Participating in Active8-Planet: Interdisciplinary teamwork and the applied side of Anthropology
I believe that by recognizing people’s mobility habits, their use of mobility infrastructure, and how they value mobility (what it means to them in everyday life), anthropologists too can help ensuring sustainable mobility in the future. Mobility is a social practice, and the use of transportation and mobility infrastructure is socially conditioned. Only by studying people’s habits and actions in smaller areas can we truly understand why they act in certain ways and what is most important to them.
In other words, an anthropologist’s job is to examine local social practices, and the name of the project sounded like an aim to work globally. But after having been engaged in the project for an entire study year, I now recognize the benefits of participating in a university-business environment in which we truly can do so much more than just in the context of our own (academic) interests and methodological approaches. In my opinion, interdisciplinarity is the key to tackling global problems such as the environmental crisis. Although anthropology mainly studies the ways of people’s lives on a microlevel, it can also have an impact on a macro-level by joining forces with other disciplines and decision makers.
Despite the fact that I had to participate in half of the project remotely due to an Erasmus exchange, my experience was extremely positive. Not only did I learn about interdisciplinary teamwork, but also about the practical, applied side of anthropology. However, while remote group work is possible and can be successful and productive, it cannot replace one’s physical presence: in-person cooperation is also shaped by informal conversations and gatherings, which are not only a fun part of the project but can also bring insights that more formal meetings do not. Furthermore, for anthropologists, it is really important to conduct participant observation as part of the methodology. On the other hand, working remotely allows for much more time flexibility in organizing interviews and Participating in Active8-Planet: Interdisciplinary teamwork and the applied side of Anthropology other project activities that you do from home. It was also interesting to observe the project progress month after month. Prior to that, I had only taken part in brief research projects as part of my studies, so I did not have much time to devote to fieldwork and data analysis. We could, however, take our time and conduct our research in stages within Active8- Planet. We collaborated with representatives from the company Endava in the topic of “mobility as a service”, focusing primarily on mobile practices in the city of Ljubljana. We spent a considerable amount of time brainstorming different ideas, comparing our perspectives on mobility in Ljubljana, and laying out the fieldwork plan. We met on a regular basis to reflect on the data we collected and to highlight pertinent topics from the interviews we conducted. We also had the opportunity to present anthropology and its methodological approach to co-members from Endava, and they informed us back about their working environment. As a result, we identified some of the key concerns about shared mobility in Ljubljana, which could serve as a good foundation for the project’s next year’s participants and their own research.
At this point, the path to global sustainable mobility may seem unimaginable. However, if each of us begin to look around us and engage in local mobility challenges that are tightly intertwined with our everyday lives, the image of what mobility practices should look like for a friendlier and healthier environment becomes clearer. Even while we might believe that changing our lifestyle to one that is more sustainable won’t actually help improving the world, doing so might just give us hope that changes are possible; and if they are achievable at the individual level, they may eventually be achievable at the systemic level as well. In this sense, it is better to think and act small than to persist in more comfortable but less ecological habits and do nothing. Riding a bike to the local store instead of driving, or sharing a car with a neighbour who has errands in the same location as we do, may not appear to be much, but are definitely improvements to the mosaic of today’s and tomorrow’s mobility practices.