In this talk Nina Vodopivec addresses the memories and present experiences of textile workers in Slovenia that she has studied over the last 20 years. She will examine the experiences of her interlocutors in relation to contemporary neoliberal change and historical processes. A focus is placed on the narratives of deindustrialization and point to bodily sensations and psychological feelings of loss and dispossession by examining affective ties and feelings, body-labour relations, and workers' intimate and social experiences of economic change.
Nina Vodopivec is a social anthropologist. Since 2006 she has been working at the Institute of Contemporary History in Ljubljana, Slovenia. Since then she has been studying processes of post-socialist and neoliberal transformations, especially in relation to the experience of work. Her work includes empirical research on the memories and lives of industrial workers (especially textile workers), but also social entrepreneurs and social experimentators. She has also studied social change in relation to experiences of time: Past, Present, and Future. In 2021, she published a book on the experience of deindustrialization Tu se ne bo nikoli več šivalo. Doživljanja izgube dela in propada tovarne ( Silencing the Sewing Machines. Work Loss experiences and the Collapse of the Factory ).