Archaeology of Camps: The Materiality of Exclusion

Zygmunt Bauman called the 20th century the "century of the camps." This designation also applies to the first decades of the current millennium. There are still forced labor and refugee camps, military camps and camps for prisoners of war. The radical exclusion practiced by earlier forced labor and in the extreme in concentration camps is still found in camps today, albeit in other ways.

Camps are established for very different reasons. An important question to be addressed in this workshop is that of the commonalities and differences among them. Camps create a highly structured spatial order of exclusion but also determine to a large extent the materiality of internees' lives. Camp administrators strive to de-individualize incarcerated people. Material barriers limit their freedom of choice. Partitioning of space and control structures are among the best-known characteristics of camps, but the control of access to everyday things deserves equal attention.

The aim of the conference is to examine the materiality of camps as a central element of exclusionary practices both in the past and present. The conference will also address the possibilities and limits of comparability, both diachronic and synchronic.

Please register by sending an email to Mr. Lennard Schönberg (jermaines93@zedat.fu-berlin.de). Due to the pandemic, it is likely that the conference will be held in a hybrid mode. Feel free to indicate your preference for in-person or online participation;we cannot, however, guarantee that we can honor your request.