The Social Anthropology research theme at the School of Anthropology and Conservation at Kent will host a symposium on Ethnographic Approaches to Wilful Blindness, a topic that is becoming more relevant in an age of post-truth and fake news. The event is jointly organised by the Department of Anthropology of the London School of Economics and Political Science and will take place on Friday 16th and Saturday 17th of June at Canterbury Cathedral Lodge. The speakers are as follows:
- Profitable Uncertainty
Dr Felix Stein (University of Edinburgh/University of Cambridge) - Turning a blind eye: financial institutions and their information barriers
Dr Daniela Peluso (University of Kent) - Waiting for a Deus ex Machina: ‘Sustainable Extractives’ in a 2° World
Dr Dinah Rajak (University of Sussex) - On the Banality of Willful Blindness
Dr Judith Bovensiepen (University of Kent) - Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea
Professor Stuart Kirsch (University of Michigan) - Post-truth as wilful blindness? A sketch for the ethnographic study of epistemology in the post-Trump era
Dr Jon Mair (Kent) - Blind Hope: Entropy and Legitimacy in the Indian General Election
Dr Andrew Sanchez (University of Cambridge) - Invisible Children? Exploring Perverse Approaches to Stateless Children in Malaysia
Dr Catherine Allerton (LSE) - The Absent Presence and the Unseen in the Photographic Frame: Systemic and Strategic Blindness in Colonial Photography
Professor Roy Dilley (University of St Andrews)
Discussants: Dr Todd Sanders (University of Toronto), Professor David Tuckett (UCL), Dr Alpa Shah (LSE)