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Generator Life in Nigeria

This paper examines generator life. It focuses on their physicality, how generators shape the technologized, ambient environment of urban Nigeria and the daily virtuosity required to obtain petrol, fill, operate and repair the generator. To live a life organized by the generator means to restructure rooms, houses, buildings, cities to take into account generator use. It involves knowing when to turn it on and off, which appliances can be used when it is on and which not, how to protect it from elements. I focus on the technology of the generator, the cultural techniques, modes of life and political forms it engenders as a means of inquiring into the relations between technology, the body and urban life.
Speaker’s bio:
Brian Larkin is the Tow Associate Professor for Distinguished Scholars at Barnard College. He is the author of Signal and Noise: Media Infrastructure and Urban Culture in Nigeria (Duke University Press, 2008) and, with Lila Abu-Lughod and Faye Ginsburg, co-editor of Media Worlds: Anthropology on New Terrain (University of California Press, 2000).

Columbia University Faculty House (directions available here)
Thursday, December 8th
6pm-8pm

Seminar Chairs: Abosede George and Rhiannon Stephens

Please RSVP to ths2122@columbia.edu if you would like to join the group for dinner at a nearby restaurant.