“Off the Grid”: Infrastructures, Processes of Spatialization, and Drones in Africa (C06)

• Subject Area: Empirical Social Research ; African, American and Oceania Studies
• Term: since 2020
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 266371360

Starting from the rapid proliferation of the civil use of drones, the project enquires about the scopes of action that emerge from the development, the use, and the practical appropriation of new technical infrastructures in Africa. It also analyses the societal consequences as well as the spatial formats that are engaged, appropriated, and possibly modified. Drones are complex technical systems that link up territorialized and non-territorialized spatial formats. This occurs due to the technologically new visual opening of spaces through which new elements and methods of spatial imaginations are provided.

• DFG Programme: Collaborative Research Centres
• Subproject of: SFB 1199: Processes of Spatialization under the Global Condition
• Applicant Institution: Universität Leipzig
• Project Head: Professor Dr. Marian Burchardt