Can Akin

Since 12/2022 Research Associate and PhD Student, Institute of Social and Cultural Anthropology, Universität Hamburg, in the DFG-funded project “Return to Mexico: Migration and the pluralization of kinship”

10/2016 - 06/2021 M.A. Social and Cultural Anthropology (major), M.A. Philosophy (minor), Ruprecht-Karls-Universität Heidelberg

Thesis: Mehr als nur Mezcal – Die Erfindung einer authentischen mexikanischen Spirituose

04/2012 - 07/2016 B.A. Social and Cultural Anthropology (major), B.Sc. Psychology (minor), Ruprecht-Karls-Universität Heidelberg

Thesis: Think out of the Box – Interdisziplinäre Weiterentwicklungen der Theory of Mind und Opacity of Mind

• Migration and return
• Social class, space and place
• Kinship and transnational relationships
• City and urbanity
• Lifestyles and distinction
• Phenomenology
• Regional: Mexico

No longer alone: Return migration, social isolation and infrastructures of belonging in Mexico City. Department of Social and Cultural Anthropology, University of Lucerne, Switzerland, 07.10.2025; Institute of Social and Cultural Anthropology, University of Hamburg, 21.10.2025.

Cultivating Commons in Urban Fragments: Return Migration and Social Infrastructure in Mexico City. Panel “The commons and the city” (organised by Christoph Brumann and Philipp Demgenski). GASCA2025, Cologne, 30.09.2025.

Some Things Will Never Change? Sibling Relations as Affective Responses in Three Transnational Contexts (with Julia Pauli and Charlot Schneider). Panel “Through thick and thin? Intra-generational kinship in and across transnational lifeworlds” (organised by Julia Pauli and Laura Ogden). 22nd IMISCOE Annual Conference, Paris-Aubervilliers, France, 03.07.2025.

(Im)perfect homecomings: return migration, social class and motherhood in Mexico City. Panel “Motherhood on the move: infrastructures of im/mobilities” (organised by Andrea Verdasco and Rachel Benchekroun). ASA2025, Birmingham, UK, 10.04.2025 (DAAD-funded).

“Esto ya no es vida para mi”: La reinvención personal de personas retornadas en la Ciudad de México [“This is no life for me anymore”: The self-reinvention of returnees in Mexico City]. Departamento de Ciencias Sociales y Políticas, Universidad Iberoamericana CDMX, Mexico, 22.02.2024.

¿Volver al nido o comenzar de nuevo? Experiencias de retorno a la Ciudad de México [Back to the nest or start from scratch? Experiences of returning to Mexico City]. Instituto de Investigaciones Históricas, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Mexico, 12.09.2023.