Katrien Pype: Of Masters and Machines  (J.J. Bachofen Lecture, Basel 28.09.2018)
Channel: Zentrum für Afrikastudien Basel
Date: 2019-07-26

Katrien Pype: Of Masters and Machines: Anthropological Reflections on Innovation and Intelligence 
This distinguished lecture by Katrien Pype, Associate Professor at the Institute for Anthropological Research in Africa at KU Leuven, is part of the JJ Bachofen Lecture Series on basic questions of Anthropology at the Seminar of Social Anthropology of the University of Basel, Switzerland.
The lecture considers anthropological approaches to the re¬lationship between human beings and the material world, especially the worlds humans create. Around the globe we are witnessing unprecedented forms of „ma¬king“, of people inventing, recycling and repairing, with or without highly advanced technological apparatuses. Katrien Pype is interested in the engagements between society and materiality in terms of belonging, represen¬tation and communication, but also wants to pay attention to the moral panics that undergird collective and individual choices when confronted with man-made machi¬nes that become too smart, and at times, that appear beyond the control of their creators and/or users. The presentation will situate the „homo faber“ of electronic modernity, or man who „makes“, fabricates, in a world governed by high-tech devices, within a longue durée of scholarship on the socio-cultural contours of creativity and knowledge, and on the ever-changing configurations of nature and culture.