Doctoral Candidate in project 8 - Artemis Mantheakis

With a background in anthropology, African Studies, and political economy, I am a Greek-Tanzanian researcher whose work explores political economies of resource extraction in Tanzania. My Research Master’s thesis combined anthropology and political economy to study artisanal limestone and gravel aggregate mining in Dar es Salaam — an under-examined sector that contributes to urban development —  with particular attention to the roles of gender, labour agency, and social reproduction in urban extractivism.

My PhD research builds on this work by examining the social and environmental consequences of dust pollution from limestone extraction, cement production, and infrastructure construction in Dar es Salaam as part of the HEALENAE project “Infrastructures of Toxic Evidence and Civic Protection” supervised by Prof Dr. Wenzel Geissler (University of Oslo) and Dr. Stella Neema (Makerere University). This research will be based at the University of Oslo and is particularly interested in how the political economy of dust shapes exposure to toxicity on the extractive frontiers of urban development, how toxicity is embodied and perceived, how pollution is monitored, and how scientific and community-based evidence of toxic pollution is produced, circulated, and contested.