Day 1 - Friday, October 3rd 2025
9:00 - 9:30 Registration
9:30 – 10:00 Opening remarks
Roberto Balzani (director of DISCI - UniBO, local host) and Roberta Bonetti (DISCI - UniBO - SIAA)
Ira Vannini (director of EDU - UniBO) and Federica Tarabusi (EDU - UniBO -SIAA)
Valentina Moro (director of DIPSUM - UniVR) and Stefania Poltrandolfo (DIPSUM - UniVR- SIAA)
Anna Bagatella (Anthropology Students Organising Committee representative)
Simon Provoost & Olivia Schneider (Applied Anthropology Network)
10:30 - 15:30 Keynotes
10:30 – 11:15 Robin Nagle "Advocacy and Gratitude: Expanding Anthropology’s Field"
11:15 – 11:45 Coffe Break
11:45 – 12:30 Massimo Tommasoli "Creativity and Bureaucratic Culture in an International Organization: An Anthropological Perspective"
12:30 – 14:00 Lunch break (not provided)
14:00 – 14:45 Elena Bougleux "Why this far? Isolation and Constraints in an Antarctic Research Station"
14:45 – 15:30 Fabio Malfatti "Making Knowledge Work: Creativity and Ethnographic Practice between Territories and Institutions"
15:30 – 16:00 Coffee Break
16:00 - 16:15 Announcement
"Why the World Needs Anthropologists - 2nd Edition" by Dan Podjed & Carla Guerron-Montero
16:15 - 17:15 Journals Roundtable
Antropologia Pubblica (SIAA)
Anthropology in Action - Journal for Applied Anthropology in Policy and Practice (Pardis Shafafi & Samira Marty)
Day 2 - Saturday, October 4th 2025
8:45-9:00 Checkin
9:00-12:00 Workshops I
12:00-13:00 Lunch break (not provided)
13:00-15:00 Perspectives
15:00-15:30 Coffee Break
15:30-18:30 Workshops II
18:45-19:00 Closing Remarks
9:00 - 12:00 Workshops I
"Recrafting home movies: ethnographic engagements on images and historical sources” Alessandra Gribaldo, Selenia Marabello, Vittorio Iervese, Federico Sigillo, Giulia Simi
"Writing the Field Otherwise: Remix, Reframe, Reimagine" Ana Maria Oprea
"Ideating with and without Generative AI: An Ethnographic Experiment" Anita Benko & Alina Arefyeva
"Signs in Action: A Design-Led Approach to Global Marketing" Elinor Lifshitz
"Anthropology, proximity and outreach" Ivan Severi
"How to Address Sensitive Topics in User Research? Artefacts to Mediate Participant-Researcher Interaction" Filippo Talami & Joana Couto da Silva
"From Fieldnotes to Flipcharts: Anthropology Meets Facilitation" Maria Benciolini &Flavio Lorenzoni
"Storytelling Maps: Participatory Practices for Applied Anthropology" Chiara Brambilla, Giulio Bertoluzza, Paolo Carera, Maria Sangaletti.
"Design Research: A Practical Workshop on UX Research and Anthropology" Rocio Santarcieri
15:30-18:30 Workshops II
"Migratory Space: A Practice of Speculating Home" Laila Mufidah & Chi-Chu (Sharo) Liang
"Experimenting with vulvas. A participatory workshop to creatively address the cultural void surrounding vulvar health" Federica Manfredi
"Classrooms as Fieldsites: An Anthrospective Approach" Jennifer Morana
"Dialoguing Species: Crafting Shared Worlds" Lisa Maria Zellner, Secil Ugur Yavuz, Lara Giordana, Alvise Mattozzi, Elisabeth Tauber, Micol Rispoli
"A Toolkit for Public Anthropology in the City: Tactics, Practices and Creative Visions for Crafting Anthropological Urban Events" Giovanna Santanera, Valentina Sbocchia, Giacomo Pozzi, Leone Michelini
"The Multimodal Anthropological Videography (MAV)" Regev Nathansohn
"Speculative Design & Future Storytelling for Anthropologists" Rosalie Post
"Currencies for the Commons: A Case for Inflation as Ethnographic Lens" Soheila Shourbaji & Natalie Wood
"The Anthropologist as a Creative Connector Across Differences" Vera de Groot
13:00-15:00 Perspectives
Francesco Vettori: Beyond Contractual Constraints: How Anthropology Reframes Evaluation Practices
Joseph Markman: Digital Intimacy in a Post-Artificial World
Anna Malpas: Towards an Anthropology of Sitting
Sisse Malene Frydendal Grøn: Mapping Occupational Accidents to Imagine Prevention – A Creative Intervention for Workplace Safety
Flavia Cangia: Rescue Routes: Entangled Trajectories Between Anthropology, Canine Worlds, and Mobilities
Jayesha M. Koushik: Storytelling for Impact
Elena Tagliani: Studying popular theatre from the spectator’s perspective. When taking part in a performance becomes a form of democratic participation and co-production of political meaning. The Greek saga of Karagkiozis as a case study
Michela Buonvino, Letizia Bindi, Jacopo Trivisonno: Co-Exhibiting the Social Life of Things: Cultural Work for Territorial Regeneration in the Apennines
Miria Gambardella: Where Do We Draw the Line? Militant Anthropology and the Ethics of Creative Practices
Flavio Lorenzoni: Work in progress. Professional Antropology POV
Matthew Lariviere: Ageing futures: How creativity can help to explore alterities for our later lives
Roberto Lazzaroni Community of Desire: Creativity and Regeneration for Museum Futures in Crisis
Elettra Bresolin: Artificial Imaginaries: Generative AI, Creative Exploration and the Reconfiguration of Paradigms
Emilia Rosselli Del Turco: Sharing space with creative work
Daria De Grazia, Mattia Pagano, Alessandra Broccolini: Shifting the Gaze: The Workshop Encounter as a Mode of Shared Re-Signification of Urban Spaces
Daniele Panzeri: Anthropology and adaptive management
Caterina Borelli: The Personal is Political—and Collective: Perspectives from the Maternal Turn
Anna Bagatella: Doing antro-archaeology in front of a beer: knowledge making and community building in creative informal spaces of conviviality
Registration opens soon!
Get your ticket now to be informed when it does.
Day 3 - Sunday, October 5th 2025
10:00 - 11:00 Network Meeting
Wrap up the conference by joining us for the annual AAN Network Meeting! This is your opportunity to directly connect with the network, explore current and upcoming initiatives, and discover ways to actively contribute to our collective mission, whether you’re looking to contribute actively or simply explore what we do. This session welcomes current members, partners, and anyone curious about joining our community.
Location tba!
13:00 - 15:00 WATER, Walk with Me! - Sensory Ethnography Walk
The Blue Sensory Walk invites participants to experience Bologna through their senses while walking from a dense urban street, through the green space of 11 September 2001 Park (Parco 11 Settembre 2001), to the blue space of the Ancient River Port (Antico Porto e Dogana Daziaria). Along the way, we will observe and discuss how concrete, stone, vegetation, human presence, and water shape our perceptions and emotions, and influence our everyday habits and practices. Guided by anthropologists and geographers, the walk focuses on three key dimensions: (1) relaxation and restoration (of the individual), (2) recreation and instoration (of the individual), and (3) mitigation of environmental pressures. Participants will reflect on how “blue spaces” (rivers, lakes, seas, ponds...) foster well-being and reconnection with the self, with others, and with the living city.
Facilitated by Katarina Polajnar Horvat and Dan Podjed
The workshop is a result of the BLUE project (J6-60099), financially supported by the Slovenian Research and Innovation Agency.
Meeting point tba!
