Graduate Students
SARAH BARKS
sbarks@emory.edu
BA, Anthropology and Philosophy-Neuroscience-Psychology | Washington University
MA, Anthropology | Emory University
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I am interested in the evolution of the human brain, the evolution of cognition, and comparative primate neurobiology. In particular, I am studying the evolution of the neural substrates for social cognition. I am performing my dissertation research, a series of functional neuroimaging studies with chimpanzees, at Yerkes National Primate Research Center. Overall, I want to apply the research methods of neuroscience to long-standing questions in biological anthropology.
KATHRYN BOUSKILL
kbouski@emory.edu
BA, Anthropology | University of Notre Dame
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Influenced by biocultural and medical anthropology, my interests rest in the interplay between sociocultural perceptions and treatments of disease and subsequent impacts on physiological processes. Specifically, I am examining the emotional and physical effects resulting from socioculturally-mediated coping mechanisms of breast cancer patients. Through multi-sited ethnographic and research approaches, I hope to further explore the sociocultural and physiological embodiment of illness.
AVI BRISMAN
abrisma@emory.edu
BA, Studio Art & French | Oberlin College
MFA, Fine Art | Pratt Institute
JD | University of Connecticut
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My work lies at the interface of legal/political anthropology, criminology, and the sociology of law and punishment, and centers around three themes:
- the relationship of art and crime (e.g., graffiti, crime as art, and the depiction of crime in popular media);
- the relationship of crime to natural and built environments (e.g., the impact of crime, fear of crime, and various processes of criminalization on the environment); and
- power and resistance in the context of prison-prisoner relationships and neighborhood-community court relationships, as well as issues of domination and hegemony in legal consciousness and legal cynicism.
I am especially interested in definitions of crime (including a consideration of who defines proscribed behavior and how these proscriptions change across cultures and over time), as well as the meaning of criminal behavior and the ways in which crime stems from relations of power and selective processes of criminalization.
In addition to conducting fieldwork for my dissertation at the Red Hook Community Justice Center in Brooklyn, New York, I am currently working on a number of projects connecting anarchist criminology, critical criminology, and anthropology.
JAMES BROESCH
jbroesc@emory.edu
BS | University of Wisconsin-Madison
MA, Anthropology | Emory University
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I am a 5th year student in the department, currently writing up my dissertation. My broad research interests are in exploring the intersections between culture, evolution, and health through rigorous and methodically grounded examinations of cultural beliefs and cultural transmission. My dissertation research in Fiji focused on how cultural knowledge is related to health outcomes and health related behaviors, and empirical examinations of predictions in cultural evolutionary theory; using quantitative, qualitative and experimental methods. My future research interests are in incorporating methods and theory from anthropology to the study of heath inequalities and development of effective public health interventions.
I am also a participant of the Culture and Mind Project, an interdisciplinary team of anthropologists, psychologists, and philosophers exploring the impact of culture on the mind and the cognitive and evolutionary foundations of culture.
AMBER CAMPBELL
amber.campbell@emory.edu
BS, Anthropology | Kansas State University
MA, Anthropology | Emory University
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My interests focus on the environmental, cultural, and political ecology of disease in both archaeological and modern populations. My dissertation will develop community level epidemiologic profiles of schistosomiasis, a parasitic infection, within Nubian archaeological contexts. My interests, however, are more focused on the interpretation of this data in terms of subsistence strategies, social organization, political economy, and belief systems as they relate to the threat of disease than on simply determining the prevalence of infection. I am particularly interested in the impact of ecological, socio-cultural, and political-economic processes on health and well being across the life course. My long term research goals are to develop contextualized bioarchaeological models of the emergence and maintenance of health inequalities within archaeological populations.
I am committed to the advancement of studies emphasizing individual life course health histories in archaeological populations to augment the strides made in bioarchaeology through the analysis of population level data.
BRYCE CARLSON
bacarls@emory.edu
BS, Biology | University of Michigan
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There is no more intimate relationship between an organism and it's environment than through diet. The body is literally built from the nutrients supplied by fruits, nuts, leaves, animal source foods, and other resources. My research investigates how various nutrients, whole foods, or classes of food types may have influenced (and continue to influence) the evolution of our species. Regarding the consumption of animal source foods, for example, I'm asking: (a) was hominin exploitation of animal resources a key factor in the expansion of brain size, tool making, sociality, or other; (b) did the consumption of flesh begin as an valuable component of an otherwise nutrient poor niche, or as a social or culturally laden item within an otherwise rich diet; (c) what was the nutritional significance of animal source foods to the foraging niche; (d) how might that significance have differed by environment or climate? To appreciate the significance of any one component of the diet to a lineage through evolutionary time, we must first prove capable of quantifying it's energetic or volumetric contribution to the individual's diet.
My dissertation seeks to quantify the consumption of individual food items within modern chimpanzees, through isotopic analyses of the tissues left behind after death (hair, bone, and teeth). With analyses of these tissues and the dietary components from which they were built, we may prove capable of tracing the consumption of individual dietary items back through the fossil record to the origin of our species and beyond.
MOYUKH CHATTERJEE
mchatt2@emory.edu
BA, English Literature | St. Stephen’s College - Delhi, India
MA, Sociology | Delhi School of Economics
M.Phil, Sociology | Delhi School of Economics
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My major interest is in the anthropology of collective violence and more broadly concept formation around theories of violence in Western philosophy by exploring relations between representation, subjectivity, productivity and ethics via anthropological modes of knowing the ‘afterlife’ of the Gujarat pogrom in 2002, India. Related to this project is an effort to build new epistemologies of visibility, invisibility, potentiality and sociality in the face of political violence.
Research Interests: relationship between anthropology and literature, poetics and aesthetics; philosophical anthropology, anthropology of Reason; histories of the enemy, hate and love in the postcolony; India, South Asia.
HOWARD CHIOU
hchiou@emory.edu
MS, Anthropological Sciences | Stanford University
BA, Human Biology | Stanford University
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I am currently a second-year medical student in the MD-PhD program at the Emory University School of Medicine. My previous projects have focused on interfaces between biology and culture within medical anthropology, including the pathogenesis of prion disease, perceptions of risk and stigma among Taiwanese living with HIV, and knowledge and risk perception for HPV among university undergraduates. Broadly, my general interests include evolutionary perspectives on human disease, technology and public health, and medical education.
SARAH DAVIS
shdavis@emory.edu
BA | Harvard University
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My focus is on the cultural militant movement that has been waged over the last 35 years on the French island of Corsica. This movement, know as the riacquistu, is intimately linked with the anti-French nationalist movement on the island. I will examine the ways in which notions of “true” Corsican identity, the “true Corsican tradition,” central tenants of the riacquistu, have been differentially experienced and interpreted by the Corsican population. One of my central questions will be: is the riacquistu a “re-appropriation of true Corsican cultural identity” as it claims—a return to extreme local modes of production, manners of singing, religious affiliations? Or, is it (somewhat ironically) an ideological construction which invites all of Corsican society, a society traditionally fragmented by powerfully local notions of family honor and moral duty, to federalize, to step beyond traditional fragmentation in the name of “civic-duty”?
MATTHEW DUDGEON
BA | Vanderbilt University
MA, Anthropology | Emory University
MPH | Emory University, Epidemiology
matthewdudgeon@gmail.com
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My broad interests are in gender and health, focusing on masculinity and the anthropology of reproduction. I conducted 28 months of field research in two K'iche' Mayan communities in Guatemala, examining men's influences on maternal and infant health, as well as men's reproductive health problems. I compared two communities so that I could see different impacts of Guatemala's civil war on demography and reproduction.
I have also earned an MPH at Emory, and my master's research examined associations between socioeconomic indicators and women's dental health care utilization during pregnancy.
Following fieldwork I began medical school at Emory and have just completed my third year. I plan to appy for residency in obstetrics and gynecology or internal medicine.
SEBASTIAN DUEÑAS
sdueas@emory.edu
BA | Universidad Catolica de Chile
MA | Universidad de Chile
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I am a third year student, currently applying for dissertation grants. My dissertation project looks at the effect of poverty and uncertainty in the development of future orientation in children and adolescents. The setting is rural Mapuche communities in Chile. My broader interest is in Psychological Anthropology, with an emphasis on children’s development in culturally diverse settings, and cognitive anthropology. Lately I have become interested in how culture contributes to self-efficacy beliefs and career choices.
ERIN FINLEY
efinley@learnlink.emory.edu
BA, Anthropology | Emory University, 1999
MPH, Behavioral Science |
Emory University, 2006
MA, Anthropology | Emory University, 2007
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Research Interests: Culture and mental health; political violence; constructions of trauma and recovery; intersubjectivity and well-being
I am a medical anthropologist interested in how culture shapes experiences of mental health and illness, particularly in the aftermath of political violence. My dissertation research will examine post-combat mental health among U.S. veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan, and the efforts of families and communities attempting to manage and respond to veterans' needs post-deployment. I am particularly interested in the role of culturally-informed strategies, such as narrative formation and meaning-making efforts, in buffering and/or exacerbating symptom severity and illness course. My fieldwork will be conducted among Anglo- and Mexican-American veterans in San Antonio, Texas.
I recently completed my MPH in Behavioral Science at the Rollins School of Public Health, an opportunity stemming from my fellowship with the Center for Health, Culture, and Society in 2003-2004. My thesis research examined emic perspectives on health and social service needs among Southern Sudanese refugees living in the metro-Atlanta area.
TRICIA FOGARTY
pfogart@learnlink.emory.edu
MA, Anthropology | Georgia State University
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I am focusing on the production and reproduction of social identity—particularly national and ethnic identities, through language use in the Republic of Moldova (formerly part of the Soviet Union ). Some factors influencing this topic are the intersections of official and unofficial discourses produced through national policies and influential community/national leaders as well as through everyday language use and people's beliefs about language use.
These topics came together during 15 months of fieldwork, between Sept. '06-Dec. '07, funded by a Fulbright-Hays dissertation research grant. Now I am beginning the process of writing my dissertation with the working title of "Building Moldova". The different discourses I hope to bring together in my writing concern development, corruption, ethnicity, kinship and other social “connections”—basically, what influences people's formation of social and national identities in the multiethnic and post-socialist context of Moldova.
TYRALYNN FRAZIER
tfrazi2@emory.edu
BS, Biochemistry | Michigan State University
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I am interested in the connection between health, disease, and development in marginalized populations. I am primarily interested in immigrant populations in France and the U.S.
BONNIE FULLARD
bfullar@emory.edu
BA, Anthropology & Psychology | University of Notre Dame, 2008
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I worked in coastal Kenya for two summers while an undergrad at Notre Dame and plan to expand the research I began into a dissertation project. I am interested in the reasons for differential capacity to benefit from treatment interventions. In particular, I want to know what causes 'breakdowns' in the provision of treatment--whether it is healthcare-seeking behavior, uptake, adherence, or biological response.
Clearly there are issues of access, perception, and power at play at various points in this process. My project has looked at reasons for initially low uptake of ARVs (anti-retrovirals, drugs for HIV) in Kenya. I would like to begin looking at not only the reasons provided by people with HIV and their healthcare providers but also to examine the reasons provided by the Ministry of Health and large-scale NGOs. In this way, I hope to understand whether policy-makers and those with HIV are attributing low treatment uptake to the same factors or whether there is a disconnect between those who require treatment and those charged with distributing it.
SWARGAJYOTI GOHAIN
sgohain@emory.edu
BA | University of Delhi, India
MA, M.Phil | Delhi School of Economics, University of Delhi
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I am concerned in dealing with the narratives of identity and modernity in relation to ethnic communities in the border regions of Northeast India. There have not been adequate studies on the subjectivities of the local populations of this region, and how these may have been shaped by the peculiar conditions of living created by historical exigencies, colonial conditions and their counter practices, and postcolonial regimes. I would also like to explore how development policies, displacement of populations, and ethnic strife may have shaped the region’s politics, and given rise to varied expressions of identity.
DINAH HANNAFORD
dhannaf@emory.edu
BA | Duke University
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My research focuses on Senegalese transnational migration to Italy. I
look at issues of gender identity, transnational marriage, xenophobia
and generational change. I am also interested formal sex work and
informal transactional sex, global youth culture, Sufi Islam and
alternate modernities.
Research Interests: transnational migration, gender, power, marriage
and kinship, modernity, subjectivity; Europe; West Africa.
CLAIRE MARIE HEFNER
chefner@emory.edu
BA, Anthropology | University of Wisconsin, Madison
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My long-term research interests lie in the anthropological study of gender and sexuality, modernity, and Islam, as viewed from the perspective of the largest Muslim-majority country in the world, Indonesia. I plan to work in bilingual/bi-cultural contexts in Indonesia, namely in pesantren, or Muslim boarding schools. Over the past ten years, I have spent most of my summers in Central Java, Indonesia studying Classical Balinese dance and working on my Indonesian. In the summer of 2008, I taught in an Islamic boarding school for girls in Yogyakarta (Pesantren Mu’allimaat Muhammadiyah) where I guest lectured for their English and Arabic programs. As part of my PhD research, I would like to explore the experiences of Indonesian students who study in the Middle East. I am particularly interested in the ideas returning Indonesian scholars and pilgrims bring home with them and the degree to which those ideas affect the shape of Indonesian Islam—especially with regard to issues of gender.
AMANDA HILLMAN
ahillm2@emory.edu
BA | Harvard University
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My primary research interests include the intersection of race, class, and health in Urban Brazil. Public policy debates and discourse in Brazil have taken a new direction in recent years with the advent of university "cotas" and deeper public examination of Brazil's long-standing, yet downplayed, racial inequalities. I am particularly interested in the adoption/ascription of "Negro" identity among the Afro-Brazilian middle class in São Paulo and Salvador. Much of my training has been in Medical Anthropology, and throughout this investigation I seek to uncover factors that may contribute to class-cutting health disparities between these groups. I also aim to incorporate a community-participatory research model.
DREDGE BYUNG' CHU KANG 
bkang@emory.edu
BA, Anthropology | University of Maryland
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I am interested in conceptualizations of gender/sexuality categories, the social legitimacy accorded to these categories, the social and moral status of the individuals inhabiting them, and the relationship of social status to material and embodied health outcomes. My dissertation research focuses on gender pluralism and social status among gay men and transgender male to female persons (kathoey or sao praphet sawng) in Bangkok, Thailand. The main question concerns how sexual subjectivities are conditioned via class positioning, and subsequently, how these sexual subjectivities, through gender presentation, impact life opportunities. My project examines gay male and kathoey experiences of stigma and management strategies that enhance their moral standing (e.g. being the "good" gay), especially in regards to transnational relationships (with Westerners and East Asians) and beauty practices. I am particularly interested in the links between Asian nations and how Thailand, as a middle income country, interacts with richer and poorer countries in the production of new queer subcultures. By focusing on inter-Asian studies and critical Asian regionalism, I hope to identify the ways that Thais construct gay/transgender identities that do not rely on or resist the West as the source of desire. Additionally, I am interested in how these international connections impact the HIV epidemic among gay and transgender populations in Bangkok.
JEN KUZARA
jkuzara@learnlink.emory.edu
BA, Anthropology and German | University of Nebraska
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My research interests center primarily on the study of infectious disease, which I hope to pursue from both bio-cultural and bio-medical foundations. My interests include the following: social factors, including gender issues, in the spread of HIV; the effects of acculturation, social inequalities, and development and infrastructural issues on parasite and pathogen loads; and cross-cultural and environmental differences in immunological function. Many of these issues are ones I have not been able to explore in much depth, and hope to narrow my focus once I have had the opportunity to do so.
BRANDIE LITTLEFIELD
brandiel@mindspring.com
BS |
Duke University
MA, Anthropology | Emory University
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My research interests focus primarily on primate behavior and reproductive endocrinology. Specifically, I am investigating the impact of female intrasexual competition on infant survival during lactation, and how female competitive behavior is mediated via gonadal and adrenal steroids. Traditional interpretations of sexual selection theory have tended to focus on male competition and female choice, often overlooking the importance of female investment (particularly the energetic investment of gestation and lactation) and reproductive variance. I am interested in looking at how these factors influence female reproductive strategies and correlate to androgen and glucocorticoid levels. I am conducting my research on female sifaka (Propithecus verreauxi) in Beza Mahafaly, Madagascar.
AUN LOR
alor@emory.edu
BS, Biology | Emory University
MPH, International Health | Emory Rollins School of Public Health
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My current research interest is on migrant health workers, more specifically health workers who have migrated from developing countries to work in the US. Global migration of health professionals has become a major public health concern, because it contributes to shortages in developing countries, which can hinder progresses in achieving public health goals, such as reducing infant and child mortality. My goal is to understand the lived experience of migrant health workers, focusing on Indian-born migrant health workers, and how these experiences influenced their decision to migrate, and in some cases return to their country of origin. These experiences are related to issues of identity, social network, assimilation, and citizenship, which are tied to socio-cultural, economics, and political, and global forces that may be beyond their immediate control, but which are significant factors in their decision-making processes. Important questions relating to global economic, health development and globalization will be explored. I am also examining the ethical dilemmas and human rights issues faced by health workers, as well as the ethical and inequality issues surrounding recruitment of foreign health workers by governmental and private agencies in the United States and other industrialized countries.
KENNY MAES
kmaes@learnlink.emory.edu
BA | University of California, Santa Barbara
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I conducted ethnographic and epidemiologic research in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, from April 2007 to December 2008. Now back at Emory, I am analyzing data and writing up findings on the mental health, food insecurity, motivations, and care relationships of Ethiopian volunteer caregivers for people with AIDS. I address how food insecurity and unemployment put this group of caregivers at risk for depression/anxiety, as well as how the mental satisfaction they get out of their role leads them to report improved mental well-being over time. In addition, I address how volunteer caregivers explain the apparently altruistic motives that they have for providing care, drawing on cultural models theory and evolutionary theory. This research was motivated by two broad problems. First, how and why do people behave altruistically in contexts of extreme insecurity and fear of both biological death and the social death that comes with being stigmatized? The second problem derives from the global “brain drain” of public health professionals from Africa. In this context, countries like Ethiopia have come to rely heavily on volunteers to support community health. The sustainability of public health volunteerism is, however, questionable. Volunteer caregivers may experience high levels of poverty and food insecurity, which leads to mental morbidity, lower motivation, and sub-standard care provision. I addressed these hypothetical links longitudinally among a large sample of volunteer caregivers for people with AIDS in Addis Ababa assessed at three time points over the course of twelve months. Ethnographic data allow me to better interpret the findings from this epidemiologic study.
My general interest is in the biocultural development of altruistic motivation and behavior, and how engaging in altruistic behavior improves health and well-being. Through my research, I aim to integrate behavioral ecological approaches with insights from cognitive anthropology. I also have interests in formal statistical modeling, development and validation of culturally tailored scales and other tools to assess cognitive variation and consensus, and anthropometric assessment of growth and nutrition, all of which are important in critiquing notions about human variation.
My previous research has included bioarchaeology and mitochondrial population genetics in West and Northeast Africa, the Levant, and the Peruvian Andes. I am also working with Prof. Armelagos on biological, cultural, and historical approaches to studying race and racism.
JENNY MASCARO
jmascar@emory.edu
BA | University of Notre Dame
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Research interests: social cognition, theory of mind
I would like to use functional and structural neuroimaging to explore the neural substrates correlated with social cognitive skills such as empathy and a theory of mind. In looking at both comparative primate neurobiology and at intra- and inter-group variation found in humans, I hope to gain a better understanding of the specific nature of these cognitive features; that is, how we develop and employ them to become successful social beings.
CHRISTINE MURPHY
cpmurph@emory.edu
BA, Anthropology | Columbia University
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I am a graduate student broadly interested in both the evolution of emotion and its cross-cultural experience, expression, and interpretation. In particular, I am intrigued by the implications of embarrassment and self-conscious emotion in the (ontogenetic and phylogenetic) development of human social consciousness, with an emphasis on the blush response.
LAUREN MYERS
lmyers2@learnlink.emory.edu
BS, Neuroscience and Behavioral Biology | Emory University
BS, Anthropology and Human Biology | Emory University
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My interests in anthropology broadly lie in the fields of psychological and medical anthropology, primarily where they intersect concerning physical wellness, mental health, and the psychobiological mediators of disease. My focus in the future will be to research and identify biomedical solutions that are informed by broader cultural experiences and meanings to increase treatment efficacy across socioeconomic and ethnic boundaries.
In particular, I am interested in examining and analyzing the complex relationships between nutrition, socioeconomic status, ethnicity, and the global obesity epidemic. By investigating the ways in which modernity has shifted and changed our dietary profiles, I hope to gain insight into the cultural and social factors currently contributing to the increased incidence of obesity and its related chronic diseases in America, as well as globally. My future research will focus on developing and understanding this connection between the cultural aspects and social implications of diet and the marked ethnic health disparities revealed through obesity's epidemiological patterns.
MICHELLE SCHULEIN PARSONS
mschul2@learnlink.emory.edu
BA, Human Biology | Stanford University
MS, Population and International Health | Harvard School of Public Health
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I came to medical anthropology through international development and health. For my masters in public health I focused on quantitative and qualitative research methods. My thesis was on middle-aged women’s use of psychotropics in Beirut . Following my masters, I worked at the World Health Organization in Geneva for two years. I have also lived in Spain, Russia, and Indonesia.
My dissertation will focus on the mortality crisis in Russia following the sociopolitical ‘transition’ during the 1990s. This public health crisis represents the largest drop in life expectancy in modern history, primarily among middle-aged men. I will examine how a cohort of older Russians, those that were at greater risk of increased mortality in the early 1990s, suffered and survived the life-threatening social changes. How did men and women experience those years? How are current expressions of distress mapped onto socioeconomic trajectories and gender? This project brings an anthropological approach to a health crisis that has not been studied through on-the-ground ethnography.
I define myself as a critical interpretive medical anthropologist with an interest in how socioeconomic and political change affects the health of individuals. I am also interested in how the methods of ethnography and epidemiology influence the production of knowledge.
KWAME PHILLIPS
kphill3@emory.edu
BA, Religious Studies and Philosophy | Macalester College
MSc, Transcultural Mental Healthcare | Queen Mary - University of London
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I am a graduate student of Visual Anthropology and Film Studies. I am interested in investigating the recent rise of suicidality among the African-Caribbean community in the UK and how this might be connected to issues of identity and personhood. My intent is to then produce a film from my research to present both a textual and visual analysis of the issues at hand.
MAURITA POOLE
mnpoole@emory.edu
BS, Arabic/Government | Georgetown University
MPH, Global Health | Rollins School of Public Health, Emory University, 2005
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Research interests: identity, race/ethnicity, beauty and modernity
My research examines the ways that Egyptian beauty ideals and practices reflect their perceptions of skin color, race, and identity. I am currently writing my dissertation, “Brown Skin is Half the Beauty”: The Intersection of Race, Gender, and Beauty in Contemporary Cairo.
YAYA REN
yren@emory.edu
JD | Vanderbilt University
MA, Social Science | University of Chicago
BA, Social Studies of Science and Medicine | University of Chicago
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I am currently working in the field in California. I currently utilize the NICU (neonatal intensive care unit) as a unique social niche for exploring the "courtesy anthropomorphization" of pre-social bodies into "little persons" in a context where medical, socio-cultural, and legal boundaries collide.
JOSH ROBINSON
jrrobi3@emory.edu
BA, Anthropology | University of Florida
BA, Geography | University of Florida
____________________________
My research interests lie within evolutionary studies and bioarchaeology. As an undergrad I focused on the archaeology of the St. Johns River region of Florida, including an analysis of the biological sex of individuals from Harris Creek (8VO24). These studies were supplemented by spatial geographic concepts, especially geographic information systems (GIS), remote sensing, and air photo interpretation, to gain a more holistic review of the subject.
While I have not settled on a specific graduate research topic, my goal is to study at the nexus of evolutionary anthropology and bioarchaeology. Within this broad umbrella I wish to investigate paleopathological and paleoecological techniques drawn from bioarchaeology, and how they can be utilized in highlighting broader trends of evolutionary histories. Many sociocultural and environmental factors are at play in evolutionary events, and I feel that a bioarchaeological approach may reveal some keys to morphological and functional developments. In addition, I want to continue integrating geographic concepts, specifically GIS techniques, in my research as they are invaluable tools for modeling and analyzing various phenomena. By studying the bioarchaeology of early modern humans and their ancestors I hope to provide a new perspective on hominid evolution.
ANA E. SCHALLER DE LA COVA
aschall@emory.edu
BA, Anthropology and French | Bowdoin College
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Research interests: Modernity and development, education, urbanization, youth, and Islam; Senegal. I have recently returned from having conducted my field research in Senegal and have begun to write up my dissertation .
My research is comparative and involves Koranic boarding schools, Islamic day schools, and national secular schools in Dakar. I examine the ways in which these diverse and historically-contingent modes of education articulate with a restructuring of the meaning of knowledge, economic instability, urban migration, and social change. I am also keenly interested in issues of personhood and identity, youth culture, and local ways of being modern.
JED STEVENSON 
Jed.Stevenson@gmail.com
BA, Archaeology, Classics, and Classical Art | University College London
MA, Anthropology | Emory University
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I came to the department with a background in archaeology, and with broad interest in—among other things—the anthropology of education, social change, and political economics in Africa , the Middle East , and the USA . Emory has allowed me to indulge these interests: during my first year I studied Arabic, took classes on African history, and learnt a great deal about American culture on the side. (I grew up in the UK.) Being at Emory has also led me to cultivate new and complementary interests in the social distribution of health and disease (especially malnutrition and infectious disease), and the evolutionary underpinnings of human behavior. During the year 2004-5, I studied Global Health as a fellow in the Center for Health, Culture, and Society. I carried out fieldwork in Jimma, southwest Ethiopia during 2007-2009. The principal question I address in this research is how parents’ schooling affects their children's life chances. The study followed the health and physical and psychosocial development of a cohort of infants during the first two years of life. I carried out this project in collaboration with colleagues at Jimma University’s Faculty of Public Health and the Jimma Longitudinal Study of Youth.
| Article by Jed Stevenson in Fall 2009 Anthropology Department Newsletter |
JENNIFER SWEENEY
jlsween@emory.edu
BA | California State University, Northridge
MA | California State University, Northridge
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I am broadly interested in food, identity, nationalism, gender studies and ethnographic film. My dissertation will focus on the ways that ‘traditional’ foods are being selectively deployed in the post-colonial Caribbean nation of Barbados, especially in response to the perceived threat of increased immigration under the implementation of a regional program that will open the borders of many Caribbean nations to interregional migration. I am interested in the ways that people use consumption to signal identity and the contexts in which this signifying takes place. I intend to use both film and text to complete my research in order to allow for a deeper more multinuanced understanding of the topic.
TAWNI TIDWELL
ttidwel@emory.edu
BS | Earth Systems, Stanford University
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I work on biocultural conceptualizations and systems of knowledge regarding the human body, health and illness, and their relations and affects within environmental and social systems, particularly drawing from my background in and study of the Tibetan medical system. I use Buddhist psychological and neuroscience underpinnings on roots of and affects on illness, and the procurement and transmission of embodied knowledge. I work both in the clinical applications and public and environmental health perspectives, as well as the theoretical framework for Tibetan medicine. My experience in Peruvian and Bolivian traditional medical systems has also deeply influenced my approach to the myriad of issues in individual-society-environment health narratives.
LESLEY JO WEAVER
lweaver@emory.edu
BA | Smith College
MPH | Emory University
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As a medical anthropology student, I am interested in chronic disease and mental health among urban middle- and upper-class women in New Delhi. India currently harbors approximately 40 million people with type 2 diabetes--more than any other country in the world--and projections estimate that this number will double by 2030. Type 2 diabetes management requires major diet and lifestyle changes and complex medication regimes (sometimes including daily injections). It may create problems regulating mood, and nearly always carries a significantly higher risk of amputation, blindness, and neuropathy, reduced physical mobility, and earlier mortality. Elaborate and time-consuming treatment regimes for diabetes may be especially challenging for women in Delhi, who frequently juggle family care responsibilities with emerging employment opportunities and modern desires. Yet, the social processes linking diabetes and compromised mental health remain poorly understood and often unacknolwedged.
My research explores the ways in which diabetes and depression/anxiety are linked through reduced family and social role fulfillment among women living in Delhi. It also explores local conceptions and experiences of mental health problems. Through my work, I hope to draw attention to the significant impact of type 2 diabetes management challenges on a woman's (and her family's) mental health status, social functioning, and quality of life, both in India and elsewhere. In conjunction with my Ph.D. work, I have also completed a Master's degree in Public Health from Emory's Rollins School of Public Health.
ANDRE WELLINGTON
awellin@emory.edu
BSc, Political Science | University of West Indies
MA, African Studies | University of California at Los Angeles
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Andre Wellington is Jamaican and earned his B.Sc. with First Class Honours in Political Science and a minor in Criminology from the University of the West Indies, Mona in Kingston, Jamaica. He is currently pursuing an M.A. in African Studies at the University of California, Los Angeles where his focus is on South Africa. His interest in Africa grew out of his collaborative experiences with the South African High Commission in Jamaica. While his research interests have and continue to evolve, he mainly focuses on issues of crime and conflict in South Africa, and is interested in alternative conceptions and interpretations of violence vis-à-vis the state, vigilantes and criminals. He has visited South Africa on two occasions: the first to deliver a paper entitled "Agricultural Protectionism in South Africa" to the All African Student's Conference at the Universiteit van die Vrystaat in Free State, South Africa in 2006. On his second visit he performed archival research on crime trends during and after Apartheid in South Africa at the University of the Witwatersrand and the University of Cape Town and was most pleased to visit and study the infamous town of Hillbrow – crime capital of Johannesburg in 2007. His desire to study Anthropology comes out of an appreciation for the discipline's critical integration of history, social theory and ethnography and its grappling with the concept of agency and social action to unearth new and creative understandings. He also intends to do comparative work on crime and violence in Jamaica and South Africa, and he feels a confluence of supportive people and institutions have brought him thus far and will carry him further still.
SHUNYUAN ZHANG
szhan22@emory.edu
BA, English Language and Literature | Shanghai International Studies University, 1999
MA, English Linguistics | Shanghai International Studies University, 2002
MA, Gender Studies | Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2008
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As a second-year student, I am interested in a variety of topics in sociocultural anthropology, including gender and sexuality, globalization, medical anthropology, and linguistic anthropology. Rather than taking them as disparate subfields within anthropology, I tend to treat them as closely interrelated perspectives through which larger social, cultural, political and economic settings and events could be embodied and represented. More importantly, I am interested in how the seemingly “local” aspects like gender practices could actively exert influence upon “global” patterning, constituting an integral part in the on-going process of globalization. My research project is concerned specifically with transgender community in mainland China.
MOLLY ZUCKERMAN
mollykzuckerman@yahoo.com
mzucke2@emory.edu
BA, Anthropology and Women’s Studies | Pennsylvania State University
Graduate Certificate, Women’s Studies | Emory University, 2008
MA Anthropology | Emory University, 2009
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I am a bioarchaeologist and paleopathologist with regional and temporal specialization in early modern England (c. 1500-1850). My current interests are in the biosocial determinants of disease in past human populations, specifically in understanding the interplay of social, demographic, and ecological factors on both the evolution of infectious disease—particularly sexually transmitted infections—and on lived experiences of disease in the past. My long-term research goals are to utilize evolutionary, ecological, and biocultural models of health and disease to examine the causes of health inequalities in the past and to use these results to inform and evaluate public health interventions.
My dissertation employs skeletal, historical, archaeological, and biochemical evidence to examine the interaction of social identity and acquired syphilis in early modern England (c. 1500-1850). Specifically, I am investigating how variation in ecological, physiological, and social factors proximately related to skeletal individuals’ sex, age, socioeconomic status (SES), and ultimately, to larger demographic, ecological, sexual, social, and political shifts, affected experiences of syphilis over time. These include functional impairment (severity and duration of infection and type of tissue destruction), access to therapeutic treatment, and questions of host-parasite co-evolution.
In addition to my dissertation, I am the Co-PI for a study examining the health, diet, and geographic origins of a small group of naturally-mummified remains from the Hetz Mountain cave site of rural southern Mongolia. This is part of a larger study, the Mongolian Mummy Project, which is funded by the National Geographic Society and is a collaboration between the Smithsonian Institution National Museum of Natural History and the Mongolian Academy of Sciences. I am also the Co-PI of a smaller project which will use trace element analysis—via handheld X-ray florescence (X-rf)—to investigate levels of exposure to environmental and industrial contaminants in English populations during the English Industrial Revolution (c. 1750-1870).
My general interests include the evolution, ecology, and epidemiology of infectious disease, syphilis and other sexually transmitted infections, skeletal biology, trace element analyses, human evolution, evolutionary medicine, human anatomy, anthropological demography, gender studies, feminist anthropology, English and European social history, and the political economy of health and disease throughout history.