Karin Louise Hermes, PhD
Writing. Speaking. Teaching. Learning.
Filipina-German storyteller/-weaver on climate justice, Indigenous rights, and political philosophies
~ Metaphors and Metaphysics ~ summarizes my musings as
“Philosopher of Spirit” or as a “Weaver of Stories”
This is a personal website with academic intentions, since I cannot separate those spheres of life, they are both entangled as one here.
I am a Filipina-German life-long learner, but I have a PhD in American Studies from the Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin and an M.A. in Pacific Islands Studies from the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa. I have lived in Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, the Philippines and Hawai‘i, and am currently based in Germany.
My interdisciplinary PhD dissertation can be described as:
An environmental and relational convergence between Hawaiian waters, land, and people, for multiethnic solidarity-building to places there, and elsewhere
For the purpose of explaining Hawaiian cosmologies and ways of knowing the land in the place-based ecophilosophy of aloha ‘āina (“love of the land”), my positionality located Filipinx/a/o ways of being in kapwa (“self-in-other”) relation. From metaphors and narratives of Hegelian metaphysics I theorized a “spirit of relationality” or vital essence in the spaces in-between and appealed to recenter/cite the Haudenosaunee kinship spirit to land and more-than-human community as pre- and post-Marxist theory for global climate justice into Huey P. Newton’s theory of Intercommunalism.
Check out how I can help:
- Academic
- Public/Advocacy
Online Ponderings
Twitter is no longer where you can find me, when I am not *ghosting*
The personal and academic spheres of life are even more entangled as one there
All kinds of Articles
- Academic
- Public/Advocacy
Consulting (contact me)
- Climate, Indigenous & Environmental Justice
- History, Decolonization, Decolonial Thought
- Nationalisms, Imperialism, Borders, Migration
- Oceania, Hawai‘i
- Philippines & Southeast Asia
- German-to-English
- German sociocultural idiosyncrasies
Education
PhD in American Studies from Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin
(2015 – 2021) “Growing Intercommunalist ‘pockets of resistance’ with Aloha ‘Āina in Hawai‘i”
My dissertation was about Hawai‘i and Filipinx settler solidarity to being Aloha ‘Āina. My interdisciplinary focus of this individual PhD project came from the Aloha ‘Āina for Maunakea on Hawai‘i Island and throughout the Hawaiian archipelago, as well as from frontline climate activists in the Philippines.
Master of Arts in Pacific Islands Studies from the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa
(2012 – 2014) “Yumi Olgeta Papua Niugini – cultural identity formations and national consciousness among urban-educated youth in Papua New Guinea”
My thesis was about Papua New Guinea, nationalism/borders, and urban youth identities. My interdisciplinary focus came from the students at the Divine Word University in Madang who participated in my qualitative study, Pacific History, Decolonialism, and Oceanic sovereignty movements.
Bachelor of Arts in Ethnology and Sociology [Sociology, Ethnology, Psychology]
(2009 – 2011) [2006 – 2009]
After 5 semesters of the Magister Artium in Sociology, Ethnology and Psychology at Universität Trier, I transferred into the Bachelor of Arts in Ethnology and Sociology at the Ruprecht-Karls-Universität Heidelberg. I received the Bachelor of Arts after 5 more semesters of disciplinary training in Sociocultural Anthropology and Sociology. My regional focus was on the Pacific Islands, Indonesia, and my topical focus was on migration and identity, graduating with a final thesis on Vietnam/Greater Mekong Subregion.
Metaphors & Metaphysics 
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