Indexing the human: from classification to a critical politics of transformation

Abstract

“Indexing the Human: From Classification to a Critical Politics of Transformation” consisted of a year-long programme of seminars, workshops and reading groups at Stellenbosch University in 2014–2015. The seminar series brought together local, regional and international scholars around four thematic areas: technologies of governance and the shapes of politics; the place of race; science, experimentality and intervention; and kinship, ethics and the everyday in South Africa. This introduction sketches the background and context in which the following three research papers of the mini focus on “Indexing the Human” were produced. The papers highlight some of the key lessons, ideas, debates and problematics that have emerged from the Indexing the Human programme.