M Degani
Biographic Data
| ID | 5512 |
|---|---|
| NAME | M Degani |
| GIVEN NAMES | M |
| FAMILY NAME | Degani |
| SIGNATURE | DEGANI M |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Cambridge |
| ORCID | 0000-0003-1393-4091 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 14 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 50 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 14 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2017 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 3 |
The Many Faces of the Parasite
The introduction to this special issue describes the ‘parasite’ as a concept through which to understand the problems and possibilities of cohabitation, with its attendant strategies of shelter and expulsion, its affects of gratitude and resentment. Building on the work of Michel Serres, it then summarises how the contributors take up this idea across three themes: the intimacies of hospitality, urban networks of economy and information, and the …
The Guyer line
This task is at the heart of one of Guyer’s central interventions: the rereading of “conversions” in Paul Bohannon’s (1955) account of Tiv spheres of exchange. Exchange tends to presume a reversible, symmetrical equivalence of this and that. Yet some kinds of exchanges are directional. They involve a conversionary intermediary that lets you move across a social or moral boundary. We see this all the time with ordinary currency conversions—my Amer…
Toward a Modal Anthropology
This article outlines a modal anthropology, defined as the ethnographic description of what is possible and necessary for actors operating within a given (technical, aesthetic, ecological) medium. Spanning a wide array of examples, from evolutionary biomechanics to socialist jokes to village feuds, it surveys extant work on modality and its disciplinary antecedents, while examining some of the tricky issues involved in shifting across modes in re…
Nun of the river: The material and spiritual economies of small hydropower in rural Tanzania
This article examines the significance of hydroelectric mini-grids owned and operated by Catholic sisterhoods in rural Tanzania, situating them within a broader context of energy transition and environmental justice. The Tanzanian state is betting that mini-grids can effectively supplement the national grid's limited reach; since 2010 it has invested considerable effort in developing a regulatory framework that streamlines licensing procedures an…
Anthro abuzz: Fuel, Electricity, and Ethnography in the Era of Global Boiling
The transition away from fossil fuels is the signature challenge of our times, the key to limiting the devastation of global heating that has already begun ravaging planetary ecosystems and civilizations
Invention and grace: Taking turns in a streetcorner bureaucracy
This article analyzes the styles of work and conflict of a group of electrical contractors who congregate across the street from a power utility office in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. Drawing on a rich tradition of urban Africanist ethnography, as well as the work of Roy Wagner and Lars Spuybroek, it argues that their long-running streetcorner bureau is a “turn” that brings together the logics of entrepreneurial accumulation and bureaucratic legitima…
The Flickering Torch
This essay offers an ethnographic analysis of Tanzania's electrical power crisis in 2011 and the national disposition to endure suffering that it seemed to make evident. It shows that in asking citizens to suffer the near-total breakdown of the power supply in good faith, the ruling party, Chama Cha Mapinduzi (CCM, or Party of the Revolution), drew on a cultural-political orientation developed during the socialist era and sustained through a long…
Gone to Ground: A History of Environment and Infrastructure in Dar es Salaam by Emily Brownell
Reviewed by: Gone to Ground: A History of Environment and Infrastructure in Dar es Salaam by Emily Brownell Michael Degani (bio) Gone to Ground: A History of Environment and Infrastructure in Dar es Salaam by Emily Brownell. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2020. Pp. 278. Emily Brownell's Gone to Ground is a brilliant, landmark study of Dar es Salaam in the 1970s and 80s. This often-overlooked period of Tanzania's history is usually na…
Cutting without Cutting Connection: The Semiotics of Power Patrols in Urban Tanzania
Before the total cutoff of a household for unpaid electrical bills, and in anticipation of the violence it might precipitate, national power utility inspectors in Dar es Salaam have recourse to a gradient of ‘soft’ disconnections designed to signal good faith and encourage repayment. Drawing on a mixture of semiotics and exchange theory, this article argues that such soft disconnections may be understood as moments when the shared grounds of the …
Air in Unexpected Places
Aircrete is a lightweight building material with a number of remarkable qualities, including high compression strength, buoyancy and thermal insulation. Perhaps most strikingly, its lack of sand aggregate makes it energy efficient compared to concrete. While aircrete is regularly sold by various construction companies, DIY enthusiasts and technicians around the world are cultivating more home-brew, open-source methods. This article follows James,…
Bottleneck: Moving, Building, and Belonging in an African City by Caroline Melly
Reviewed by: Bottleneck: Moving, Building, and Belonging in an African City by Caroline Melly Michael Degani Caroline Melly, Bottleneck: Moving, Building, and Belonging in an African City. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2017. 224 pp. In this lucid and well-written ethnography, Caroline Melly asks us to consider the problems of mobility that arise in mid-2000s Dakar and in African urban life more broadly. This is an extended post-structural…
La véranda, le climatiseur et la centrale électrique: Race et électricité en Tanzanie postsocialiste
Cet article analyse l’importance idéologique de la notion de « race » dans le secteur de l’électricité en Tanzanie, en suivant les débats autour de deux exploitants de centrales thermiques privés, Independent Power Tanzania Limited (IPTL)/Pan African Power (PAP) et Richmond Development Corporation. Engagées à l’origine dans le cadre de contrats de fourniture « d’énergie de secours », les deux sociétés sont devenues des prestataires de longue duré…
Shock Humor: Zaniness and the Freedom of Permanent Improvisation in Urban Tanzania
This essay explores scenes of zany comedy in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, across three sites: a television sketch about repeated electrical shock; the careers of freelance electricians known as vishoka; and encounters between residents and power utility inspectors. Drawing on the work of Sianne Ngai, as well as long-term ethnographic research, the essay argues that zaniness manifests the structural paradoxes of entrepreneurial populations that have a…
Modal reasoning in Dar es Salaam's power network
In Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, residents, electricians, and power-utility workers tolerate some unofficial forms of modifiying the electrical network, such as unsanctioned reconnections and extensions. These practices, which can also involve theft, bribery, and other illegal activities, both undermine and sustain an increasingly expensive public infrastructure that is in disrepair and subject to routine bureaucratic neglect. But such modifications a…
Modal reasoning in Dar es Salaam's power network
In Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, residents, electricians, and power-utility workers tolerate some unofficial forms of modifiying the electrical network, such as unsanctioned reconnections and extensions. These practices, which can also involve theft, bribery, and other illegal activities, both undermine and sustain an increasingly expensive public infrastructure that is in disrepair and subject to routine bureaucratic neglect. But such modifications a…
Shock Humor: Zaniness and the Freedom of Permanent Improvisation in Urban Tanzania
This essay explores scenes of zany comedy in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, across three sites: a television sketch about repeated electrical shock; the careers of freelance electricians known as vishoka; and encounters between residents and power utility inspectors. Drawing on the work of Sianne Ngai, as well as long-term ethnographic research, the essay argues that zaniness manifests the structural paradoxes of entrepreneurial populations that have a…
Cutting without Cutting Connection: The Semiotics of Power Patrols in Urban Tanzania
Before the total cutoff of a household for unpaid electrical bills, and in anticipation of the violence it might precipitate, national power utility inspectors in Dar es Salaam have recourse to a gradient of ‘soft’ disconnections designed to signal good faith and encourage repayment. Drawing on a mixture of semiotics and exchange theory, this article argues that such soft disconnections may be understood as moments when the shared grounds of the …
Nun of the river: The material and spiritual economies of small hydropower in rural Tanzania
This article examines the significance of hydroelectric mini-grids owned and operated by Catholic sisterhoods in rural Tanzania, situating them within a broader context of energy transition and environmental justice. The Tanzanian state is betting that mini-grids can effectively supplement the national grid's limited reach; since 2010 it has invested considerable effort in developing a regulatory framework that streamlines licensing procedures an…
Modal reasoning in Dar es Salaam's power network
In Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, residents, electricians, and power-utility workers tolerate some unofficial forms of modifiying the electrical network, such as unsanctioned reconnections and extensions. These practices, which can also involve theft, bribery, and other illegal activities, both undermine and sustain an increasingly expensive public infrastructure that is in disrepair and subject to routine bureaucratic neglect. But such modifications a…
La véranda, le climatiseur et la centrale électrique: Race et électricité en Tanzanie postsocialiste
Cet article analyse l’importance idéologique de la notion de « race » dans le secteur de l’électricité en Tanzanie, en suivant les débats autour de deux exploitants de centrales thermiques privés, Independent Power Tanzania Limited (IPTL)/Pan African Power (PAP) et Richmond Development Corporation. Engagées à l’origine dans le cadre de contrats de fourniture « d’énergie de secours », les deux sociétés sont devenues des prestataires de longue duré…
Shock Humor: Zaniness and the Freedom of Permanent Improvisation in Urban Tanzania
This essay explores scenes of zany comedy in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, across three sites: a television sketch about repeated electrical shock; the careers of freelance electricians known as vishoka; and encounters between residents and power utility inspectors. Drawing on the work of Sianne Ngai, as well as long-term ethnographic research, the essay argues that zaniness manifests the structural paradoxes of entrepreneurial populations that have a…
Bottleneck: Moving, Building, and Belonging in an African City by Caroline Melly
Reviewed by: Bottleneck: Moving, Building, and Belonging in an African City by Caroline Melly Michael Degani Caroline Melly, Bottleneck: Moving, Building, and Belonging in an African City. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2017. 224 pp. In this lucid and well-written ethnography, Caroline Melly asks us to consider the problems of mobility that arise in mid-2000s Dakar and in African urban life more broadly. This is an extended post-structural…
Air in Unexpected Places
Aircrete is a lightweight building material with a number of remarkable qualities, including high compression strength, buoyancy and thermal insulation. Perhaps most strikingly, its lack of sand aggregate makes it energy efficient compared to concrete. While aircrete is regularly sold by various construction companies, DIY enthusiasts and technicians around the world are cultivating more home-brew, open-source methods. This article follows James,…
Cutting without Cutting Connection: The Semiotics of Power Patrols in Urban Tanzania
Before the total cutoff of a household for unpaid electrical bills, and in anticipation of the violence it might precipitate, national power utility inspectors in Dar es Salaam have recourse to a gradient of ‘soft’ disconnections designed to signal good faith and encourage repayment. Drawing on a mixture of semiotics and exchange theory, this article argues that such soft disconnections may be understood as moments when the shared grounds of the …
The Flickering Torch
This essay offers an ethnographic analysis of Tanzania's electrical power crisis in 2011 and the national disposition to endure suffering that it seemed to make evident. It shows that in asking citizens to suffer the near-total breakdown of the power supply in good faith, the ruling party, Chama Cha Mapinduzi (CCM, or Party of the Revolution), drew on a cultural-political orientation developed during the socialist era and sustained through a long…
Gone to Ground: A History of Environment and Infrastructure in Dar es Salaam by Emily Brownell
Reviewed by: Gone to Ground: A History of Environment and Infrastructure in Dar es Salaam by Emily Brownell Michael Degani (bio) Gone to Ground: A History of Environment and Infrastructure in Dar es Salaam by Emily Brownell. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2020. Pp. 278. Emily Brownell's Gone to Ground is a brilliant, landmark study of Dar es Salaam in the 1970s and 80s. This often-overlooked period of Tanzania's history is usually na…
Toward a Modal Anthropology
This article outlines a modal anthropology, defined as the ethnographic description of what is possible and necessary for actors operating within a given (technical, aesthetic, ecological) medium. Spanning a wide array of examples, from evolutionary biomechanics to socialist jokes to village feuds, it surveys extant work on modality and its disciplinary antecedents, while examining some of the tricky issues involved in shifting across modes in re…
Nun of the river: The material and spiritual economies of small hydropower in rural Tanzania
This article examines the significance of hydroelectric mini-grids owned and operated by Catholic sisterhoods in rural Tanzania, situating them within a broader context of energy transition and environmental justice. The Tanzanian state is betting that mini-grids can effectively supplement the national grid's limited reach; since 2010 it has invested considerable effort in developing a regulatory framework that streamlines licensing procedures an…
Anthro abuzz: Fuel, Electricity, and Ethnography in the Era of Global Boiling
The transition away from fossil fuels is the signature challenge of our times, the key to limiting the devastation of global heating that has already begun ravaging planetary ecosystems and civilizations
Invention and grace: Taking turns in a streetcorner bureaucracy
This article analyzes the styles of work and conflict of a group of electrical contractors who congregate across the street from a power utility office in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. Drawing on a rich tradition of urban Africanist ethnography, as well as the work of Roy Wagner and Lars Spuybroek, it argues that their long-running streetcorner bureau is a “turn” that brings together the logics of entrepreneurial accumulation and bureaucratic legitima…
The Guyer line
This task is at the heart of one of Guyer’s central interventions: the rereading of “conversions” in Paul Bohannon’s (1955) account of Tiv spheres of exchange. Exchange tends to presume a reversible, symmetrical equivalence of this and that. Yet some kinds of exchanges are directional. They involve a conversionary intermediary that lets you move across a social or moral boundary. We see this all the time with ordinary currency conversions—my Amer…
The Many Faces of the Parasite
The introduction to this special issue describes the ‘parasite’ as a concept through which to understand the problems and possibilities of cohabitation, with its attendant strategies of shelter and expulsion, its affects of gratitude and resentment. Building on the work of Michel Serres, it then summarises how the contributors take up this idea across three themes: the intimacies of hospitality, urban networks of economy and information, and the …
Sociology (7 works) · Water Governance and Infrastructure (6 works) · Anthropological Studies and Insights (5 works) · Political science (5 works) · Anthropology (4 works) · Law (4 works) · Power (physics (4 works) · Tanzania (4 works) · Engineering (3 works) · Ethnography (3 works)