Stories

Are you interested in this project and what we are doing?

Please read on for stories from the field and reflections by our researchers.

‘In pursuit of well-being’

b.e.bartelink@rug.nl / /

Cultural Encounters Team Member Amisah Bakuri will defend her PhD thesis at the University of Amsterdam on December 22nd 2021. Her PhD thesis is an anthropological study focused on the pursuit of well-being among Somali-Dutch and Ghanaian-Dutch people residing in the Randstad area of the Netherlands In The Netherlands (and in global public health), religion is often […]

Sexual Enchantment: experiences of the ordinary and the extraordinary

What makes sex something extraordinary for people, and how do people experience the extraordinary amidst the familiair and the everyday? How is this connected to peoples experiences of the transcendent? These questions were taken up by members of our project team. Following the initiative of Jelle Wiering,  we presented our insights from the Cultural Encounters […]

Labour of love: Secrecy and kinship among Ghanaian-Dutch and Somali-Dutch in The Netherlands

b.e.bartelink@rug.nl /

Credits: Gabriela Bustamante  How do secrets play a role in the intimate relations between mothers and daughters or between marriage partners? And how to understand secrecy in relation to love and intimacy? Amisah Bakuri and Rachel Spronk , in  a paper they co-author with Rijk van Dijk, explore how people negotiate moral expectations regarding sexuality, respect, and […]

Embodied stories: African-Dutch women narrate (in)visibility and agency in the city of The Hague

b.e.bartelink@rug.nl /

 Inspired by her work in the Cultural Encounters project, team member Brenda Bartelink started a side project in 2018/2019. In her research on religious leaders she engaged with churches from the perspective of leadership, which is often – though not always- a male perspective and informed by the ideal type role models religious leaders want […]

Pentecostal Approaches to Governance and Security.

b.e.bartelink@rug.nl / / /

Brenda Bartelink wrote a report for the Transatlantic Policy Network on Religion & Diplomacy (TPNRD) in which she translates the insights from the Cultural Encounters project to inform diplomats and people working in international relations. The rapid growth of Pentecostalism is having a significant impact on individuals, communities, and indeed entire nations—especially in Africa and […]

Pentecostalism and the Coronavirus: “Wash Your Hands and Be Washed in the Blood of the Lamb”

k.e.knibbe@rug.nl / / /

How do Pentecostal churches deal with the restrictions put in place to ‘flatten the curve’ of the coronavirus infection rates, what is their take on the pandemic and how does this relate to the public health and other concerns that the pandemic raises? An analysis of the sermon of the leader of the Redeemed Christian […]

Women power. Afrikaans-Nederlands design, mode en eten

b.e.bartelink@rug.nl / /

Op vrijdag 29 november 2019 was de eindpresentatie van het KIEM-project Designing the body. African-Dutch women’s narratives on health and wellbeing, een initiatief van de Rijksuniversiteit Groningen in samenwerking met ontwerpbureau Design that Matters en Kariboe Bibi, een centrum van en voor empowerment van Afrikaanse vrouwen in Den Haag. Geaard in Afrika en geland in […]

Designing the Body – Lets meet!

b.e.bartelink@rug.nl / /

    On September 22nd the first workshop in the project Designing the Body, entitled Let’s Meet will take place in The Hague.  The project team is looking forward to welcoming many women there.           ‘Designing the Body’ is a project with, by and for African-Dutch women in which stories are […]