison? The perhaps surprising answer is: Of course! You will learn more about this with the help of three illustrative contributions on Europe and Asia by researchers from the Bonn Centre for Dependency and Slavery Studies. A short series of three presentations will be held in German and English.
BCDSS PhD Researcher Anas Ansar will lead a post-screening discussion on contemporary slavery / human trafficking at the WOKI Cinema Bonn, on 11 February, 17:30h. Every year, millions of people around the world, mainly women and girls, fall victim to modern-day human trafficking. Over a period of seven long years, Helen Simon researched and listened to people whose stories had previously gone unheard. This documentary by Helen Simon, Germany 2021, will be screened in the original languages (Afrikaans, Arabic, Czech, Dari, English, German, Portuguese, Romanian, Swahili) with German subtitles. Duration: 91 minutes Please note: cinema ticket fees apply. To book tickets in advance see the Woki website below. The discussion will be held in ENGLISH.
Join us for the screening of “Vagrants, Vagabonds, Immorals", a documentary directed by Nina Tedesco and Paulo Terra (Brazil 2024). The film focuses on the dictatorship period (1964-1985) but addresses the connection between the early 20th century and the present. What are the meanings of vagrancy throughout Brazilian history, at least since Abolition? Who was considered a vagrant? What are the possibilities of resistance to attempts at criminalization of vagrancy? The movie tries to answer these questions through the an intersectional lens comprising class, gender, race and sexualities, by engaging in a dialogue about these issues with four female activists: Neusa Maria Pereira, journalist and one of the founders of the Movimento Negro Unificado; Shirley Krenak, Indigenous activist of the Krenak people; Jovanna Baby, founder of the organized movement of transgender people in Brazil; and Nataraj Trinta, historian and organizer of the Slut Walk in Rio de Janeiro. Open to all!
The next reading and discussion will feature Anne Haeming, the author of 'Der gesammelte Joest: Biografie eines Ethnologen,' published by Matthes & Seitz in 2023. Join Pia Wiegmink and Jennifer Leetsch on 15 February 2024 as they query the author on the creative processes involved in writing about Wilhelm Joest, a nineteenth-century German ethnographer and traveller; the Rautenstrauch-Joest Museum in Cologne traces its origins to his private collection of over 3,500 objects. Please note that this an onsite event. However, for remote attendees we are offering a Zoom streaming (with microphones disabled). See below for the link. The discussion will be held in English.
"Enslaved Females in Eighteenth- and Nineteenth-Century North America: Examining the Fugitive Slave Archive" Through an examination of the fugitive slave archive and other sources, this lecture seeks to fill some of the scholarly gaps on the experiences of enslaved females of African descent in Canada. More specifically, it will offer some distinctions between the lives and experiences of enslaved females in slave minority (temperate) and slave majority (tropical) sites in the British transatlantic world.