Events

Upcoming events and talks

20–22 Jul 2026 Vienna, Austria

‘Risky’ Kaynartepe: A Case of Counterinsurgent Governance Through Urban Regeneration

Arjin Taş - Presenter

RC21 Urban and Regional Development Conference: Ineuqalities and the City

University of Vienna

Details

Roundtable on Mutations of Urbanism: Illiberal cities and what to do about them

Ayşe Çağlar - Participant

RC21 Urban and Regional Development Conference: Ineuqalities and the City

University of Vienna

Details
21–24 Jul 2026 Poznań, Poland

Matters of Risk: Infrastructures and Technologies of (In) Security and Polarization

Umut Kuruüzüm - Convenor

co-organised with Ebru Kayaalp, Tessa Diphoorn, Vidushi Kaushik

European Association of Social Anthropologists (EASA) 2026: Possibilities in a Polarised World

Details

Household Finance Lab: bureaucratic governance, coercion and capital accumulation in an economically polarised world

Nana Iashvili - Organizer

co-organized with Ryan Davey, Jitka Kralova, Rano Turaeva, Mathias Sosnowski Krabbe, Alexandra Ciocanel, Balazs Gosztonyi, Judit Durst

European Association of Social Anthropologists (EASA) 2026: Possibilities in a Polarised World

Details

Beyond financialized lives?: Investigating Giravnoba in Tbilisi

Nana Iashvili - Presenter

European Association of Social Anthropologists (EASA) 2026: Possibilities in a Polarised World

Details

Past Events

Jun 2026 — Kobe, Japan

Workshop on (Un)Chaining Disasters: Materials, Work, and the Everyday of Re-Configuration

The workshop invites case studies that examine supply chains, forms of work, and human experiences affected by disruptions such as wars and armed conflicts, industrial accidents, earthquakes, storms, wildfires, large-scale infrastructure failures, and other events involving material destruction and displacement.

Kobe University

Jun 2026 — London, UK

Domination Through Counterinsurgent Urban Governance: The Case of “Risky” Kaynartepe

Arjin Taş - Presenter

British Society for Middle Eastern Studies (BRISMES) 2026 Conference

SOAS, University of London

May 2026 — Vienna, Austria

Counterinsurgent Urban Governance in Post-war Diyarbakır: Contemporary Urban Manifestations of a Colonial and Imperial Pacification Paradigm

Arjin Taş - Speaker

CEUrban Research Group Seminar

Central European University, Vienna

Apr 2026 — Online

Counterinsurgent Urban Governance in Post-war City: The case of Kaynartepe

Arjin Taş - Speaker

Webinar on Kurdish Urbanisms: Urban Research from Turkey’s Internal “South East”

Apr 2026 — American University of Cairo, Egypt

Class at Work on the Seismic Line

Umut Kuruüzüm - Presenter

Co-authored with Ann-Christin Zuntz

Conference on Spectres of the Undercommon: Inhumanities in the Wake of the Catastrophe

American University of Cairo

Apr 2026 — Leuven, Belgium

Giravnoba in Georgia: Between commodification and decommodification of housing

Nana Iashvili - Presenter

BeNeLux Geography Conference

KU Leuven

Mar 2026 — Online

“Collateralized lives”: Home, debt, and financialization in the Republic of Georgia

Nana Iashvili - Presenter

Anthropology Seminar Series for Spring 2026 (in English) 

The Anthropology Research Center and the PhD Program in Social and Cultural Anthropology, Ilia State University

Feb 2026–Apr 2026 — Vienna, Austria

Anthropology of Debt and Finance

Nana Iashvili - Lecturer

Spring Term, 2026

Seminar at the Social and Cultural Anthropology, University of Vienna

Jan 2026 — Vienna, Austria

The Livability Apparatus. Establishing Vienna as Most Livable in the World

Monday Lectures at ifk

International Research Center for Cultural Studies University of Art and Design Linz

Dec 2025 — Vienna, Austria

Workshop on Spaces and Traces of Containment: Architectures of Extractivism

Ayşe Çağlar - Organizer

Migrants and Urban Politics: Governing the Displaced and Cities, IWM

Nov 2025 — Lisbon, Portugal

Early-Career Workshop in Urban Studies: “What’s the Urban worth? Revaluing the value of urban life”

University of Lisbon

Nov 2025 — Salzburg, Austria

Soziale Durchmischung: von radikalem Tool zu oberflächlichem Marker von Diversität

Tagung Stadt, Land, Wohnen: Herausforderungen und Perspektiven der regionalen Wohnungsmarktforschung

Paris Lodron Universität Salzburg

Nov 2025 — Illinois, USA

Expanded Extractivism: Regimes of Confined Labour, Containment, and the Geographies of Displacement

Ayşe Çağlar - Speaker

Anthropology Department and Keyman Centre for Turkish Studies, Northwestern University

Nov 2025 — Waterloo, Ontario, Canada

Extractivism Expanded: Confined Labor, Regimes of Containment, and City-making

Ayşe Çağlar - Speaker

Migration, Mobilities, and Social Politics Research Cluster, University of Balsillie School of International Affairs

Oct 2025 — Amsterdam, Netherlands

Shifting Ideology: When Social Inclusion Gives in to Livability in Urban Renewal Policies

Anthropology of the State Network Conference

University of Amsterdam

Oct 2025 — Bologna, Italy

Extractive Hospitality: Refugee Accommodation and the Humanitarian-Development Nexus in Greece

Danai Avgeri - Participant

Workshop on Extractive Borders: Profiting from Migrants’ Forced Im/Mobility

University of Bologna

Oct 2025 — Los Angeles, USA

Refugee Containment and the Political Economy of Aid at the EU Border

Danai Avgeri - Speaker

The Centre for the Study of International Migration, UCLA

Oct 2025 — Toronto, Canada

Financialization, Extractivism, and the Governance of Migration

Ayşe Çağlar - Convenor

Scholars of Excellence Workshop

The Canada Excellence Research Chair in Migration and Integration, Toronto Metropolitan University

Sep 2025 — California,

The Humanitarian Fix: Crisis Capitalism and Refugee Containment in Greece

Danai Avgeri - Speaker

Department of Anthropology, Stanford University

Feb 2025–Sep 2025 — Vienna, Austria

New Critical Perspectives in Anthropology

Nana Iashvili - Lecturer

Fall Term, 2025

Seminar at the Social and Cultural Anthropology, University of Vienna

Jul 2025 — Rabat, Morocco

Risky Areas’ of Diyarbakır: The Formation of Risk and (De)securitization

Arjin Taş - Presenter

5th ISA Forum of Sociology

International Sociological Association (ISA)

Jul 2025 — Rabat, Morocco

Limbos of Diyarbakır: Ambiguous Urban Redevelopment Processes and Counterinsurgency

Arjin Taş - Presenter

5th ISA Forum of Sociology

International Sociological Association (ISA)

Jun 2025 — London, UK

The Role of Law in Urban Restructuring and Counterinsurgency in the ‘Risky’ Areas of Diyarbakır.

Arjin Taş - Participant

Workshop on Authoritarianism, Law, and the Remaking of Society

The Social Life of Law Academic Research Project, The School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS)

Jun 2025 — London, UK

‘Risky Areas’ of Diyarbakır: Dissemination of Counterinsurgency in Urban Restructuring

Arjin Taş - Presenter

3rd Kurdish Studies Conference

London School of Economics (LSE) & University of Sheffield

May 2025 — Vienna, Austria

Workshop on Urban space in tension between financialization and the right to the city

Arjin Taş - Participant

Vienna Doctoral School of Social Sciences, University of Vienna

May 2025 — Vienna, Austria

Workshop on Urban space in tension between financialization and the right to the city

Vienna Doctoral School of Social Sciences, University of Vienna

May 2025 — Vienna, Austria

Workshop on Urban space in tension between financialization and the right to the city

Nana Iashvili - Organizer

Vienna Doctoral School of Social Sciences, University of Vienna

May 2025 — Online

I came as a legal, and Romania made me illegal. The production of precarity and irregularity within the Romanian migration regime

Ioana Simina Popescu - Presenter

Conference on Capitalist Transformations in Central and Eastern Europe

University of Babes-Bolyai

May 2025 — Lyon, France

Pluralising Ethnographies of the State and Migration Regimes

Danai Avgeri - Presenter

The Intensive Programme on Anthropology in the Plural

Lumière University Lyon 2

May 2025 — London, UK

Marxist Approaches to Borders and Migrant Justice

Danai Avgeri - Presenter

The Law and Marxism Spring School

Centre for Law and Social Change, SOAS

Apr 2025 — Athens, Greece

Refugee Rentierism, Racialised Extractivism and the Spatio-racial Fix of Humanitarian Assistance in Times of Capitalist Crisis

Danai Avgeri - Presenter

Historical Materialism Conference

Apr 2025 — Vancouver, Canada

“Governing the displaced in cities: The rule of “emergency”, Janus Face of Mayors’ power, autocratic reconfiguration of state power

Ayşe Çağlar - Speaker

Special Session: Cities That Defy Their Nations, International Conference on Urban Affairs

Feb 2025–Jul 2025 — Vienna, Austria

New Critical Perspectives in Anthropology

Nana Iashvili - Lecturer

Spring Term, 2025

Seminar at the Social and Cultural Anthropology, University of Vienna

Feb 2025 — Fukuoka, Japan

‘Risky Areas’ of Diyarbakır: Use of Urban Redevelopment in Urban Governance and Counterinsurgency

Arjin Taş - Presenter

The 11th Meeting of East Asian Regional Conference in Alternative Geography (EARCAG)

Jan 2025 — Brussels, Belgium

Changing landscapes of urban governance: the displaced and the states

Ayşe Çağlar - Keynote speaker

Conference on Sharing insights and joining forces for rebuilding Europe’s migration society

National Library of Belgium

Dec 2024 — Halle, Germany

Financializing homes: mechanisms and practices of indebtedness in Georgia

Nana Iashvili - Presenter

Conference on Household Finance in an unequal world: social approaches

Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology

Oct 2024 — Vienna, Austria

Home as a financial asset: chains of indebtedness in Georgia

Nana Iashvili - Speaker

The Challenges of the Urban Future Platform, University of Vienna

Oct 2024 — Vienna, Austria

Workshop on Continuities and Ruptures in Forced Migration: The Politics of Labor, Borders, and Representations

Danai Avgeri - Organizer

Europe-Asia Research Platform on Forced Migration, IWM

Oct 2024 — Vienna, Austria

16th EthnoDoks workshop: Interdisciplinary approaches to ethnographic research

Arjin Taş - Organizer

Central European University & University of Vienna

Oct 2024 — Vienna, Austria

16th EthnoDoks workshop: Interdisciplinary approaches to ethnographic research

Nana Iashvili - Organizer

Central European University&University of Vienna

Oct 2024 — Vienna, Austria

Workshop on Continuities and Ruptures in Forced Migration: The Politics of Labour, Power and Representations

Ayşe Çağlar - Organizer

Europe-Asia Research Platform on Forced Migration, IWM

Sep 2024 — Vienna, Austria

“They came to work.” The production of vulnerability and irregularity within the Romanian migration infrastructure

Ioana Simina Popescu - Presenter

Vienna Anthropology Days (VANDA) Conference

Social and Cultural Anthropology, University of Vienna

Sep 2024 — Malmö, Sweden

Governing cities and governing the displaced: Mayors, ‘emergency rule’, and urban politics

Ayşe Çağlar - Speaker

The International Migration and Ethnic Relations (IMER), Malmö University

Jul 2024 — Amsterdam, Netherlands

Participate! Co-producing citizen participation practices and democratic ideas

EASST and 4S Joint Conference

Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam

Jul 2024 — Santiago de Chile, Chile

The politics and spaces of encounters: advancing dialogues between and within the Global North and the Global South

Arjin Taş - Participant

7th Doctoral School in Comparative Urban Studies

RC21 Urban and Regional Development & International Journal of Urban and Regional Research (IJURR)

Jun 2024 — Cambridge, UK

Genocide and Organised Abandonment

Danai Avgeri - Speaker

Talk with M. Elnaiem, Director of the Decolonial Centre

CRASSH, University of Cambridge

May 2024 — Cambridge, UK

Conference on Debordering futures: Racial capitalism, Coloniality and Migrant Justice

Danai Avgeri - Organizer

University of Cambridge

May 2024 — Vienna, Austria

Mitgestaltung von urbanen Transformationsprozessen – vom Brunnenmarkt bis zur Thaliastraße

with Cornelia Dlabaja

Talks & Walks Series: 50 years of soft urban renewal in Vienna with Sektion Stadtforschung

Austrian Association for Sociology (ÖGS)

May 2024 — Vienna, Austria

IWM Spring Fellows’ Conference 2024

Ayşe Çağlar - Organizer

IWM

Apr 2024 — Online

Manufacturing Ruin, Manufacturing Revitalization: Displacement and Migration in Detroit

Ana Ćuković - Presenter

American Association of Geographers Annual Meeting

Apr 2024 — Vienna, Austria

In/formality as a Working Style: Urban Renewal in Vienna, Austria

CEU Graduate Conference

Central European University (CEU)

Apr 2024 — Vienna, Austria

Wem hört Wien zu?: Bürger*innenbeteiligung in Stadterneuerung

Politiken des Schweigens | lecture series Disziplinen in Bewegung

Faculty Center for Transdisciplinary Historical and Cultural Studies, University of Vienna

Apr 2024 — Honolulu, Hawaii

Provincialising Racial Capitalism: The Refugee Humanitarian-Development Fix and the Social Reproduction of ‘Surplus Populations’ in Austerity Europe

Danai Avgeri - Presenter

American Association of Geographers Annual Meeting

Apr 2024 — Honolulu, Hawaii

The Political Economy of Migration Governance: ‘Extraction, Logistification and Racial Capitalism

Danai Avgeri - Convenor

American Association of Geographers Annual Meeting

Apr 2024 — Toronto, Canada

Political economy of Containment industries: Confinement and (im)mobilized labor in the making of Linz

Ayşe Çağlar - Participant

Scholars of Excellence Workshop on the “integration business”: A radical critique on migration, development and reception services

The Canada Excellence Research Chair in Migration and Integration, Toronto Metropolitan University

Apr 2024 — Honolulu, Hawaii

The Longue Durée of Extractivism, Confinement, and (im)mobilized Labor in City- making in Linz

Ayşe Çağlar - Presenter

American Association of Geographers Annual Meeting

Apr 2024 — New York City, USA

Rethinking Migrant Inclusion in Detroit: the Role of Philanthropy

Ana Ćuković - Presenter

Urban Affairs Association Annual Conference

Jan 2024 — Vienna, Austria

‘Risky Areas’ of Diyarbakir: Normalization of the use of counterinsurgency strategies in urban restructuring

Arjin Taş - Speaker

The Challenges of the Urban Future Platform, University of Vienna

Nov 2023 — London, UK

In and against the workfare/welfare state: Humanitarian Workers in Borderland Greece

Danai Avgeri - Presenter

Historical Materialism Conference

Nov 2023 — Kolkata, India

Governing the displaced in cities: Wars, the rule of “emergency”, and extraction

Ayşe Çağlar - Keynote speaker

Calcutta Research Group’s 8th Annual Conference

Calcutta Research Group (CRG)

Nov 2023 — Toronto, Canada

Expanded extractivism, confinement, and (im)mobilized labor in city-making

Ayşe Çağlar - Speaker

American Anthropological Association/Canadian Anthropology Society Annual Conference

Nov 2023 — Toronto, Canada

Situating cities as sites of investment

Ana Ćuković - Presenter

American Anthropological Association/Canadian Anthropology Society Annual Conference

Oct 2023 — Mexico City, Mexico

Hijacking the Politics of Protection and the Counter-revolution of Borders in Europe’s ‘Refugee Crisis’

Danai Avgeri - Presenter

9th International Conference of Critical Geographers

Oct 2023 — Vienna, Austria

Keywords in Refugee and Migration Studies

Ana Ćuković - Organizer

Europe-Asia ResearchPlatform on Forced Migration, IWM

Sep 2023 — New York, USA

Shifting contours of urban governance: an intriguing landscape beyond decentralization?

Ayşe Çağlar - Speaker

Migration, Urban Governance, and Restructuring in the Context of Recentralizing Neoliberalism

New School for Social Research

Aug 2023 — Riga, Latvia

Planning without Responsibility: ‘quality of life for all’ in Vienna without resources

 Anthropology of the State Network Conference

Riga Stradiņš University

Jul 2023 — Vienna, Austria

Participation in Urban Planning: A Path to Less Inequality?

 ÖGS Kongress

Vienna University of Economics and Business

Jun 2023 — Cambridge, UK

Pylos Shipwreck: Necropolitical Governance at the EU Border

Danai Avgeri - Presenter

Refugee Week Conference

University of Cambridge

Jun 2023 — Berlin, Germany

How are the urban counterinsurgency strategies, developed during the urban conflict, normalized and generalized by the state?

Arjin Taş - Participant

Multimodal Research and Publishing Workshop

ZOIS, DeZIM & VISION

May 2023 — Cambridge, UK

Colonial Afterlives of Infrastructure: From Phosphate to Asylum Processing in the Republic of Nauru

Danai Avgeri - Organizer

Research Seminar

Infrastructural Geographies Research Group, University of Cambridge

Apr 2023–Jun 2023 — Cambridge, UK

Thinking from the East: Geographies of Post-socialism and the Geopolitics of Knowledge

Danai Avgeri - Organizer

Seminar

University of Cambridge

Mar 2023 — Cambridge, UK

Unruly Speech: Displacement and the politics of Transgression

Danai Avgeri - Organizer

Book Launch

Centre for the Study of Global Human Movement, University of Cambridge

Mar 2023 — Vienna, Austria

Cities and Human Mobility Research Collaborative Vienna Research Symposium

Ayşe Çağlar - Organizer

Europe-Asia Research Platform on Forced Migration, IWM & Zolberg Institute on Migration and Mobility

Feb 2023 — Lisbon, Portugal

Counterinsurgency and Spatial Subjugation through Urban Destruction and Redevelopment in Sur, Diyarbakır

Arjin Taş - Presenter

Conference Turkey at 100: (Dis)Continuities and (Dis)contents

The Orient Institute & The Institute of Social and Political Sciences (ISCSP), University of Lisbon

Feb 2023 — Vienna, Austria

“Arrival” Infrastructures of the Displaced from Ukraine in Vienna

Ayşe Çağlar - Organizer

Europe-Asia Research Platform on Forced Migration, IWM

Nov 2022–Dec 2022 — Barcelona, Spain

Counterinsurgency and Spatial Subjugation Through Urban Destruction and Redevelopment in Sur, Diyarbakir

Arjin Taş - Presenter

4th International Conference on Anthropology of Urban Conflict

The Observatory for the Anthropology of Urban Conflict

Oct 2022–Jun 2024 — Cambridge, UK

Borders, Colonialism and Migration

Danai Avgeri - Organizer

Study Group

Centre for the Study of Global Human Movement, University of Cambridge

Sep 2022 — Istanbul, Turkey

Conference on Digitized Migrants

Ana Ćuković - Organizer

Calcutta Research Group (CRG), IWM, Migration Research Center Koç (MiReKoc)

Jul 2022 — London, UK

Migration, Mobility Justice and the Right to Health in a Post-pandemic World: Lessons and Future Directions for Research, Policy, and Advocacy

Danai Avgeri - Participant

Roundtable Discussion

Centre for Universal Health, Chatham House

Apr 2022 — London, UK

COVID-19 Vaccines for Migrants and Refugees: Securing Equitable Access

Danai Avgeri - Organizer

Expert Panel Event

Centre for Universal Health, Chatham House

Mar 2022 — Darjeeling, India

City Space, Migrants, Production of Vulnerability

Ana Ćuković - Convenor

Ethics of Solidarity, Care and Protection Youth Camp

Mahanirban Calcutta Research Group (MCRG)

Feb 2022–Mar 2022 — Online

The Intersection of Public Health and Migration Policies in Greece in the Context of COVID-19

Danai Avgeri - Presenter

 American Association of Geographers Annual Meeting

Oct 2021 — Istanbul, Turkey

‘Revitalizing’ Detroit: Creating Pathways for Migrant Emplacement

Ana Ćuković - Presenter

International Summer School on Research Methods and Ethics in Migration Studies

Migration ResearchCentre Koç University (MiReKoc)

Jun 2021 — Vienna, Austria

13th EthnoDoks workshop: What can ethnography really do?

University of Vienna

Apr 2021 — Vienna, Austria

Repräsentativität in qualitativer Sozialforschung. Und was hat das mit Beteiligungsverfahren zu tun?

 WIP Lecture Series

Municipal Department 25 (MA 25)

Apr 2021 — Vienna, Austria

Governance Arrangements of Urban Renewal

CEU Graduate Conference

Central European University (CEU)

Jul 2020 — Lisbon, Portugal

Soft Urban Renewal: Inclusive Governance Technique?

The European Association of Social Anthropologists 2020

University of Lisbon

Jul 2020 — Online

Working outside of the Frame: Municipal Placemaking and Coalition Building in Detroit, USA

Ana Ćuković - Presenter

European Association of Social Anthropologists

Jun 2020 — Online

Europe-Asia research platform on Forced Migration: Initiating a new research focus at IWM

Ana Ćuković - Organizer

IWM

Jun 2019 — Lyon, France

Mediated negotiations for space between Viennese municipal authorities and residents of the city

Creole Intensive Program

University of Lyon

Apr 2019 — Dearborn, USA

Revitalizing Warrendale: Migrant Inclusion and Neighborhood change in Detroit

Ana Ćuković - Presenter

Book Workshop on Uncertain Refuge: Vitality and Vulnerability in Arab Detroit

Center for Arab American Studies, University of Michigan

May 2017 — Marseille, France

The Urban Geographies of Migration Control in Greece

Danai Avgeri - Presenter

Mediterranean Migration and Borders: Beyond the Security Nexus 

Institute for Advanced Studies, Aix Marseille University

Oct 2016 — London, UK

Temporality as a Technique of Governing Migration: Authoritarian and Liberal Variations from Greece’s Recent Past

Danai Avgeri - Participant

Workshop on Questioning the Temporalities and Cartographies of Migration

King’s College London

Mar 2016–Apr 2016 — San Francisco, USA

Governing Migration at the Urban Frontiers of Europe: The Case of Athens

Danai Avgeri - Presenter

American Association of Geographers Annual Meeting

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