Papers by Sheri Lynn Gibbings
City and society, Aug 1, 2013
The accuracy of the Content should not be relied upon and should be independently verified with p... more The accuracy of the Content should not be relied upon and should be independently verified with primary sources of information. Taylor and Francis shall not be liable for any losses, actions, claims, proceedings, demands, costs, expenses, damages, and other liabilities whatsoever or howsoever caused arising directly or indirectly in connection with, in relation to or arising out of the use of the Content. This article may be used for research, teaching, and private study purposes. Any substantial or systematic reproduction, redistribution, reselling, loan, sub-licensing, systematic supply, or distribution in any form to anyone is expressly forbidden.
Communication, Culture and Critique, 2019
This paper investigates the sociotechnical imaginary surrounding Uber’s supposedly imminent arriv... more This paper investigates the sociotechnical imaginary surrounding Uber’s supposedly imminent arrival in Winnipeg, through an examination of communication in the public sphere. We examine how actors mobilized their communicative resources in efforts to either bring ride-hailing or keep it away. For some advocates, ride-hailing technology was less important than Uber’s symbolic value of building Winnipeg’s image as an innovative city. Media coverage contrasted innovation and Uber with Winnipeg’s anxieties about being behind other cities and its taxi industry’s reputation as stuck in the past. These visions of Winnipeg’s future addressed an unspoken White, middle-class city dweller. While Winnipeg’s transportation industry was shaped by the socially located experiences of racialized immigrant men as taxi drivers and Indigenous women as passengers, these actors had less power to shape the imaginary. Our analysis suggests that cities like Winnipeg view Uber as an image-making product as m...
University of Toronto Press eBooks, Aug 11, 2021
Toronto. Her doctoral fieldwork explores romance writing and publishing in North America.
Bijdragen tot de taal-, land- en volkenkunde / Journal of the Humanities and Social Sciences of Southeast Asia, 2017
This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the prevailing cc-by-nc license at ... more This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the prevailing cc-by-nc license at the time of publication.
Public History Review, 2012
This article explores post-colonial memories about street traders among individuals who lived in ... more This article explores post-colonial memories about street traders among individuals who lived in the former colony of the Dutch East Indies. It argues that these narratives romanticize the relationship between Europeans and indigenous peoples. Street vendors are also used to differentiate between periods within colonial and post-colonial history. The nostalgic representation of interracial contact between Europeans and traders is contrasted with representations of other figures such as the Japanese and the nationalist. A recurring feature of these representations is the ability of Europeans to speak with street traders and imagine what they wanted and needed. The traders are remembered as a social type that transgressed politics and represented the neutrality of the economic sphere as a place for shared communication. The article concludes that the figure of the street vendor contributes to the nostalgic reinvention of the colony but is also used in narratives to differentiate betwe...
Anthropologica, 2016
Street traders in many Indonesian cities face social and legal constraints because they are deeme... more Street traders in many Indonesian cities face social and legal constraints because they are deemed to be hampering the city's order and cleanliness. I describe how a group of vendors adopted the state's concern over greenery and developed their own “green” project. They also called themselves the rakyat kecil (small people) and argued that they were the poor underdogs being mistreated by the corrupt government. This moral positioning is best seen as an expression of what I am calling “citizenship as ethics,” in which the legitimacy of being in a public space is validated through discourses and actions deemed “good” or “right” in the local public imagination.
Citizenship and Democratization in Southeast Asia, 2017
Clientelism and Citizenship 2 Citizen Participation and Decentralization in the Philippines 31 Em... more Clientelism and Citizenship 2 Citizen Participation and Decentralization in the Philippines 31 Emma Porio 3 Everyday Citizenship in Village Java 51 Takeshi Ito 4 Elections and Emerging Citizenship in Cambodia 68 Astrid Norén-Nilsson 5 Sosialisasi, Street Vendors and Citizenship in Yogyakarta 96 Sheri Lynn Gibbings part 2 Identity and Citizenship 6 Militias, Security and Citizenship in Indonesia 125 Laurens Bakker 7 Custom and Citizenship in the Philippine Uplands 155 Oona Paredes 8 Citizenship and Islam in Malaysia and Indonesia 178
International Feminist Journal of Politics, 2011
From the start, United Nations (UN) Security Council Resolution 1325 was celebrated as an achieve... more From the start, United Nations (UN) Security Council Resolution 1325 was celebrated as an achievement for Member States and activists around the world with the promise that gender would be considered in all peace and security-related decisions and planning. This paper describes how two Iraqi women who spoke at an informal meeting at the UN generated embarrassment for some UN-based
City & Society, 2013
This article documents how the democratic detective is related to important changes in the meanin... more This article documents how the democratic detective is related to important changes in the meaning and clustering of both keywords and social types since the democratic transition in Indonesia in 1998. The article describes how during a government-organized street vendor relocation, Arif, a young street vendor, as a democratic detective, positions himself in relation to the rakyat (the people), which is viewed as the most authentic body to bring forth social and political change in Indonesia; and to the oknum, an individual who abuses his position of power for personal benefit. In this paper, I show how the democratic detective is developing new techniques for achieving transparency based on a shared pattern of latent communication in newspapers and is involved in producing a narrative reminiscent of a detective story. [Indonesia, Yogyakarta City, transparency, detectives, street vendors, urban figures].
Indonesia
Abstract:Infrastructures are typically viewed as the material and social forms that allow for exc... more Abstract:Infrastructures are typically viewed as the material and social forms that allow for exchange over space: the pipes, wires, people, roads, and, in the digital age, cell towers and wireless networks, that connect villages, towns, and cities to wider national and transnational systems, and facilitate the flow of goods in both a cultural and physical sense. Infrastructures are important for social life, not only because they allow for exchanges but because they “mediate” social reality, connecting individuals and localities to wider cultural, religious, and economic networks. The articles in this special issue grew out of a workshop held at the University of Toronto in summer 2016. The cities represented in these studies—Jakarta, Yogyakarta, Semarang, and Bogor—are all on Java, although the kinds of infrastructures they highlight can be found throughout the archipelago. This collection analyzes infrastructures for mitigating urban flooding (Abidin Kusno, Lukas Ley), “escorting” migrant workers to and from their jobs in other countries (Johan Lindquist), accessing the internet (Jessika Tremblay, Merlyna Lim), moving people around cities (Sheri Lynn Gibbings et al.), handling household food waste (Tammara Soma), and informal living and working (Jan Newberry).
Vis a Vis Explorations in Anthropology, Jan 15, 2010
Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 2.5 Canada license. SHERI G... more Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 2.5 Canada license. SHERI GIBBINGS is a Ph.D. candidate with the Department of Anthropology at the University of Toronto. Her doctoral fieldwork explores street vending in Yogyakarta, Indonesia. JESSICA TAYLOR is a Ph.D. candidate with the Department of Anthropology at the University of Toronto. Her doctoral fieldwork explores romance writing and publishing in North America.
Anthropologica, Jul 1, 2005
In 1940, a Dutch colonial officer named Louis Fontijne (1902-1968) was commissioned to conduct an... more In 1940, a Dutch colonial officer named Louis Fontijne (1902-1968) was commissioned to conduct an investigation of indigenous land tenure and leadership in the Residency of Timor and Dependencies. Dealing specifically with Kelimado, a region included in the Nage district of central Flores, its main product was a remarkable study of society and culture and the effects of over three decades of Dutch administration and Christian proselytizing. In regard to ethnographic detail and analytical insight, the work, entitled Grondvoogden in Kelimado, resembles more an academic thesis than a government report; yet another interest is Fontijne's forthright critique of colonial policy and recommendations for administrative reform.
Indonesia, 2013
On a warm spring evening in 2007, I sat on a bench with "Arif," a street vendor, discussing the m... more On a warm spring evening in 2007, I sat on a bench with "Arif," a street vendor, discussing the municipal government's plan to relocate three groups of vendors to a marketplace. He explained that the government's relocation plan had raised questions and suspicions among a group of traders who identified themselves as Pethikbumi (Paguyuban Pedagang Klithikan Mangkubumi). In their opinion, the municipal government was trying to impose this relocation onto the street vendors in an undemocratic manner. Furthermore, the government was misrepresenting the situation in order to further its own political ends. The municipal government claimed that the traders being relocated were secondhand-goods (klithikan) and antiques traders. However, while this was true for some of the groups of vendors involved, the majority of the traders selling on Mangkubumi Street sold new merchandise. From Arifs viewpoint, the mayor, Herry Zudianto, was behind this project. Arif said, Because Yogyakarta is famous for its tourism, [Herry] wants to build a specialized market for antiques and secondhand goods. Because Herry is the 11 am grateful to my informants who shared their knowledge and experiences with me during my fieldwork in Yogyakarta. The Wenner Gren Foundation and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC) made this research possible. I thank Joshua Barker, Katherine Maclvor, and the two anonymous reviewers for their critical comments on earlier drafts. I also thank Indonesia's editors for their comments. Any remaining errors are my own.
Bulletin of Science, Technology & Society, 2006
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Papers by Sheri Lynn Gibbings