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2024 – Plenary sessions

Prof. Christopher Pinney

Professor of Anthropology and Visual Culture at University College London

On Medium Specificity, Or, What’s Photography Got to Do With It?

For the last several decades photography has been largely discussed under the shadow of “power”, “culture”, and “identity”. There has been little room for questions of techne and semiotics (ie what makes photography different from other media). This presentation will discuss the usefulness of some of the arguments advanced by Walter Benjamin, Roland Barthes, and Ariella Aisha Azoulay, and how they might enhance our understanding of photographic practice today. It will also introduce the role of indexicality, contingency, photography’s “screen”, and the concept of “photographability” and the “citizenry of photography”.

Saima Zaidi

Communication designer, Karachi

Collective Memory: Community Engagement through Visual Interventions

Contemporary visual vernacular in Pakistan demonstrates the impact of diverse cultural assimilation over several millennia, a glimpse into lived culture and its impact on people and places underscoring the confluence of cultures. This talk focuses on two immersive curatorial projects, Sheherezade: The Walled City Anthology, Lahore (2018-2019) depicting site-specific installations drawing from the Walled City’s mythic environment fusing the digital realm with the visual heritage; the second features Jhuley Lal: Crafting the Contemporary, a dialogue between heritage and modernity explored through pieces
designed and fabricated as part of an international collaborative residency in Shikarpur, Khairpur and Karachi (2023-2024)—conceived as a strategic intervention, bringing together designers with local craftspeople offering a contemplation of the possible futures of Sindh’s craft traditions. Finally, this talk will segue into The Reading Project—Karachi, a current project by Numaish-Karachi to revitalise the historic Khalikdina Hall and Library as an inclusive, cultural urban retreat, promoting healthy exchanges among visitors of different age groups, genders, ethnicities, and socio-economic backgrounds.

Dr Nicolas Puig

Anthropologist at the IRD (Université Paris Cité), Paris

Anthropology of Sound: Approaches and Knowledges through Sonic Relationships

Bird songs in Papua New Guinea, fish grunting in Senegal, fireworks in Napoli, footsteps in Cairo streets, or explosions in Beirut, sounds have become the focus of attention for researchers in ecological and social sciences. In this context, anthropology of sound emerged in the 1970s from a dual tradition, that of ethnomusicology and that of musical listening to the world’s harmony. Then approaches diversified to encompass a range of sound-related practices, relations, and perceptions. I will present the approaches developed by anthropologists working on sonic relations and present the kind of knowledge they can reach through sonic methodologies.