The Domestic Moral Economy
An Ethnographic Study of Value in the Asia Pacific Region
Following the appointment of Chris Gregory as Professor of Political and Economic Anthropology (part time) the Department of Social Anthropology has established a project that will investigate anthropological approaches to analysis of value. This project is directed by Professor Karen Sykes, and consists of four components aimed at different audiences.
The first consists of an annual series of graduate seminars on anthropological approaches to value. This series is held in spring during Gregory’s annual visit to Manchester. These are intended, first and foremost, for graduate students in Anthropology at Manchester but others are welcome. They are based around a discussion of recent articles on anthropological approaches to value. The aim is to address general questions by means of an examination of ethnographic analyses from different regions of the world.
The second is a series of interdisciplinary roundtable discussions in collaboration with the Political Economy Institute. These are open to staff and graduate students at Manchester but outsiders are welcome. Themes discussed are drawn from classic debates about the theory of value and moral economy to contemporary issues such as the values that inform remittances in the transnational economy today or those that shape micro-finances of poor families in local neighbourhoods.
The third is a series of international workshops that will take an historically-informed comparative analyses of value in the domestic moral economy (DME) of Asia-Pacific region. These workshops will be based around specific themes in the general area of kinship and the economy. These workshops will be concerned to study the value question from the perspective of the DME in the Asia-Pacific region rather than being on the region. In other words, scholars who have worked in the UK on migrants from Asia and the Pacific would be most welcome.
The fourth is a research project on ethnographic studies of value in the DME of the Asia-Pacific region, which is funded by the ESRC for four years from 2010 to 2015. This project builds on the long term research in the region by the three co-applicants, Chris Gregory (ANU and Manchester), Fiona Magowan (Queens University Belfast) and Karen Sykes (Manchester), along with our Project Partner, Jon Altman (ANU) and will include other scholars. The aim is to create a community of researchers at different stages of their careers – graduates, postgraduates, established scholars – who will be able to pursue their own theoretical agenda but in a collaborative climate of debate and discussion framed by the general question of value.
Scholars interested in participating in this program in whatever way are encouraged to contact Professor Karen Sykes. We particularly welcome enquires form potential graduate students in interested in conducting fieldwork on the topic be it in the Asia-Pacific region or with migrants from that region living in the UK or elsewhere. We are also keen to establish links with post-doctoral students who have carried out fieldwork in the general area of kinship and the economy and who are looking for a forum to present their findings and to develop new projects.
This project is also part of the Political Economy Institute