Serjara Aleman successfully defended her PhD at the University of Lausanne and was a grantee of the Swiss National Science Foundation (doc.ch program). In her thesis, she explores critical cultural work in Lima, Peru and proposes relational filmmaking as a decolonial multimodal research practice. Through long-term audiovisual collaboration, this approach moves beyond extraction and encourages shared knowledge-making rooted in engagement and negotiation foregrounding the ethical and political stakes of the discipline. She is a researcher at the Centre intercantonal d’information sur les croyances (CIC) in Geneva and at the HES-SO University of Applied Sciences and Arts Western Switzerland of Social Work in Fribourg.
Federica Moretti is an anthropologist. She obtained her PhD from the University of Lausanne, as part of the ERC-ARTIVISM project. She has been a researcher and lecturer in the ERC-SOCIOBORD project at the European University Institute and at the Laboratoire d’Anthropologie des Mondes Contemporains of the Free University Brussels (ULB). She is an affiliated researcher at the Institut des sciences sociales des religions (ISSR) at the University of Lausanne and at Department of Social and Cultural Anthropology at the KU Leuven. Passionate about tackling ethical questions in research, she is an active member of the Commission de réflexion éthique et déontologique (CRED) of the Swiss Anthropological Association.
Sara Wiederkehr is a PhD candidate in Anthropology at the University of Lausanne. In her thesis, she analyses the role of street art and social imaginaries in the construction of space and place in Los Angeles, California, by following the performativity of street art and its capability of creating belonging and reshaping urban space. She is a member of the Commission d’Anthropologie Visuelle of the Swiss Anthropological Association.
Contemporary anthropology increasingly confronts challenges of representation amid evolving cultural, social, and political landscapes. This special feature investigates how anthropologists engage in multimodal practices—from academic writing and digital media to performance and visualization—to convey research and negotiate power dynamics. It examines the transformation of field data into anthropological products, highlighting how politics, decoloniality, and ethical considerations shape representation. Through a two-part, student-led workshop, graduate students and practitioners explored alternative methods, employing self-reflection, performance, and creative visualization to address historical imbalances and misrepresentations. The resulting dialogue underscores the importance of reflexivity and engaged research practices that challenge traditional disciplinary boundaries. By integrating diverse perspectives and innovative techniques, the contributions call for a reimagined anthropology that embraces complexity and inclusivity while dismantling entrenched hierarchies. This feature ultimately advocates for a dynamic, performative approach to representing the “other” and rethinking scholarly practices. It offers a transformative roadmap for future anthropological inquiry with rigor.
References
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Fischer-Lichte, Erika. 2009. “Culture as performance.” Modern Austrian Literature 42 (3), Special Issue: Performance: 1–10
Köhn, S. 2016. Mediating Mobility. Visual Anthropology in the Age of Migration. New York: Columbia University Press.
Larsen, Peter Bille, Doris Bacalzo, Leïla Baraccini, Patrick Naef, Susie Riva, and Eda Elif Tibet. 2022. Repositioning Engaged Anthropology. Critical Reflexivity and Overcoming Dichotomies, Tsantsa / Swiss Journal of Sociocultural Anthropology 27: 4–15. https://doi.org/10.36950/tsantsa.2022.27.7994.
Mingolo, Walter, and Rolando Vázquez. 2013. “Decolonial AestheSis: Colonial Wounds / Decolonial Healings.” Social Text Online, Periscope, July 15, 2013. https://socialtextjournal.org/periscope_article/ decolonial-aesthesis-colonial-woundsdecolonial-healings/.
Schneider, Arndt. 2008. “Three Modes of Experimentation with Art and Ethnography.” Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute (N.S) 14 (1): 171–94.
Tibet, Eda, E. 2022. “Learning to Be Freed. Affective Multimodalities in Third Space.” Tsantsa / Swiss Journal of Sociocultural Athropology 27: 58–77. https://doi.org/10.36950/tsantsa.2022.27.7788.
