Heo/Geo Lecture Series 2023-12: Janina Dannenberg on the crisis of the (re)productive

Can a non-capitalist economy provide insights to society-nature relationships? 

According to Janina Dannenberg, there is a need for general transformation of society-nature relationships especially In times of socio-ecological crisis -- one where a new kind of economy (degrowth, non-capitalist) is needed. 

The approach of (re)productivity (taken from Biesecker & Hofmeister, 2010) integrates socio-ecological research perspectives with feminist criticisms of economics and offers a framework for analyzing the current socio-ecological crisis as well as for developing visions of sustainability. The ‘crisis of the (re)productive’ occurs when unpaid forms of labor or natural processes are identified as excluded from monetary valuation by the economic system but not so from exploitation through that system. The crisis is connected to material-physical, social-cultural and discursive-symbolic phenomena.

For the 12th iteration of the Heo/Geo Lecture Series for 2023 (and the first one for the academic year 2023-2024), Janina Dannenberg from the University of Freiburg will share her insights on the 'crisis of the (re)productive' on Friday, 22 September 2023 at 5:00PM (PHT) / 11:00AM (CEST). Her talk, entitled Collective Landownership and the Crisis of the (Re)Productive will spotlight indigenous peoples in the Philippines. 

Based on Dr Dannenberg's fieldwork among the Matigsalug Manobo in Mindanao, the talk discusses the way collective ownership of land shapes a (re)productive economy and the crisis of the (re)productive. Land ownership is embedded in everyday practices of collective or individual land uses and organization in the domestic sphere and in the public. Therefore the study covers individual challenges regarding the crisis of the (re)productive as well as the crisis on the level of the Indigenous Peoples Organization which is responsible for managing the Ancestral Domain. It sets a focus on two fields of application of land ownership: Shifting cultivation, as a practice in crisis and ecotourism as a local vision of sustainable economy. The approach of (re)productivity is critically reflected and further developed.

Janina Dannenberg is a post-doc researcher at the Department of Environmental Social Science and Geography at the University Freiburg, Germany. She studied environmental science at University of Lüneburg with two visiting semesters at University of Philippines Diliman (2004-2005). She has written her master's thesis about conflicts on intellectual property rights on plants in the Philippines and her dissertation on collective landownership and socio-ecological crisis. She is connected to Philippine civil society through her involvement in projects on civic spaces and human rights.

The Heo/Geo Lecture Series is presented by the UP Department of Geography and the Philippine Geographical Society. The lecture series serves as a space to further enrich geographical knowledge of those in the academe, the industry, and various community collectives. This talk is part of the 40th anniversary celebration of the UP Department of Geography as an academic discipline in the Philippines.

To participate in the lecture, register at this link or through this link: https://tinyurl.com/me92jpf9