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Institute of Social and Cultural Anthropology

Photo: UHH/Ohme

Univ.-Prof. Dr. Michael Schnegg

schnegg_neu

Professor

Address

University of Hamburg
Institute of Social & Cultural Anthropology
Edmund-Siemers-Allee 1, West (ESA W)
20146 Hamburg

Office

Room: 230

Office hours

Every monday, 14-15 PM


Google Scholar

ResearchGate

Contact

Tel: +49 40 42838-7915

My ethnographic work aims to explore what it feels like to live a rural life in an increasingly urbanized and warming world. To this end, I am collaborating with philosophers to further the field of phenomenological anthropology. This has resulted in the establishment of the 'Hamburg Symposium on Philosophy and Anthropology' (with Thiemo Breyer, Cologne), in which we have discussed critical phenomenology (2023), experience (2024) and atmospheres (2025).

More specifically, my work traces:

Phenomenological Anthropology

Schnegg, Michael (2025) "Collective Loneliness. Theorizing Emotions as Atmospheres" Current Anthropology 66 (2) http://dx.doi.org/10.1086/734796

Schnegg, Michael (2024) Culture as response. Ethos.

Schnegg, Michael (2023) Phenomenological Anthropology: Philosophical Concepts for Ethnographic Use. Zeitschrift für Ethnologie/Journal of Social and Cultural Anthropology 148 (1): 59–102.

Schnegg, Michael (2024) Rural boredom: atmospheres of blocked promises. Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute.

Schnegg, Michael (2023) The Un/Ethical Demand: A Responsive Approach to Sharing and Its Ethics. Ethnoscripts 25.

Climate change

Schnegg, Michael. 2021. Ontologies of Climate Change: Reconciling Indigenous and Scientific Explanations for the Lack of Rain in Namibia. American Ethnologist 48 (2):260-273.

Schnegg, Michael. 2021. What Does the Situation Say? Theorizing Multiple Understandings of Climate Change. Ethos 49 (2):194-215.

Schnegg, Michael, Coral I. O’Brian, and Inga J. Sievert. 2021. It’s Our Fault: A Global Comparison of Different Ways of Explaining Climate Change. Human Ecology 49 (3):327-339.

Schnegg, Michael. 2019. The Life of Winds: Knowing the Namibian Weather from Someplace and from Noplace. American Anthropologist 121 (4):830-844.
 

Emotions and affect

Schnegg, Michael, and Thiemo Breyer. 2022. Empathy Beyond the Human. The Social Construction of a Multispecies World. Ethnos: 1-22.

Schnegg, Michael. 2023. Affekträume: Gefühlvolle Begegnung von Menschen und Natur. In Anthropologie der Emotionen. Affektive Dynamiken in Kultur und Gesellschaft, edited by T. Stodulka, A. von Poser, G. Scheidecker and J. Bens. Berlin: Reimer Verlag.
 

Temporality

Schnegg, Michael. 2023. There was no future in the past: Time and the environment in rural Namibia. HAU: Journal of Ethnographic Theory 13 (1):146-158.

Schnegg, Michael. 2021. Eleven Namibian Rains: A Phenomenological Analysis of Experience in Time. Anthropological Theory 0:1-23.

Schnegg, Michael. 2023. Die Sorgen um das Klima von morgen. In Zeit und Sorge, edited by M. Bitzer, I. Bosbach, L. Brand, J. F. Burow, C. Ehrens, M. S. Hoffmann, J. John, O. Kedenburg, J. Sellig, L. Stiller, A. Henkel, I. Karle, G. Lindemann and M. Werner. Baden-Baden: Nomos Verlagsgesellschaft mbH & Co. KG.
 

Infrastructure and Institutional Governance

Schnegg, Michael, and Richard Dimba Kiaka. 2018. Subsidized Elephants: Community-based Resource Governance and Environmental (In)justice in Namibia. Geoforum 93:105-115.

Schnegg, Michael. 2018. Institutional Multiplexity: Social Networks and Community-Based Natural Resource Management. Sustainability Science 13 (4):1017-1030.

Schnegg, Michael, and Michael Bollig. 2016. Institutions Put to the Test: Community-based Water Management in Namibia During a Drought. Journal of Arid Environments 124:62-71.

Schnegg, Michael, and Theresa Linke. 2015. Living Institutions: Sharing and Sanctioning Water among Pastoralists in Namibia. World Development 68:205-214.
 

Sharing

Schnegg, Michael. 2021. Becoming a Debtor to Eat: The Transformation of Food Sharing in Namibia. Ethnos: 1-21.

Schnegg, Michael. 2015. Reciprocity on Demand: Sharing and Exchanging Food in Northwestern Namibia. Human Nature 26 (3):313-330.

Curriculum Vitae

2015 Paul-Lazarsfeld-Visiting-Professor at the Department of Methods in the Social Sciences, University of Vienna

2010-2014 Head of the Department for Cultural Studies & Cultural History at the University of Hamburg

Since 2010 Full Professor (W3) at the Institute of Social & Cultural Anthropology at the University of Hamburg

2009 Assistant professor (with tenure track) at the Institute of Social & Cultural Anthropology at the University of Cologne

2007 Assistant professor at the Institute of Social & Cultural Anthropology at the University of Hamburg

2003 Dr. phil, title of the thesis: "Das Fiesta Netzwerk: Soziale Organisation einer mexikanischen Gemeinde, 1679-2001" (= the fiesta network: social organization of a Mexican community, 1679-2001)

2002-2004 Paternity leave

1999-2002 Research associate, DFG funded project "Moderner Kulturwandel am Beispiel von compadrazgo in Mexiko", headed by M. Casimir, Th. Schweizer

1997 Magister Artium, main subject Anthropology, subsidiary subjects Sociology and History. Title of the thesis: "Soziale Struktur und Alltagsleben in virtuellen Gemeinschaften" (= social structure and daily life in virtual communities)

1992-1997 Studies of Anthropology, Economics, Sociology and History at the University of Cologne

1971 Born in Munich

 

Research Interests

  • Phenomenology
  • Culture and Climate Change
  • Emotions and Affects
  • Southern Africa, Latin America

Publications

Projects

Current research projects

2019-2023 DFG-Projekt
Different ways of knowing the weather in Namibia
Michael Schnegg

2019-2026 DFG-Projekt
Social Constructions of Climate Futures
Michael Schnegg & Michael Brüggemann & Simone Rödder

2018-2022 NORFACE / BMBF
Artisanal Gold Mining, Mobility and Ideas of Sustainable Futures in Ghana
Michael Schnegg & Robert Pijpers

2010-2019 DFG - long-term project
„Local institutions in globalized societies"

2016-2026 NSF Projekt
The effect of social networks on inequality: A longitudinal cross-cultural investigation
collaboration in cross-cultural project, Jeremy Koster (Principle investigator)

Completed research projects

2013-2016 DFG-Projekt
"Construction and reception of the discourse on climate change in the Philippines"
Michael Schnegg & Thomas Friedrich

2012-2016 BMBF - SASSCAL
"Deforestation and Development"
Michael Schnegg & João Baptista

2010-2015 BMBF - Sustainable land management - The Future Okavango
„Cultural knowledge, valuation, and regulation of ecosystem services"
Michael Schnegg & Michael Pröpper

2010-2013 DFG-Projekt
„Aging in the transnational space: (re-)migration processes between Mexiko and the USA"
Julia Pauli & Michael Schnegg

Workshops

2018 Conference at the University of Hamburg: „In troubled Waters“ – (with Michael Bollig und David Parduhn) programm

2016 Organisation der Konferenz "Comparing Culture(s): Reinvigorating Explicit Comparison as a Method in Anthropology", 27.05.-29.05.2016, Hamburg (gemeinsam mit Edward Lowe, Soka University)

2013 Organisation der Tagung "XXXIII Sunbelt Social Networks Conference of the International Network for Social Network Analysis (INSNA)", 21.-26. Mai 2013, Hamburg (gemeinsam mit Betina Hollstein, Sonja Drobnic)

2009 Organisation des Workshops „Eliten zwischen Aneignung, Anpassung und Abgrenzung” auf der Tagung der Deutschen Gesellschaft für Völkerkunde, Frankfurt (Main) (gemeinsam mit Dr. Pauli)

2009 Leiter der Module „Grundlagen der Netzwerkanalyse" (2 Tage) und „Gesamtnetzwerke" (4 Tage) der 3. Trierer Summerschool: „Network Analysis for the Humanities and the Social Sciences"

2008 „Changing livelihoods in the face of AIDS" (CLIVIA), 18.-20.01.2008, Durban, Südafrika (zusammen mit Dr. Scott Drimie und Clemens Greiner, M.A.)

2008 Leiter der Module „Grundlagen der Netzwerkanalyse" (2 Tage) und „Gesamtnetzwerke" (4 Tage) der 2. Trierer Summerschool: „Network Analysis for the Humanities and the Social Sciences"

2007 Organisation des Workshops „Verwandtschaft Heute” auf der Tagung der Deutschen Gesellschaft für Völkerkunde, Halle (Saale) (gemeinsam mit Prof. Alber, Prof. Beer, Dr. Pauli)

2007 Kommentator: „Social networks and institutional change: pathways and limits of state intervention in rural societies”, European Science Foundation - COST action A 35 Progressore - Working Group 4 (State and Peasants), Münster, 30.-31. März 2007

2007 Leiter der 6-tägigen 1. Trierer Summerschool: „Network Analysis for the Humanities and the Social Sciences"

2006 2nd International Symposium in Media Informatics - „Cow Paths: Agency in Social Software" - 16.-17. November, 2006, B-IT, Bonn (zusammen mit Dr. Ralf Klamma)

2000 Organisation der internationalen Konferenz „Networks, ethnography and social theory. In memoriam Thomas Schweizer”, Universität zu Köln, 9.-12. Juli 2000 (zusammen mit Prof. Dr. M. Bollig, Prof. Dr. H. Lang und Dr. J. Pauli)