PhD Courses in Denmark

Department of Anthropology 

Date and time: 12 December 2025 from 10:00 to 13:00

In this course we delve into the theme of witnessing affliction with Lotte Buch Segal. After a short introduction, we will engage in discussions on how to methodologically and ethically engage in such work. What does it mean to do fieldwork in contexts of suffering, to bear witness, and how does this affect our knowledge production? This course aims to not only introduce participants to literature on ethics and suffering, but based on their own fieldwork, make them better equipped at actively reflecting on knowledge production in dire contexts. As preparation for the course participants are asked to read the referenced literature and consider the ethical leverage of the concepts employed in their own work and their mode of writing.

​Lecturer: Lotte Buch Segal

Courser organiser: Ala Jamal Zareini

Language: English

ECTS: 0,5

Max number of participants: 8

Course fee: The PhD School at the Faculty of Social Sciences participates in Denmark’s national network for PhD courses. This course is free of charge for PhD students enrolled at one of the participating PhD schools (PhD students enrolled at a Danish University, except Copenhagen Business School). Other PhD students will be charged a course fee of DKK 1,200 per ECTS for participation in the course (PhD students enrolled at Copenhagen Business School or a University outside Denmark).

Registration: Please register via the link in the box no later than 14 November 2025

Further information: For more information about the PhD course, please contact the PhD Administration (phd@hrsc.ku.dk).

Compulsory Readings

-          Han, C., & Brandel, A. (2019). Genres of Witnessing: Narrative, Violence, Generations. Ethnos, 85(4), 629–646. https://doi.org/10.1080/00141844.2019.1630466

-          Das, Veena (2007)"4. The Act of Witnessing: Violence, Gender, and Subjectivity". Life and Words: Violence and the Descent into the Ordinary, Berkeley: University of California Press, 2006, pp. 59-78. https://doi.org/10.1525/9780520939530-005

-          Talebi, Shahla (2017). Who is Behind the Name?: A Story of Violence, Loss, and Melancholic Survival in Post-Revolutionary Iran. Journal of Middle East Women's Studies (2011) 7 (1): 39–69. https://doi.org/10.2979/jmiddeastwomstud.2011.7.1.39

-          Segal, L (2025) Detailing Scenes of Ordinary Grief across Ethnography and Poetry. In A Matter of Detail. Anthropology, Philosophy, and Aesthetics. Edited by Andrew Brandel, Veena Das, Sandra Laugier and Perig Pitrou. Toronto: Toronto University Press. (Denne her udkommer først til slut november, jeg skal nok sende et pre-print).

Additional reading:

-          Hlavka, Heather R. and Mulla, Sameena. "Introduction. Imagining and Witnessing Sexual Assault Adjudication". Bodies in Evidence: Race, Gender, and Science in Sexual Assault Adjudication, New York, USA: New York University Press, 2021, pp. 1-40. https://doi.org/10.18574/nyu/9781479809639.003.0001

-          Das, V. (2020). THE LIFE OF CONCEPTS: In the Vicinity of Dying. In Textures of the Ordinary: Doing Anthropology after Wittgenstein (1st ed., pp. 307–332). Fordham University Press. https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctv11991fx.15

-          Segal, L. B. (2015). The burden of being exemplary: national sentiments, awkward witnessing, and womanhood in occupied Palestine. Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, 21(S1), 36-40. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-9655.12164

-          Darwish, M. (1982). Memory for Forgetfulness. Berkeley: University of California Press.