Tilman Menzel
International Research Training Group 'Temporalities of Future in Latin America'
PhD Candidate
Anthropology
Project: "Intersectional Temporalities. Aspirations and anticipations of young indigenous women in Costa Rica"
14195 Berlin
Education
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Since 05/2025 |
PhD Candidate, International Research Training Group ‘Temporalities of Future’ |
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11/2023 – 04/2025 |
PhD Candidate at the Faculty for Linguistics and Literature, Universität Bielefeld (Supervisor: Prof. Dr. Julia Roth) |
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10/2020 – 11/2022 |
Master of Arts in Interdisciplinary Latin American Studies at Freie Universität Berlin |
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07/2017 – 12/2017 |
Exchange Semester at the Universidad del Norte, Barranquilla, Colombia, subject: International Relations |
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10/2015 – 09/2019 |
Bachelor of Arts in Political Science & Sociology at Johannes Gutenberg-Universität Mainz |
Work Experience
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Since 05/2025 |
Researcher, International Research Training Group ‘Temporalities of Future’ |
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02/2023 – 10/2023 |
Internationalization Officer at the Institute for Latin American Studies of Freie Universität Berlin (Substitute during maternity leave) |
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06/2021 – 03/2024 |
Assistant to the Internationalization Officer at the Institute for Latin American Studies of Freie Universität Berlin |
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10/2019 – 08/2020 |
Project Coordinator at Servicios de Educación y Promoción Juvenil A. C., Heredia, Costa Rica |
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04/2018 – 09/2019 and 02/2016 – 09/2017 |
Student Assistant at the ERASMUS+ Office of Johannes Gutenberg-Universität Mainz |
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11/2018 – 07/2019 |
Student Assistant at the DFG-funded Research Project “EUFoot”, Johannes Gutenberg-Universität Mainz |
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02/2018 – 03/2018 |
Intern at Instituto Nacional de las Mujeres, San José, Costa Rica |
Awards and grants
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Since 10/2024 |
Studienstiftung des deutschen Volkes, Doctoral Research Grant |
Project: "Intersectional Temporalities. Aspirations and anticipations of young indigenous women in Costa Rica"
The project seeks to explore the processes of future-making by young indigenous women from different contexts in Costa Rica, as well as the production and role of different temporalities in their discourse. While classic approaches on the study of temporalities in indigenous communities have presented a juxtaposition of western linear time versus cyclical indigenous time, my research project joins other works that try to deconstruct this dichotomy by looking into the complexity of processes shaping different temporalities and their interactions.
In the empirical research, an ethnographic approach, guided by several works on decolonial and feminist methodologies, will be pursued via the combination of participant observation with in-depth expert interviews with young indigenous women in three different contexts: the indigenous territory Ngäbe-Buglé de Coto Brus, the indigenous territory of Salitre and the community of indigenous university students in the urban region of Costa Rica. By applying an intersectional perspective, my research highlights the interactions of different dimensions of inequality such as gender, class, ethnicity, age and formal education and how these shape the aspirations and anticipations of the participants regarding the future.
