If you’re reading this there’s an excellent chance you know that Pedal Powered Anthropology has relocated to Germany. While this doesn’t preclude content on the United States or Rhode Island by any stretch (actually my next book is specific to Rhode Island history!), it does mean that our horizons have been expanded. Dramatically.

Getting here was a bit disorienting at first. We had an immediate setback with the lot of us getting Covid and having to quarantine and therefore not be able to conduct any integration-specific business. That behind us, we have been able to make decent progress on exploring our surroundings, which are starting to be detailed in blog posts (the last two covered a good amount of Leipzig history). We have also started a podcast, called From Snout to Schnauze, which is a glimpse of the cross cultural integration and what this whole process is like for a small family with an infant and minimal to moderate German proficiency.

About that. There are several ways to go about being able to reside, work, and therefore stay in Germany. You can have specific professional qualifications that fit some of the industries experiencing labor shortages (things like STEM fields, elder care, and several vocational fields like HVAC/welding), you can have professional qualifications that you think are beneficial to the German economy and for which you’d like to seek recognition, you can be self-employed/an entrepreneur, OR you can be a freelancer.

There are quite a few others, but for me these are the ones that apply. Having a college degree from a school recognized by the German government means I’m likely to be able to find my way to a high skilled work/residence permit. With about 15 years experience in factory work, I can probably work it out to where I get a permit based on that. However, with Pedal Powered Anthropology having led me to produce a mess of short documentaries, a couple long ones, and write two books while deeply researching a third…I feel like the self-employment/freelance permits may be of particular value here.

We’ve been having some issues getting through to/into the Leipzig Job Center (which specializes in helping immigrants, refugees, and generally marginalized communities find their way to gainful employment and residence. Like any good governmental organization, they’re open Monday, Thursday, and Friday from 8-12. Tuesday they’re open 8-6. Wednesday they’re open by appointment only (I’ve been told I don’t need an appointment for my questions so we can just come in…we haven’t been able to do that). They’re also closed on weekends.

That’s been tricky but we absolutely have to get there tomorrow. Time is ticking and we’ve gotta get our permits and get things moving.

Treating the freelance visa as what’s decided, here’s the loose plan going forward for Pedal Powered Anthropology.

Advertising is a must. Not everybody needs to pitch in money for this organization, but some people can/will want to. Getting in front of them and showing them how to contribute is critical.

Staggered and consistent content is also a must. I’m writing books, I’ve got a load of documentaries packed away until we’ve got a computer again. We’ve got a podcast. There’s a second contributing author. There are loads of blog posts slated on bunches of topics. Castles and other historical buildings here as well as other old bits of stuff I find are high on the list for quick turnaround. That stuff is particularly exciting because much of the information I’m finding doesn’t seem to be written about at any real length in English. That may be the most marketable aspect of Anthrospin to the Stadtgesichtliches Museum Leipzig. Plus the other stuff that I personally am interested or which I focused on for my degree (primatology, evolutionary biology, biological anthropology, linguistics, and of course, bicycles).

I’ll be mapping out work days/weeks for the two of us here in Germany who can be expected to do more than drink milk from the tap. In general, here’s the structure I’m going for:

Short bits of content such as updates like this post, photos, or TikToks will be shared publicly as soon as they’re ready.

Short blog posts and minor project updates will be shared for Patreon contributors 3 days before they’re shared publicly.

Longer posts, short documentaries, and project previews will be on Patreon one week before they’re shared publicly.

Book and DVD advertisements will be posted weekly.

German-language content will be popping up now and again by the end of October and with increasing frequency as the German audience inevitably begins to grow.

I’ll be reaching out to organizations like the NPS and local history museums in Rhode Island to be a part of video conferences and presentations (like the mill talk with Slater Mill earlier this year).

We’ll be talking through and pitching some live streams and AMA type events to generally be more present and interactive with our audience.

In a general sense though, Anthrospin is kind of being rebuilt here. Europe is a large and incredibly diverse place, with all sorts of cultural and biological history sort of at our fingertips. While Leipzig will be our bubble of operation for a while, there’s a whole slew of countries within a day trip from us. We encourage everyone who sees this to comment the types of content and locations they’d like to see/see more of. After all, that’s what we’re here for.