Blog | City

From August 2nd to 12th, a group of Kenyan and German students conducted the fieldwork of their study project in Nairobi, Kenya. The main goal was to explore the food system in the urban region of Kasarani, a constituency of Nairobi. Various methods, such as mapping and interviews, were used to gain insights into the food security status of the local people and the different factors that influence it.

A thin line between ethics and aesthetics haunts these reflections on field research in an African city, approached through the positionality of a researcher from a European context. Based on some visual impressions encountered during the fieldwork, the researcher Francesca Ceola retraces the process of reorientation in a place geographically and culturally very far away from her habitat recognizing what she knows in what she sees. In doing so, she contests the abstraction of “going to do fieldwork” as separate from everyday scientific practices.

How does the Kenyan middle class live? Subproject A05 “Being Home” examines living spaces in Nairobi and their significance for identity formation, drawing on urban developments of its colonial past. Project leader Jochen Kibel and cooperation partner Makau Kitata talk to journalist Brenda Strohmaier about their first findings.

CRC 1265 Project leader Ignacio Farías in conversation with Brenda Strohmaier Cities and city dwellers not only contribute significantly to global warming, but they are also particularly affected by it. Using Stuttgart and the Japanese city of Fukuoka as examples, subproject C05 investigates how this very knowledge reaches the work of scientists, urban planners and politicians, and how it is being translated into concrete measures. Project leader Ignacio Farías, Professor of Urban Anthropology at Humboldt University, explains how a social science analysis serves survival in a broken world.

Ariane Sept im Gespräch mit Julia Paaß vom Netzwerk Zukunftsorte zu konfliktreichen Gemeinschaften und gemeinschaftlichen Konflikten auf dem Land. Schon länger wird darüber debattiert, dass die ländlichen Räume für die urbane Mittelschicht zunehmend attraktiver würden. „Gefühlt will im Prenzlauer Berg jeder Zweite aufs Land“, titelte beispielsweise der Deutschlandfunk im Sommer 2019. Auch die Forschung beobachtet eine „aktuelle Konjunktur des Ländlichen“. Seit Beginn der Covid-19-Pandemie schwirrt der Begriff Stadtflucht noch stärker durch mediale Debatten.

Robertha Barros und Paulo Victor Melo schreiben über soziale Ungleichheit in Brasilien in Zeiten der Corona-Krise. Sie plädieren dafür, die Krise als Chance zum Umverteilen und Umdenken zu nutzen.