During its three-year funding phase (2021–2024), the network project De:link//Re:link will investigate new spatial configurations and local perspectives on transregional infrastructure projects such as the Belt and Road Initiative initiated by China in 2013. “Link” indicates the network’s focus on local insights and new knowledges. In this context, the consortium will examine the dynamics of entanglements and disentanglements as well as processes of social / political / cultural / economic / lingual de- and re-concentration in Asia, Africa, and Europe. These dynamics will be studied in greater depth from different disciplinary perspectives that rest on multi-scalar and multi-sited fieldwork. Analytical and conceptual approaches of New Area Studies and Southern Theory form the connecting theoretical and methodological framework. The overarching goal of cooperation among the consortium’s four partners (Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, Leibnitz-Zentrum Moderner Orient, Centre for East European and International Studies, and Bonn International Center for Conversion) is to strengthen a pluri-directional exchange of knowledge and shared knowledge production between and of scholars and other academic actors in Germany and the core regions of research (Africa, Asia, Europe, Eurasia, Afrasia).
For the network project’s first public event, we are happy to have Prof. Dr. Oussouby Sacko, president of the Kyoto Seika University, as our keynote speaker. Professor Oussouby Sacko will speak about the relationship between Mali and China, reflecting on his own experiences studying and working as an architect on BRI infrastructure projects. His speech will be followed by the presentation of project spotlights and a roundtable discussion of members of the research consortium.
Date: 25 June 2021
Time: 1–4 p.m. (CET)
Location: Online (Zoom)