This workshop explores the diversity of repair practices in unusual places around the world, playing with the ambiguity of the term ‘unusual’ both in the sense of workshops less studied by conventional research and repairs that deviate from manufacturers' usual standards and protocols. The participants, from a variety of academic and geographical backgrounds, will use ethnographic case studies to highlight the social, economic and technological implications of these practices. The objects and repairs covered range from motorbikes to boats, from video consoles to solar panels. Using empirical data, the aim is to document the life of workshops on the fringes of or outside formal repair circuits, in order to identify common or singular trajectories, understand local forms of repair, and study maintenance gestures and techniques. 

Alberto Preci (CNRS - CREDA)

Nicolas Richard (CNRS - IFEA)

Diego Villar (Ca' Foscari University Venice)

As part of the ANR project « Accidents, malfunctions and downtime. Another view of extractive territories »

(INTERRUPTIONS - ANR-21-CE03-0017)

For more information, please write to: prealberto@gmail.com

Wednesday 19/06

Campus Condorcet, Bâtiment Recherche Sud, Salle 0.033  

5, cours des Humanités, 93322 Aubervilliers

Morning Session (9h - 12h30)

Discussant: Jérôme DENIS (Université PSL – CSI Mines Paris) 

Repair or Repurpose? A Digital Bricolage Lexicon – Nicolas NOVA (Haute École d’Art et de Design – Genève, HES-SO) 

“Ho jayega (it will get done)”: Networked Repair Labor in Delhi Markets – Julia CORWIN (London School of Economics) 

“If it can’t be fixed, it has copper, springs, aluminum...”. The Right to Repair or the Need to Fix? – Tomás ERRÁZURIZ (Campus Creativo – Universidad Andrés Bello) 

Of Remains and Aspirations in Subaltern Backyard Spaces: The Second-Hand Batteries and Solar Panels Business in a Small Town in the Indian Countryside – Rémi DE BERCEGOL (CNRS – PRODIG – Institut Français de Pondichéry) 

Moral Orders of Repair: A Study of the Practical and Ethical Work of Repair in Mobile Computing Worlds in Uganda – Daniel MWESIGWA (Cornell University)

Afternoon Session (14h00 - 18h00)  

Discussant: David PONTILLE (CNRS – CSI Mines Paris)  

Réparer aux pieds d’immeubles : la pluralité de services des mécaniciens de rue en Seine-Saint-Denis – Denis GIORDANO (OCE research center/Institut ethnographique – EMLyon Business School) 

Chinese Low-Tech Diesel Engines and the Re-Pairing of Mobility on Congo’s Inland Waterways – Peter LAMBERTZ (Centre d’anthropologie culturelle – Université Libre de Bruxelles) 

Mécanique locale et chaînes d’approvisionnement globales. Assembler, entretenir et réparer une moto chinoise au Togo – Giorgio BLUNDO (CeRCLEs – EHESS Marseille)

Mytho-mécanique et transition énergétique la conversion au gaz des véhicules anciens à La Paz, Bolivie – Nicolas RICHARD (CNRS – IFEA) – Théo MILLIN (Université Rennes2 – IFEA) 

‘We seal air’: Tyre Repairers and the Making of ‘Frictional Infrastructures’ in Megacity Lagos (Nigeria) – David GARBIN (University of Kent)

Thursday 20/06 

Campus Condorcet, Bâtiment Recherche Sud, Salle 0.033  

5, cours des Humanités, 93322 Aubervilliers

Morning Session (9h - 12h30) 

Discussant: Morgan MEYER (CNRS – CSI Mines Paris)

(Amazonian) Bush Mechanics: Motorbike Bricolage among the Chacobo – Diego VILLAR (Ca' Foscari University Venice) et Adam James Ross TALLMAN (Friedrich-Schiller-Universität Jena)

Motorcycles Custom Shops as Spaces of Post-Repair Pedagogies for A-Technical Bikers – Gabriel JDERU (Department of Sociology – University of Bucharest)  

The Spaces of Repair in a Mechanical Workshop of the Argentine Chaco – Alberto PRECI (CNRS – CREDA) 

Repair in the Context of Road Accidents – Patrick LAVIOLETTE (Division of Social Anthropology – Masaryk University)

Filming Repair, Repairers and Repair-Places : Case Studies in West Bahia (Brazil) – Marie CHENET (Université Paris 1 – LGP), Pierre GAUTREAU (Université Paris 1 – PRODIG), Ève Anne BÜHLER (Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro – NUCLAMB), Alberto PRECI (CNRS – CREDA)

Afternoon Session (14h00 - 18h00)

 Discussant: David DUMOULIN (USN/IHEAL – CREDA) 

Makeshift Boats: Transience, Turbulence and the Sea of Mourning in Georgia – Tamta KHALVASHI (Ilia State University) 

Maintenance et métamorphoses : l’art de réparer les cargos en bois en Inde du sud – Denis VIDAL (IRD – École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales) 

Unusual Repair Practices of Telephone Technicians in Luxembourg – Stefan KREBS (University of Luxembourg) 

Airbag Repair in Sharjah: Rethinking Automotive Safety, Security Norms and Ethics – Gayatri RATHORE (Université Paris 1 – PRODIG – ANR GlobalCar) 

Historiography in the Garage: Idealizing Histories of Repair – Joshua GRACE (Department of History – University of South Carolina)