The Before Ruins registration is open below until 15. February 2026.
What to expect from the programme?
🏗️ Please check the Dates & programme page for updates while we are working on the programme 🚧
- Wednesday 25th is dedicated to the opening, keynotes, panel discussion and stsing e.V. general assembly, and wrapping up with a reception.
- On Thursday 26th the cases will work in parallel all day, followed by a visit to archeologists workshops at German Mining Museum, screening of Isabelle Stengers: Building hope on the edge of the abyss (2023) by Fabrizio Terranova, and a social event.
- Friday 27th will start with a poster session from the previous day's cases, followed by paper sessions and working group meetings. The conference will conclude with the closing keynote by Endre Dányi.
Registration fees
The following options are available, with the fee depending on membership of stsing e.V. association. Please review the information on this page, find yourself in the table, and click through to register.
| Members | Non-members | |
|---|---|---|
| Students and unemployed non-academics | 50€ | 70€ |
| PhDs and part-time employed non-academics | 100€ | 120€ |
| Postdocs and full-time employed non-academics | 150€ | 170€ |
| Professors | 210€ | 230€ |
Please see the association's webpage if you would like to join as a member and get involved.
Dietary needs and childcare
Please indicate your dietary needs in the Bemerkungen ("remarks") field of the registration form. Likewise, use it to indicate childcare needs including number and ages of kids for childcare, and dates and times for it. We are doing our best to accommodate everyone.
Photography
The organisers will take photographs during the conference. By registering, you agree to have those taken and published. If you would like to opt out, please state so in the Bemerkung ("remarks") field.
Case work
The Before Ruins conference is built around two dozen exciting cases organised by the research community.
The call for case participation ran in late 2025. If you missed it and did not apply, the following cases still welcome more people to join. Choose one, and email the case organiser directly with a few lines about your interests in their case.
- Anarchive of time – remembering and imagining before ruins
- Archives of (In)action: German academic complicity from South Africa to Palestine
- Before the Ruins of Speed - The Transrapid as an Abandonment of a Sociotechnical Future
- Doing feminist and anti-colonial science - art and stories at the kitchen table as intervention
- Empowering Map Collection Research with Digital Tools
- From Friction to Cooperation: Rethinking Heterogeneous Positions in Collaborate Experiences
- Poetic place-making amidst coal’s multiple afterlives: A laboratory of social dreaming in Recklinghausen Süd
- Sorting Biographies in Ruins and Fragments: Computational Methods as a Promising Approach for STS?
- Urban (hi-)stories in past and present, Dortmund edition. An enhanced walkshop format.
- What is participation in your case? – A workshop to methodographically analyse and jointly reflect on the opportunities and challenges of participatory research approaches as a case in and for STS
- Who and What Tells the Future? Re-storying Deindustrialised Places Across Europe through Everyday Objects
Accommodation
We have pre-booked a limited number of rooms for the conference participants at the following hotels in Bochum. Participants are responsible for making their own reservations and payments.
B&B HOTEL Bochum-City
Alleestraße 30–32, 44793 Bochum
Stay dates: 25.–27. March 2026
Booking deadline: 10. February 2026
Rates including breakfast:
- Room: €79.90 per room/night
- Twin room: €107.80 per room/night
Reservation by email only: bochum-city@hotelbb.com. Please mention “Before Ruins Conference”. If needed, use Group Reservation No: 1669839.
Credit card guarantee or pro-forma invoice with bank transfer before arrival. Free cancellation up to 14 days before arrival. Afterwards, 90% of the room price will be charged.
Holiday Inn Express Bochum
Address: Viktoriastr. 14b, 44787 Bochum
revenue@express-bochum.de
Stay dates: 25.–27. March 2026
Booking deadline: 10. February 2026
Rates including breakfast + VAT:
- Standard room €99.00 per room/night (room €94.20 + breakfast €4.80)
- Double occupancy €10.00 extra per room/night
Please use the dedicated reservation link. If needed, please use the following keyword in your communication with the hotel: “The 2026 conference of stsing / Before Ruins Conference”.
Free cancellation until 18. March 2026.
What if the conference is full?
Places will be guaranteed to the case organisers, participants who applied to join a case via the call, and paper presenters. If the conference is full, members of stsing e.V. will be given priority.