Curriculum Vitae
Educational Background
2009 – 2010
Lecturer at the Free University Berlin (Social Anthropology), lectures given on Religion in East Africa as well as migration theories
2006 – 2010
PhD student at the Free University Berlin (Social Anthropology), Dissertation about : “Narrating Islamic Conversion – Erzählungen religiösen Wandels in Ostafrika“
2006
University lecturer at the Humboldt University Berlin, giving a course about ‚The social history of Islam in East Africa’
2004 – 2006
Research Assistant at the Centre for Modern Oriental Studies (ZMO), Berlin in a Project about ‚Islamic Mission in Contemporary East Africa’, field work in Kenya (Nakuru and Kisumu) and Tanzania (Moshi)
2000
Internship at the UNHCR (United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees) in Western Tanzania (Kasulu), research on the living conditions of Burundian refugees in an UNHCR refugee camp
1996 – 2003
M.A. studies at the Free University Berlin and the University of Edinburgh, majoring in Social Anthropology, minor subjects: Sociology and Political Science, Graduation with a thesis about a refugee camp in Tanzania
Grants and Invitations
12/2013
Invitation as a Fellow to the Bayreuth Academy of Advanced African Studies
2006 - 2009
PhD studies financed by a grant from the ‚Evangelisches Studienwerk Villigst’
09/2005
Invitation to the Summer Academy of the Wissenschaftskolleg Berlin with the theme ‚Experts and Mediators of Knowledge in the 20th Century: Transregional Perspectives.’ (04.-11. September 2005)
1996 - 2002
M.A. studies financed by a grant from the ‚Evangelisches Studienwerk Villigst’
Organisation of Conferences und Workshops
2014
International Workshop in Nairobi, Kenya 'Eastleigh and beyond: The Somali factor in Urban Kenya' (Aug./Sept.), with Dr. Neil Carrier (University of Oxford) and Kadara Swaleh (University of Nairobi).
2014
Panel at the VAD-Tagung in Bayreuth about 'The future of the African (middle) classes' (11.-14. June), with Dr. David o'Kane (MPI), Dr. Lena Kroeker and Dr. Florian Stoll (both Universität Bayreuth).
2013
Joint Institutes Colloquium of the MPI for Social Anthropology and the Institute for Social and Cultural Anthropology of the Martin-Luther-Universität Halle-Wittenberg with the topic 'Citizenship Today' (with Dr. Katharina Schramm, MLU, and Dr. Martin Ramstedt, MPI).
2011
In-house Training ‚Network Analysis’, MPI for Social Anthropology, Halle (03.-06. November), with Andre Thiemann (MPI).
2009
Panel at the ECAS (European Conference on African Studies) in Leipzig with the theme ‚Imagining Islamic Centres: Reshaping Locality through Shifting Affiliations’ (04.-07. June), with Britta Frede (ZMO).
2006
Panel at the VAD (Vereinigung für Afrikawissenschaften Deutschland) conference in Frankfurt about ‚Translocal Transfers of Islamic Knowledge in Africa’ (24.-27. July), with Prof. Dr. Achim von Oppen and Britta Frede (both ZMO).
2005
International conference ‚Conversion, Modernity and the Individual –with particular reference to Islam in Africa’ at the Zentrum Moderner Orient, Berlin (25.-26. November), with Prof. Dr. Achim von Oppen and Dr. Chanfi Ahmed.
Presentations at Conferences and Workshops
2017
Heimkehr oder Entfremdung? Somalische „Rückkehrer“ aus Europa nach Ostafrika. Kolloquium des Centre of Atlantic and Global Studies (CAGS), Leibnitz Universität Hannover, 28.06.2017.
2016
‚Giving Informality a Room: (Somali) Shopping Centres in Kenya‘, Inhabiting the Corridor: a workshop on surging resource economies and urban life in East Africa, MPI for the Study of Religious and Ethnic Diversity, Göttingen, 27.-29. Oktober 2016.
‚Wenn die Unsicherheit bleibt. Langzeitgeflüchtete und staatliche Strategien in Kenia und Tansania‘, Tagung des Netzwerks Flüchtlingsforschung, Osnabrück, 06.-08. Oktober 2016.
‚Conviviality, Cohabitation and Cosmopolitanism. The Art of Living Together‘, 1st South-East-African & European Conference ‚Refugees and Forced Migrants: Social rights – care – mutual benefits?‘ organised by the MPI for Social Law and Social Policy & Pwani University, Kilifi (Kenia), 02.-03. August 2016
‚(Im)mobile families - regional and transcontinental Somali family networks, Tagung der European Association of Social Anthropologists (EASA), Mailand (Italien), 20.-23. Juli 2016
‚Somali Malls and Markets in East Africa and Beyond‘ (jointly with Neil Carrier), The Place of Trade: Marketplaces and the global informal economy, University of Oxford, African Studies Centre, 13. Juni 2016.
2015
‚Citizenship in the making. Somalis in Kenya and the question of belonging‘, 12th Somali Studies International Association (SSIA) Congress, Helsinki (Finland) 19.-23. August
‚Biometric Bureaucracy, the War on Terror and the New Citizenship and Immigration Act - Kenya and its Somali inhabitants‘, European Conference on African Studies (ECAS), Paris (Frankreich), 08.-10. Juli 2015.
2013
'Citizenship in the making. Somalis in Kenya and the question of Belonging', Presentation at the workshop 'Sharing/Dividing Futures' at the Bayreuth Academy of Advanced African Studies, Bayreuth (Germany), 12.-13. December.
'Demystifying Business: "Somali" Shopping Complexes in Kenyan Cities and the reconfiguration of space', European Conference on African Studies (ECAS), Lisbon (Portugal), 27.-29. June.
2012
'Placemaking: Somali migrants in Kenyan cities', Presentation at the institutes colloquium of the Institut für Afrikanistik, Leipzig (Germany), 26. November.
'Waiting for peace in Somalia or why it is sometimes better if nothing happens', Conference of the European Association of Social Anthropologists (EASA) 2012, Paris (France), 10.-13. July.
'Sometimes you forget that you don't belong here - Somali refugees "returning" to Kenya', Conference of the Vereinigung für Afrikawissenschaften Deutschlands (VAD), Köln (Germany), 30. May - 02. June.
'The beauty of feeling superior: Conversion narratives as performative acts in a climate of religious competition', Conference of the Association of Social Anthropologists of the UK and Commonwealth (ASA), Delhi (India), 03.-06. April.
2011
'Somalis in Kenyan Cities: Some Thoughts about Using the Term Diaspora', European Conference on African Studies (ECAS), Uppsala (Sweden), 14.-19. June.
2010
'Religious Placemaking: Somali Migrants in Kenya', Conference of the African Studies Association (ASA), San Francisco (USA), 18.-21. November.
2009
'Processes of establishing Islamic movements in contemporary Kenya: The example of the Tablighi Jamaat', European Conference on African Studies (ECAS), Leipzig (Germany), 04.-07. June.
2008
'Biographical Reconstruction & Self-Transformation: Some theoretical considerations about conversion narratives in East Africa', Conference of the Vereinigung für Afrikawissenschaften Deutschlands (VAD), Freiburg (Germany) & Basel (Switzerland), 14.-17. May.
'The circular flow of conversion narratives: conversion to Islam in East Africa and its public role', Presentation at the institutes colloquium of the Institute of Social and Cultural Anthropology of the Free University Berlin (Germany), 28. January.
2006
'Conversion Narratives as a Means for Islamic Missionary Movements in East Africa', Conference of the African Studies Association (ASA), San Francisco (USA), 16.-19. November.
'Islamische Konversionserzählungen im Aushandlungsprozess - das Internet als Verbreitungsraum von islamischen Diskursen und ihre Aneignung in Ostafrika', Conference of the Vereinigung für Afrikawissenschaften Deutschlands (VAD), Frankfurt/M. (Germany), 24.-27. July.
2005
'Narrating conversion: discourses (and mediators) of religious change in East Africa', Workshop 'Conversion, Modernity and the Individual with particular reference to Islam in Africa and Asia' at the Zentrum Moderner Orient, Berlin (Germany), 25.-26. November.
'Conversion to Islam in East Africa - Ideas and Mediators', Summer Academy 'Experts and Mediators of Knowledge in the 20th Century: Transregional Perspectives' of the Wissenschaftskolleg Berlin (Germany), 04.-11. September.
'Biographie und "Selbsttransformation" - Konversion zum Islam in Ostafrika', Conference of the Sektion Biographieforschung, Deutschen Gesellschaft für Soziologie, Frankfurt/M. (Germany), 01.-03. July.
2003
'Flüchtlingspolitik in Tansania: Migrant/innen zwischen Abschiebung und Integration', 4. Tag der Polyphonen Ethnologie, 13. June.