June 2023

Localizing Confucius Institutes Through African Languages: The Confucius Institute in Dar es Salaam

Two Confucius Institutes exist in Tanzania. Their construction was financed by China and they are hosted by the University of Dar es Salaam and the University of Dodoma. The Tanzanian Director of the Confucius Institute at the University of Dar es Salaam (UDSM), Prof. Dr. Aldin Mutembei is a Fellow of our De:Link // Re:Link research project. Prof. Mutembei gave a very insightful public lecture at the Institute for Asian and African Studies here at the Humboldt University zu Berlin.

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Talk: The Power of Transcultural Politics Along China’s BRI

On June 15, 2023 Jamila Adeli and Linda Ammann gave a presentation at the University of Vienna. Under the title “The power of transcultural politics along China’s Belt and Road Initiative: The promise of culture in Sino-African relations” we introduced a decidedly (trans)cultural perspective on the BRI and its reciprocal relations in so-called new silk

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Electricity pylons at the Rawalpindi market, Pakistan 2022.

Pakistan-China BRI-CPEC Relations: The Impact and Challenges of Electricity Production, Transmission and Distribution in Pakistan for Chinese Companies

Pakistan desperately needed investments in its energy sector because constant electricity blackouts and load shedding were gradually crippling its economy. The 2015 launch of the China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) which is part of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) brought hope to 236 million Pakistanis who make up the world’s fifth largest nation by population. Chinese companies increased electricity production through many new power production projects.

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Podium Discussion: China Connecting People? A Transregional Inquiry into Infrastructural Dis/connections in Africa and Eurasia

Belts, roads and initiatives – in plural – are being forged through China’s global infrastructural engagement. Countless ports, highways and railways are constructed, reconstructed and rehabilitated for connecting people in Asia with Africa and Europe for seamless trade and economic development. In this transregional roundtable, we bring these aspirations down to earth. We trace emerging

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Dr. Beril Ocaklı

Guest Lecture: Dr. Beril Ocaklı on Re/searching Connections: Geopolitics and Poetics of the BRI Infrastructure in Eurasia

A decade on, China through the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) continues to occupy minds and political geographies. Unveiled a decade ago at the Nazarbayev University Campus in Astana, Kazakhstan, the BRI remains an unprecedented undertaking for seamlessly interconnecting people and places in Asia with Africa and Europe through multifarious large-scale infrastructure. Drawing on published

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Workshop: Museums as Cultural Infrastructures. Claiming History and Heritage in Central Eurasia

Museums seem to be everywhere in post Soviet Central Eurasia. From magnificent state buildings to regional, private, and ‘house’ museums, they all attest to an interest in and an urge to document and shape collective, national and public discourses of identity that relate to specific visions of the past. By engaging a variety of material,

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