François Ömer Akakça

I am a comparative anthropologist with long-term ethnographic field research in Inner Asia. My interest is in social morphology, human–nature interaction, the evolutionary and structural trends across life-forms, and the history of science. What I enjoy most is uncovering hidden mechanisms — in human behaviour and in the world at large.

I welcome correspondence and collaboration.

• Anthropology as natural science
• Empiricism above ideology
• Neither published nor perished

• Kinship systems, family structures and matrimonial strategies
• Animal husbandry and agro-pastoral economies
• History and biology of animal and plant domestication
• Turkic and Iranic languages in comparative perspective

• Population genetics and biological markers of human history
• Epistemological history of mathematical sciences

• Japanese ethnography and North Pacific anthropology

English, French, German, Kazakh & Kirghiz, Persian (Dari & Tajik), Russian, Turkish, Uzbek

Ongoing

Exploratory ethnography in Japan, including the ethno-ecology of depopulated places.

An ethnographic atlas inspired by Murdock: a semantic database with short encyclopaedic entries.

Planned

The peopling of the Earth across genetic, archaeological and ethnographic evidence.

An epistemological account of formative experiments in physics from the seventeenth to the nineteenth century.

Fieldwork on hunters in the interior of Kamchatka when possible again.

Past

Comparative case studies on nature use among (Altai and Tarbaghatai) Kazakhs and (Pamir and Alai) Kirghiz pastoralists.

Kinship, affinity and lineage theory among Kazakh & Kirghiz groups.

Turkic and Iranic ‘tribal’ ethnic identities across borders and in relation to the state.

Uzbek and Tajik dialectology.

Al-Biruni’s epistemological stance in his mathematical and astronomical work.

Main field work sites in Central Asia.

click a dot for details on the fieldwork site

click a line to highlight the corresponding site on the map

• Turkmen way of living after the agrarian transformation; Turkmen, Persian;
  Summer 1993; Gorgan, Iran.
• Daily life in a post-Soviet Turkmen & Russian urban setting; Turkmen, Russian;
  Summer 1993; Krasnovodsk, Turkmenistan.
• Markets and handicrafters of Kashgar; Uyghur;
  1994, 1996, 1997; Kashgar, China.
• Saintly lineages and ritual life; Kazakh;
  1994; Turkestan, South Kazakhstan.
• Transborder family histories; Kazakh;
  1994; Southeastern Kazakhstan.
• Pastoral settlement patterns; Kazakh;
  1995, 1996, 2009; Eastern Turkestan.
• Ethnic settlement and land use patterns; Kazakh, Mongol, Tuvan;
  1995; Chinese Altai.
• Mountain and steppe agropastoralism & kin group surveys; Uzbek, Tajik;
  1997-1998; Nurata Range, Uzbekistan.
• Uzbek and Tajik dialectological studies;
  1998-2002; Tashkent, Samarkand, Bukhara.
• Nature use among mountain dwellers; Kazakh, Russian;
  1998-1999; Altai, NE Kazakhstan.
• Religious rituals;
  Spring 2003; Mashhad.
• Mobile pastoralism and hunting subsistence economy; Kirghiz;
  2005-2008; Eastern Pamir.
• Archive and field work on tribal group identities; Karakalpak, Kazakh;
  2007; Karakalpakstan, Uzbekistan.
• Ethnic and geographic survey; Kirghiz;
  2008; Chong-Alai.
• Kin groups and matrimonial strategies; Uzbek, Turkmen & Tajik;
  2009-2014; North Afghanistan.

• Social organisation, kinship and lineage theory — Berlin 2004/05, 2006/07, 2008/09
• Legal anthropology and customary law — Berlin 2004, 2006
• Pastoralism, land use and animal domestication — Berlin 2005, 2007
• Violence, conflict and warfare — Berlin 2005/06
• Ethnology and historiography of Central Asia — Berlin 2003/04, 2006, 2007/08
• Transborder ethnic groups — Berlin 2007/08
• Critical reading of regional debates — Berlin 2008, 2008/09
• Fieldwork in theory and practice in conflict contexts — Bamberg 2017/18
• Ethnology of Afghanistan and Iranian Central Asia — Bamberg 2017
• IT tools for orientalists — Bamberg 2017
• Digital archiving (al-Biruni Institute, Tashkent) — Halle 2011
• Tajik — Berlin 2003–2004, 2008–2009 · Bamberg 2010, 2017 · Dushanbe 2014
• Kazakh — Berlin 2004, 2004/05, 2005
• Kirghiz — Berlin 2006, 2006/07, 2007
• Uzbek — Samarkand 2018–2019 · Naples 2021

Berlin, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin (Assistant Professor) · Bamberg, Chair of Iranian Studies (Stand-in Asst. Prof.) · Naples, “L’Orientale” 2021 (Visiting Professor) · Dushanbe & Samarkand, Institute of Foreign Languages.

Background in mathematical sciences and computing; science and computer nerd by inclination. Semantic and relational database architecture and programming (OWL, triple stores and SPARQL; DuckDB and PostgreSQL). JVM and Clojure by preference; J, R and Julia for scientific computing. Data extraction, wrangling and analysis; task automation and LLM-assisted programming. Unix system administration and basic DevOps.

I share my knowledge and results through teaching, seminars and reports, and contribute linguistic, ethnographic and museographic expertise to collaborative projects.