Rita Kesselring

Publikationen auf Alexandria

From August 2022: Associate Professor of Urban Studies, School of Humanities and Social Sciences, University of St.Gallen (https://www.unisg.ch/en/university/schools/school-of-humanities-and-social-sciences/subject-areas/urban-studies/)

2021 – 2022: Senior Lecturer (Wissenschaftliche Mitarbeiterin), Institute of Social Anthropology, University of Basel, Switzerland

2013 – 2020: Senior Lecturer (Oberassistentin), Institute of Social Anthropology, University of Basel, Switzerland (on parental leave between February and July 2020)

September 2018 to March 2019: Fung Global Fellow, Princeton Institute for International and Regional Studies, Princeton University, USA

2018 – 2020: Editor-in-Chief and co-editor, Anthropology Southern Africa (ASnA) 

2017 – 2018: Project leader and coordinator, Valueworks: Effects of Financialization along the Copper Value Chain (SNIS-funded; 24 months)

2015: Visiting researcher, Dag Hammarskjold Institute for Peace and Conflict Studies, University of the Copperbelt, Kitwe, Zambia (March-December) Host: Prof. Owen Sichone

2012: Lecturer, Institute of Social Anthropology, University of Basel, Switzerland

2012: Visiting researcher, Department of Social Anthropology, University of Cape Town, South Africa (June-September) Host: Prof. Fiona Ross

2011: Visiting researcher, Human Rights Institute, University of Connecticut, USA (January-December) Host: Prof. Richard Wilson

2010: Lecturer, Institute of Social Anthropology, University of Basel, Switzerland

2009 – 2010 and 2012: Research fellow and co-management of Swiss-South African Joint Research Project “Safeguarding Democracy” (University of Basel and University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa)

2005: Post-graduate studies, Centre for African Studies, University of Cape Town, South Africa

2002 – 2003: Advanced degree in didactics/ adult education, Frey Akademie Zürich, Switzerland (SVEB 2 certificate)

2001 – 2007: Bachelor and Master studies in Social Anthropology, English Linguistics and International Law, University of Zürich, Switzerland

Board member, Swiss Apartheid Debts and Reparations Campaign (KEESA)

Board Member, Fund for Development and Partnership in Africa (fepa)

Advisory Board Member for ‘Energy Assemblages’, an SNF-funded research project (2019-2023), University of Lausanne

Member, Swiss Society for African Studies (SAGS)

Member, Association for African Studies in Germany (VAD)

Member, Swiss Anthropological Association (SEG, SAA)

Founding member, Arbeitskreis Forschung zur Vergangenheits­politik, Switzerland

Invited talks (selection)

Relations, Interdependencies and Commons between Southern Africa and Switzerland. +/-1632m: disturbing the Swiss/African Commons. Collegium Helveticum, Zurich. 16 June 2023

Foreign Investors in Zambia. Maxmising benefits for Zambia Conference. American Center at the Copperbelt University, Zambia. 26 July 2022, online

Pathways to Sustainability in Mineral Supply Chains: Tracking the Trends in the Copper, Platinum Group Metals and Gold Supply Chains. Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik (SWP), Berlin. 20-21 June 2021

Roundtable Pasts and Futures of Swiss Engaged Anthropology. Annual Conference of the Swiss Anthropological Association on Give and Take: Anthropology as Exchange, Neuchâtel. 10-12 November 2022

Pathways to Sustainability in Mineral Supply Chains: Tracking the Trends in the Copper, Platinum Group Metals and Gold Supply Chains. Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik (SWP), Berlin. 20-21 June 2021

The Historicity of the Global: Dialogues across Borders. Institute for European Global Studies, University of Basel. Roundtable Global History – an Interdisciplinary Approach, 15 November 2019

Africa & the Academy in the 21st Century, Centre for African Studies, University of Basel, 1-2 November 2019

Princeton Institute for International and Regional Studies, Princeton University (NJ, USA). Roundtable on Resources, Power and Global Disorder, 4 December 2018

Interdisciplinary Ethnography Workshop Fall 2018. Anthropology Department, Princeton University (NJ, USA). Roundtable on Why Ethnography Matters: Ethnography Across Disciplines, October 2, 2018

Institut für Ethnologie und Afrikastudien, Mainz, Institutskolloquium, 19 June 2018. Capital Investment and the Local State at an Extractive Frontier: Zambia’s Northwestern Province

Geneva Academy, Transitional Justice Lunch Café, 22 May 2018. Apartheid Victims: Law, Memory and Emancipation in Post-Apartheid South Africa

Sustainability Week 2018 – Mobility, University of Basel. Brown Bag Lunch 17 April 2018. Moving Copper from Zambia to China: the Role of Switzerland

Max-Planck Institute for Social Anthropology and Institute for Social and Cultural Anthropology, Halle. Lecture Series Fueling the Future: Energy, Resources & Environment, Halle, April 10, 2018. Extraction, Energy Supply and Corporate Power in New Mining Towns in Zambia

Department of Jurisprudence, Law Faculty, University of Pretoria, Seminar on Jurisprudence, February 25, 2017. An Anthropological Perspective on the TRC

CAS Edinburgh African Studies Centre, Seminar Series, December 7, 2016. Built Environment and Sociality in New Mining Towns in Zambia

Nordic Africa Institute, Comparing Africa’s Copperbelt workshop, December 5-6, 2016. The Local State in a New Mining Area, Northwestern Zambia

Lauterpacht Centre for International Law LCIL, University of Cambridge, Friday Lecture, October 21, 2016. Law, Victimhood and the Body

General Assembly, Centre for African Studies, University of Basel, December 18. The Mining Frontier under Construction: Built Environment, the Body and Sociality in the NWP, Zambia

Dag Hammarskjold Institute for Peace and Conflict Studies, University of the Copperbelt (CBU), Kitwe, Zambia, June 26, 2015. The new Smelter Road in Solwezi: mitigation after the construction of a non-lieu

Afrikakolloquium, Institut für Asien- und Afrikawissenschaften, Humboldt Universität zu Berlin, January 28, 2015. Apartheid-era victims in today’s South Africa: Bodily memory of harm and the possibility of new forms of sociality

Festrede, Diplomfeier MA/PhD, Faculty of Humanities, University of Basel, April 5, 2014. Apartheidopfer heute

Judging Human Rights Violations: Pondering Past and Future after Kiobel, Workshop, Tel Aviv University, Faculty of Law, Minerva Human Rights Center, December 15-16, 2013. Bringing Apartheid-Era Crimes Before U.S. Courts

The ‘New Social Forms’ Seminar Series, Department of Anthropology and Sociology of the University of Stellenbosch, South Africa, August 23, 2012. The legal vs. the political avenue: does it really matter for those who seek justice? Experiences from Khulumani Support Group

Law School, University of Connecticut, February 23, 2011. Legal Developments in South Africa since the Truth and Reconciliation Commission

Papers, Panels, Chairs (selection)

Symmetrical Ethnography in an Asymmetrical World? Ethnography Talks, School of Humanities and Social Sciences, University of St Gallen, 1 December 2022

Wednesday Colloquium, Social Anthropology, University of Basel, 18 November 2020. The Extractive Enclave: whiteness, social differentiation, and a global division of labor in Northwestern Zambia

The Micropolitics of Mining Capitalism, ERC-project WORKinMINING workshop, University of Liège, Belgium, presentation in panel Place-making amidst Mining Capitalism, 11-13 September 2019 

Princeton Institute for International and Regional Studies, Princeton University (NJ, USA), presentation of book chapter at internal seminar, 05 March 2019

Princeton Institute for International and Regional Studies, Princeton University (NJ, USA), presentation of book project at internal seminar, 25 September 2018

Association of African Studies in Germany (VAD) biennial conference “African Connections”, Leipzig, 28 June 2018. Panel chair and introduction: Disenclaving the Planers’ Enclaves

European Social Science History Conference 2018 (ESSHC), 4-7 April 2018, Belfast, Northern Ireland. An Ordinary Player in Town: the local state in a new mining area, Northwestern Zambia

7th European Conference on African Studies (ECAS), June 29-July 1, 2017, Basel, Switzerland. (Infra)Structures of Extraction in Africa. (co-convenor and introduction)

WISER, Wits Institute for Social and Economic Research, Wits Interdisciplinary Seminar in the Humanities, February 27, 2017. Presentation and book launch: Bodies of Truth

Annual Conference of the American Anthropology Association (AAA), November 16-20, 2016, Minneapolis, USA. Roundtable: The Future of the Anthropology of the Law. (organizer and paper)

Annual Conference of the Swiss Anthropological Association, Institute of Social Sciences, University of Lausanne, November 10-12, 2016. Studying along the Commodity Chains: Financialization and its Impact of Local Life (co-convenor with Stefan Leins and paper)

Colloquium, Department of Ethnology, University of Lucerne, October 5, 2016. Infrastructures of Power: energy supply and sociality in a new mining area in Zambia

Ethics of Energy? Fragile Lives and Imagined Futures, St. Andrews, UK, March 17-18, 2016. On and Off: Life and Energy Supply in a New Mining Town in Zambia

ASA (American African Studies Association), Indianapolis, November 20-23, 2014. Panel Reconciling the Excluded: Embodied Memory and the Mediation of Violence; paper: Embodied Pasts and the Possibility of Social Change (co-chair and paper)

SEG (Schweizerische Ethnologische Gesellschaft), Basel, October 31-November 1, 2014. Panel: Epistemological Explorations: Participation and observation as complementary methods (co-chair with Prof. Till Förster)

Land Divided: Land and South African Society in 2013: A Comparative Perspective, University of Cape Town, South Africa, March 24-27, 2013. ‘Citizens’ and ‘Subjects’ in Today’s South Africa: Apartheid-era victims in urban areas and their ideas of redress (paper)

AEGIS Conference Trust and Reconciliation in Post-Conflict Societies, Institute of Social Anthropology and Centre for African Studies, University of Basel, October 4-6, 2012. The irreconcilable body? Social and bodily responses to apartheid-era injuries (paper)

Carnegie III Conference, University of Cape Town: Strategies to Overcome Poverty and Inequality, September 3-7, 2012. Apartheid-era victims’ everyday attempts to overcome embodied inequality and experiences of violence, in panel: Legal Frameworks, Law and Justice (paper)

50 years Conference Centre for African Studies Edinburgh; CAS@50: Cutting Edge and Retrospectives, University of Edinburgh, June 6-8, 2012. Juridification from a victims’ perspective: What it is about the law that politics fails to bring about?, in panel: Criminalisation of Conflict in Africa (paper)

4th European Conference on African Studies (ECAS), June 15-18, 2011, Uppsala, Sweden. The Recognition of Past Injuries in Post-apartheid South Africa, in panel: Damaged Bodies: Anthropological Perspectives on the Inscription of Experiences (co-chair and paper)

Annual Meeting of the American Anthropology Association (AAA), Montreal, Canada, November 16-20, 2011. What law undertakes to resolve and tends to create: How victims subject positions are generated in courts and resonate in the everyday life of South African victims of apartheid-era human rights abuses (paper)

North Eastern Workshop on Southern Africa (NEWSA), October 21-23, 2011, Burlington, Vermont, US. The Operativeness of Law beyond Courts: The discursive formation of victimhood in the politics of reparation and accountability in post-apartheid South Africa (paper)

Conference / workshop organization

Critical Reflection, Practices and Ethics. September 9, 2021, Basel. Co-organizer with colleagues from the Centre for African Studies Basel 

Research Symposium: Life along the Copper Value Chain: the Swiss Commodity Hub and its Impact in the Global South. December 11, 2018, Palais des Nations, Geneva. Co-organizer with the UNRISD

Roundtable Life along the Copper Value Chain: the Swiss Commodity Hub and its Impact in the Global South. December 10, 2018, Graduate Institute, Geneva. Co-organizer with the UNRISD and the Graduate Institute

The Copper Value Chain: Life in Zambia, the Swiss Commodity Hub, and Responsible Business. December 8, 2018, Basel. Co-organizer with the Centre of African Studies Basel, the Swiss ADR, Afrika-Komitee and Solifonds

Ways of Knowing, 6th annual graduate conference, Harvard Divinity School, October 27-28, Cambridge, Boston MA, USA. Module organizer (5 panels): Bodily Ways of Sharing Knowledge

The New Debt Crisis. Structural adjustment, loans, corruption and profits - the case of Mozambique. November 18, 2017, Basel. Co-organizer with the Centre of African Studies Basel, the Swiss ADR, fepa, Afrika-Komitee and Solifonds

Rohstoffindustrie vs. Staat und Gesellschaft. October 28-29, 2016, Basel. Co-organizer with the Centre of African Studies Basel, the Swiss ADR, fepa, Afrika-Komitee and Solifonds

The Urbanization Process in the Solwezi Region, Northwestern Province, Zambia. A joint workshop between the Dag Hammarskjold Institute for Peace and Conflict Studies, University of the Copperbelt, and the Institute of Social Anthropology, University of Basel. December 7-9, 2015, Solwezi. Organizer

Migration und Xenophobie: Vergleichende Blicke auf Südafrika und die Schweiz. November 27-28, 2015, Basel. Co-organizer with the Centre for African Studies Basel, the Swiss ADR, fepa, Afrika-Komitee and Solifonds

Die Bergbauindustrie im Südlichen Afrika: 20 Jahre Kontinuität und Wandel. November 7-9, 2014, Basel. Co-organizer with the Centre for African Studies Basel, the Swiss ADR, Afrika-Komitee and Solifonds

Landkonflikte im Südlichen Afrika: Aktuelle Entwicklungen in Zimbabwe und Südafrika. November 15-16, 2013, Basel. Co-organizer with the Centre for African Studies Basel, the Swiss ADR, Afrika-Komitee and Solifonds

Social Movements and the Position of the Researcher. September 17-18, 2013, Basel. Workshop offered in the framework of the joint training module “Methodological Challenges in Area Studies”. Part of the organizing team together with colleagues from the Centre for African Studies, Basel

Rita Kesselring holds the Chair for Urban Studies, School of Humanities and Social Sciences: www.unisg.ch/en/university/schools/school-of-humanities-and-social-sciences/subject-areas/urban-studies/