Recording now available: SIEF talk on "Culture in Dialogue" - “Heritage at War. Plan and Prepare”

SIEF invites you to view the recording of the talk on “Culture in Dialogue”. The topic of the conversation was the recently published book “Heritage at War. Plan and Prepare”, edited by Mark Dunkley, Anna Tulliach, and Lisa Mol.

The recording is available on the Videos page.

Tribute to Thomas Hylland-Eriksen

SIEF would like to pay tribute to esteemed professor of Social Anthropology at the University of Oslo, Thomas Hylland-Eriksen, who sadly passed away on Nov 27, 2024.

We honor the immense contribution Hylland-Eriksen made to European Ethnology, Folklore Studies, Cultural Anthropology, and adjoining disciplines. Not only was he an academic giant, whose invigorating research is widely read and discussed across the globe, but he also served as a lodestar, as an engaged teacher and a public intellectual. His legacy will continue to inspire scholarly generations.

We would like to express our heartfelt condolences to his family and loved ones.

we share a beautifully written obituary from Thorgeir Kolshus, head of Department of Social Anthropology, and Svein Stølen, rector, University of Oslo.

On behalf of the SIEF Board/Société Internationale d’Ethnologie et de Folklore/International Society of Ethnology and Folklore,

Marie Sandberg, President
Thomas McKean, Vice-President
Sophie Elpers, Executive Vice-President

SIEF Summer School 2024 “Postscapes Matter”

23-27 September 2024 in Zagreb, Croatia

The SIEF Summer School 2024 explores how and why postscapes matter; as a lived experience, a historical or temporal condition and as a conceptual tool or a way of knowing. We invite our participants to consider: What comes after post-? What is left of post-, as a concept? Why is it still important to think in terms of diverse postscapes?

More information on the Summer School page.

Living Eating Habits, Revitalized Foodways and the Concepts of Tradition and Food Heritage

The 24th Food Research working group conference took place at the Museum of Ethnography in Budapest, Hungary 18-20 September 2024.

Over the three days, 44 speakers from 14 countries gathered over three days across 9 sessions to examine the role of food and related traditions in shaping or preserving the identities of communities, with a focus on globalization, festivalization, and sustainability. Read more here >>

Lost Places and Abandoned Landscapes

Space-lore and Place-lore working group conference, taking place 29th–30th October 2024; University of Szeged, Hungary

Cultural landscapes across the globe have experienced rapid and profound transformations. Throughout the 20th and 21st centuries, economic, political and climatic shifts have compelled various communities to leave their homelands and adapt to new environments. As a result, numerous areas have been depopulated and, local landscape management and practices vanished. Read more here >>

The 15th Conference of the SIEF Ritual Year Working Group: Food, Feasts, Festivities, & Folklore

The theme revolves around the importance and meaning of food. The conference aims to highlight the centrality of gustatory experiences and gastronomical practices in various ethnolinguistic groups around the world. Read more here >>

New issue of Ethnologia Europaea, Vol. 54, no. 2

This new issue of Ethnologia Europaea comes with several changes to the structure and editorship of the journal. It is with poignant memories and happy expectations for Ethnologia Europaea that we write about a new era: to begin, EE has just moved to a new publisher at the start of 2024. Berghahn Journals will now be our home for the foreseeable future, and we are already enjoying the professional atmosphere of this independent, progressive and social science-friendly publishing house. With this switch from OLH, EE now becomes part of Berghahn's OpenAnthro model.

We feel this change will usher in a bright new future for the journal because it will give it much more visibility, as we will be part of a collection of high-ranking journals, including Social Anthropology/Anthropologie Sociale (SA/AS) and the Anthropological Journal of European Cultures (AJEC). Please do recommend the OpenAnthro collection to your libraries; it is library subscriptions that make this “open model” possible.

Cultural Analysis, Volume 22.2 (2024)

Special Issue “In relation to microbes"

Special issue editors: Valdimar Tr. Hafstein, Áki G. Karlsson, and Veera Kinnunen

This special issue explores various aspects of multispecies symbiotic practices where humans and microbes relate to each other. Whether making and digesting food, composting and caring for soils, or managing waste, some of these practices have been actively cultivated for millennia, others recently glimpsed through advances in microbiology, while others await discovery, but may prove vital for the future shape of life on Earth.