| Education |
|---|
| 1996 – 2001 PhD in Anthropology, University of Sydney. Thesis title: An Historical Anthropology of Ngazidja. Degree awarded 2003 |
| 1982 – 1986 MA (Hons) in Social Anthropology, University of Edinburgh. Dissertation title: Zaffer Pe Sanze: Ethnic Identity and Social Change among the Ilois in Mauritius. |
| Employment |
|---|
| 2026 – Senior Research Officer, ifeas |
| 2025 – 2026 Associate Researcher, ifeas |
| 2024 – Research Associate Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology, Halle |
| 2020 -2024 Senior Research Fellow, Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology, Halle |
| 2017 – 2019 Senior Research Officer, Zentrum für Interdisziplinäre Regionalstudien, Martin-Luther Universität Halle-Wittenberg, Halle |
| 2016 Senior Research Fellow, Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, Jena |
| 2015 – 2016 Senior Research Fellow, Max Planck Institute for Social Anthropology, Halle |
| 2011 – 2014 Senior Research Officer, Centre on Migration, Policy and Society (COMPAS), University of Oxford |
| 2009 – 2011 ERSC Research Fellow, COMPAS, University of Oxford |
| 2008 – 2009 Departmental Lecturer, Institute of Social & Cultural Anthropology, University of Oxford |
| 2008 Teaching Fellow, Department of Anthropology and Sociology, SOAS |
| 2005 – 2007 ARC Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Centre for Middle East & North African Studies/Dept. of Politics & International Relations, Macquarie University |
| 2004 Lecturer, School of Sociology & Anthropology, Univ. of New South Wales |
| 2002 – 2004 Tutor, Dept. of Anthropology, University of Sydney |
| 2002 Lecturer, School of History, University of New South Wales |
| 2000 – 2001 Lecturer, Université de Paris 7 – Denis Diderot, Paris |
| 1999 – 2000 Lecturer, School of History, University of New South Wales Tutor, Dept. of Anthropology, University of Sydney |
| 1996 – 2001 Doctoral candidate, Dept. of Anthropology, University of Sydney 1995 – 1996 Tutor, Dept. of Anthropology, University of Sydney Research Assistant, Dept. of Economic History, University of Sydney |
| 1992 – 1994 Educational support and development, Sydney Institute of Technology |
| Awards and Grants |
|---|
| 2019 Fritz Thyssen Stiftung, Conference Grant |
| 2017-2019 German Research Foundation (DFG) Research Grant |
| 2011-2013 John Fell OUP Research Fund Award |
| 2011-2013 British Library Endangered Archives Programme Grant |
| 2009 – 2011 Economic and Social Research Council Mid-Career Fellowship |
| 2008 British Academy Conference Grant |
| 2005 – 2008 Australian Research Council Postdoctoral Fellowship |
| 2005 – 2006 American Institute of Yemeni Studies Fellowship |
| 1997 – 2000 University of Sydney Postgraduate Award with stipend |
| 1999 Carlyle Greenwell Research Fund Fieldwork Grant |
| 1999 Univ. of Sydney Faculty of Arts PhD Students Research Support Scheme |
| 1997 – 1998 Carlyle Greenwell Research Fund Fieldwork Grant |
| 1997 University of Sydney Faculty of Arts Fieldwork Fund for Research Students |
| 1985 Carnegie Trust for the Universities of Scotland Fieldwork Grant |
Mila na ntsi and la démocratie: Custom and modernity in the Comoro Islands.
DFG project number 571915249
This DFG-funded project seeks to further our understanding of the discourses and practices surrounding the conjunction of customary and Western colonial-legacy political systems and, more widely, non-European perspectives on the world. In the Comoro Islands the customary political process is collectively recognised and widely accepted, and is largely successful in local governance. This recognition is only possible because of common, shared and ubiquitous understandings of the principles upon which these systems are based: mila na ntsi, “tradition and land”, a framework that establishes social norms and provides parameters for practice. However, and although custom is no less effective and often more effective than its Western counterpart, it is formally excluded from the operation of the state: customary political elements can only operate informally alongside formal politico-legal systems founded upon Western democratic principles.
The project will explore the reasons why Comorians do not formally sanction customary political systems: why there are never serious suggestions that custom be invoked, despite all the evidence that it functions efficiently? We will probe the largely artificial separation of politics from cultural practice, and the underlying logics of the opposition between “tradition” and “modernity” as viewed in the Comoros. We will consider whether a rejection of custom in favour of an inefficient European system is a product of Comorian perspectives on the world that see Comorian culture as tradition, and inferior to European culture, qua modernity, and we will draw upon the concept of mimesis to problematise the post-colonial encounter. We will question Comorian perspectives on life, and, developing Bourdieu’s concept of illusio, and the idea of the cleft habitus, we explore whether and how Comorians envisage customary practices as offering them a better future.
Dr. Iain Walker
Tel.: +49 6131 39-32867
E-Mail: walkeria@uni-mainz.de