|
|
Bicy-colonization: A symmetrical ethnography of the development project Kola pro Afriku (Czech Bikes for Gambian Schools)
Werner, Jan ; Stöckelová, Tereza (advisor) ; Brož, Luděk (referee)
This study is a symmetrical ethnography of the Czech development project Kola pro Afriku (Czech Bikes for Gambian Schools), which involves the collection, repairs, modification and shipment of old Czech bicycles to The Gambia. Once there, they are distributed to partner schools and offered to communing pupils. In my research, I mainly focus on the pivotal technology of the project, bicycles, and their performances. Drawing on classic ethnographies of development and (most importantly) on studies based on the actor-network theory (ANT), I gradually explore the bike collection process, their modifications and repairs, their shipment to The Gambia and their local operations. When doing so, I focus on the social topology of the bicycles and its transformations in the timespace. In this regard, the bicycles gradually appear as junk (i.e. a dysfunctional relict of stabilized networks), as a fluid collectivity and as individually fluid. Thereby, this study shows that technology transfers may lead not only to changes in the set of relations, of which the given object consists, but in the very modes, in which those relations arise. It is precisely these topological transformations that significantly contribute to the functioning of the project Kola pro Afriku. Key words: development cooperation,...
|
|
|
Bicy-colonization: A symmetrical ethnography of the development project Kola pro Afriku (Czech Bikes for Gambian Schools)
Werner, Jan ; Stöckelová, Tereza (advisor) ; Brož, Luděk (referee)
This study is a symmetrical ethnography of the Czech development project Kola pro Afriku (Czech Bikes for Gambian Schools), which involves the collection, repairs, modification and shipment of old Czech bicycles to The Gambia. Once there, they are distributed to partner schools and offered to communing pupils. In my research, I mainly focus on the pivotal technology of the project, bicycles, and their performances. Drawing on classic ethnographies of development and (most importantly) on studies based on the actor-network theory (ANT), I gradually explore the bike collection process, their modifications and repairs, their shipment to The Gambia and their local operations. When doing so, I focus on the social topology of the bicycles and its transformations in the timespace. In this regard, the bicycles gradually appear as junk (i.e. a dysfunctional relict of stabilized networks), as a fluid collectivity and as individually fluid. Thereby, this study shows that technology transfers may lead not only to changes in the set of relations, of which the given object consists, but in the very modes, in which those relations arise. It is precisely these topological transformations that significantly contribute to the functioning of the project Kola pro Afriku. Key words: development cooperation,...
|
guest ::
