‘Belonging’ is a fundamental aspect of human life. People’s increasing mobility and global dis-, and replacement in the context of recurring environmental, political and humanitarian crises profoundly shape the experience, interpretation, and negotiation of belonging. At the 2017 conference of the German Anthropological Association (GAA), anthropologists explored the physical, affective, and moral challenges of varying actors in face of mobility, crisis, and economic hardship, but also the emergence of new forms of belonging incited by these challenges.

The conference workshop entitled ‘Embodied Belonging: In/exclusion, Health Care, and Well-Being in a World in Motion’ – organized and chaired by Claudia Lang (Cermes3, Paris) and Dominik Mattes (Freie Universität Berlin) – set the scene for understanding why and how belonging becomes relevant in the context of health and well-being. Special emphasis was placed on health-related transformations in people’s lives in the context of migration, displacement and replacement. [More]