Serendipity Wednesday: Have a Coffee & Chat at the GBAS Cafe!
Wednesday, 10:00 - 16:00 CET
What did you find interesting in the GBAS sessions? Curious to learn more and share experiences with other participants? Maybe you want to meet people around the world who use business anthropology in different ways? Or maybe you want to learn how to become a business anthropologist yourself.
In true Berlin Style, you're invited to step out to a virtual café for a coffee break and a chat. Everyone is welcome to these open and gently moderated discussions. Find a list of times, moderators, and topics below.
Contacts: Mustafa Abdalla and Inga Treitler
10 CET: Graham Pruss
Seeing the future of human settlement
Does the future of human settlement need new models? Settler colonialism, wherever in the world it has taken place, has created private environments within public spaces. Can we learn from the realities of unhoused or home-less communities around the world; from mobility, environmental catastrophe, and displacement? What do you think?
11 CET: Marguerite Coetzee
In South Africa, the youth are ancestors of the future
Today, June 16, is Youth Day. It honours youth’s contribution to South Africa’s transition into democracy and considers the future of our youth. In 1976 there was an uprising in which school children were massacred. Does the focus on youth in South Africa’s national celebration offer new ways to see the future?
10 CET: Lotta Björklund Larsen
Data through the anthropological lens
What are data? How can we use data to know something? In the age of opinions, ratings, facts, fake news etc., there are lots of data – also big data. Many of us use the anthropological gaze to help business sort out what data to use. Let’s discuss worldwide experiences.
11 CET: Keiko Yamaki
Companygraphy, an Instrument of Civilization
Does “Companygraphy” describe how society is organized? A company is a community, a place where people spend time together. Within each role-based team in a company, are overlapping networks of private relationships and collaborations. Products and services are created in a multi-layered set of norms and values. Companygraphy as instrument?
12 CET: Taapsi Ramchandani
In technology we trust, for the future of businesses
Let's talk about intersections of technology, anthropology, and lived experience. In this golden age of the smartphone, can our tools, methods and theories help businesses aggregate people-insights to anticipate the future? How does the anthropological lens fit into quantitative data sources like surveys? Bring your questions and ideas. We’ll chat.
13 CET: Dominique Desjeux
Discovering the Future of Consumption by Observing the Present
Are we facing war between China, the USA, and other countries because of the globalization of consumption? Competition for raw materials, "proteins" (soybean) and energy yields conflict. Perhaps business anthropology’s work in observing and tracking material, social, and symbolic constraints on consumption can deter conflict. What do you think?
12 CET: Jonas Ecke
Humanitarian crises - what can anthropology do?
What is the public awareness of businesses’ role in humanitarian crises witnessed across the globe? Global warming, Covid-19, persistent famines and forced migration, unending proxy wars in the Middle East. Do anthropologists in business and in global and local NGOs have influence in remedying and preventing such crises?
13 CET: Camilla Carabini
What is the (digital) money of the future?
Can anthropology add to the study of new kinds of money? Fintech giants contribute to radical change in the use of digital money from Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies to the stablecoins. Governments are developing digital currencies too. How will monetary sovereignty be reshaped? What will be the implications for businesses?
14 CET: Federico Barbieri
Business Anthropology revitalizing public spaces
Can corporations use anthropology to build the social and cultural fabric and revitalize cities? In Genoa, for example, the MONUMENT© Project - a collaboration of industrial partner MecPlex and the Politecnico di Milano - a square or park may become the city’s investment in social sustainability. What about your experiences?
14 CET: Jean Balestrery
The Transforming Terrain of Organizations
What are some emerging trends in business organization? From diverse teams to digital geographies, from empathic organizations to work-life flexibility, moving beyond business-as-usual. For example, my work in the private health insurance industry in the U.S., witnesses less soloing today. What organizational shifts are you seeing or contributing to?
15 CET: Lora Koycheva
Marketing Anthropology?
Or Cassandra's Curse?
Is anthropology an avant-garde discipline, ahead of its time? Does anthropology suffer from Cassandra´s curse? How can anthropology become a lens for new ways of seeing? What is lost and what is gained in the space between marketing the discipline to others, translating our empirical apparatuses, and negotiating our jargon?