Our Team
Beatriz Véliz Argueta
Director/ Creator
Beatriz is a historian/ethnographer/artist interested in storytelling, geography, and the construction of place. Her work draws from historical and ethnographic approaches and combines cartography, history of science and art history in making visible the construction of the Other. She holds a PhD from Humboldt Universität zu Berlin and is Multimedia Visiting Fellow in the Department ‘Anthropology of Economic Experimentation’ at the Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology (Halle, Saale).
In conversation and collaboration with the following colleagues:
Ceren Deniz
Ceren is a social and cultural anthropologist and Research Fellow at the Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology. Her work addresses inequalities and injustices related to class, gender, ethnicity, uneven development, and migration particularly within the job market and labour relations. She is interested in tracing impacts of global social and economic transformations in the experiences of making livelihood and meaning in the everyday life. She received her doctoral degree from Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg in 2021. From 2021 to 2022, she ran the activities and events of ‘Gemeinsam MUTig’ at DaMigra e.V. in Halle (Saale), a project to promote the economic, social, political empowerment of refugee and immigrant women.
Siqi Tu
Siqi Tu is a sociologist and research fellow at the Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology and currently leads the development of the Mobility Lab (MoLab). Her research investigates the global mobility of young people, transnational elite education, and the political economy of urban and community development. She holds a PhD in sociology from the Graduate Center of the City University of New York.
Zhipeng Duan
Zhipeng Duan is a designer and Research Fellow at the Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology. He has coordinated various initiatives for strengthening the “nearby” in China. In his research, design experiments, and curatorial work, he explores how people think and act in relation to their immediate surroundings, their nearby. Zhipeng received his PhD in design from the Oslo School of Architecture and Design. His doctoral research explored the situatedness of design and forms and values of design in everyday life.
Elizabeth Brzoska
Elisabeth Brzoska is a master’s student in social and cultural anthropology at Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg. Her research explores the creation of safer spaces for marginalized people in Leipzig and surrounding areas.
Biao Xiang
Biao Xiang is Director of the Department ‘Anthropology of Economic Experimentation’ at the Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology in Halle (Saale). He was previously Professor of Social Anthropology at the University of Oxford. More about Biao at https://www.eth.mpg.de/xiang
