Seminar: Digging deeper than before. Social and technical change in artisanal gold mining in Siguiri, Guinea Conakry

Following the increase in global prices during the last two decades, gold mining has become a key sector for many West African economies, accelerating  their internationalization (through growing investments from foreign large-scale companies) and transforming the livelihoods of millions of people (particularly artisanal miners working in small-scale extraction areas). In this seminar, Dr Lanzano draws from his ongoing ethnographic work in artisanal mining areas in West Africa to describe how migrant miners from neighboring countries and technological innovations have contributed to the rapid transformation of work conditions and institutional settings of gold mining around the village of Tonso (Upper Guinea, prefecture of Siguiri). More intensive digging and processing techniques, and an increased mobility in the localization of mining areas, are reshaping the logic of gold production and posing a challenge to the control traditionally exerted by local institutions. 

This seminar will be organized together with the Department of Cultural Anthropology and Development Sociology, Leiden University.