Abstract
This paper moves from the observation that "China" is not only marginal in anthropological theory-making: it remains strikingly absent from an ethnographic perspective too. Scholars of Global China have already noticed a discrepancy between how much "China" lingers in everyday discussions, yet how seldom Chinese actors are actually encountered. "China," here, is certainly not absent, but it is also not entirely present -- it functions as a background, often taking the contours of an abstract opportunity or looming threat.
This paper reflects on this particular absent presence of China through two case studies: the amber markets in Poland's Gdansk and Mexico's Chiapas. Here "China" -- in the form of capital, promise, and material actors -- is both present and absent in peculiar ways. In Gdansk, economic slow-downs and the Covid-19 pandemic have re-cast relationships between Polish and Chinese actors. In Chiapas, "China" is profoundly affecting the amber market despite its absence. Through those (missed) encounters, I develop the notion of ethnographic absent presence, and introduce a new project on global amber circulations across extraction, trade, and science.
More about the seminar.