Sabrina Sebastian-San Miguel
Sabrina E. Sebastian-San Miguel represents the very best of combining medical anthropology, science and technology studies (STS), and disability studies—a burgeoning intersection in which Sabrina’s thesis and class work makes an important intervention. It examines how new technologies impact the everyday lives of people with diabetes. To quote from the opening words of her thesis, “Diabetes is not a science but an art.” Sabrina put this theoretical phrase into practice in my Bodies at Work class, creating a 4,000-bead(!) sculpture that turned the flattened datafication of health into a three-dimensional representation of embodiment. Moreover, her senior thesis is characterized by an attentiveness to the lived experience of chronically ill and disabled people, and her work scholarly and beyond (including running a disability studies house course) demonstrates her commitment to social justice, thinking of disability capaciously and politically. I am proud to nominate her for the Judith McDade award.
– Professor Emily Rogers
Malynda Wollert
Malynda Wollert brought to her work in Cultural Anthropology incredible boldness, originality, creativity, and smarts. With an instinctual ethnographic eye, she also continually questioned the ethics, politics, and “rightness” of any anthropological query or text. Savvy in her reading of dense texts, Malynda posed challenged questions. And her writing was at once prodigious and poetic. Double majoring in Art, Art History, and Visual Studies, her senior thesis (for both) earned Distinction on the topic of the intertwinements of God, politics, history, memory, and culture as manifest in the physical landscape—particularly signage—in East Tennessee. At 533 pages with a massive bank of images, surveys, interviews, and an interactive map (of where certain signs occur in East Tennessee), this was a monumental accomplishment, stunning across the board. Having also spent a summer with Duke Engage in Togo, Malynda was a highly engaged major and one whose record has been outstanding.
– Professor Anne Allison
Corali Francisco-Zelkine
Corali Francisco-Zelkine is originally from Miami Florida, where she grew up in a bilingual-bicultural family speaking French and Spanish. She is committed to working for social advocacy and change, especially in the areas of racial and gender justice. Her honor’s thesis, “Collective Care: Community-Based Practices in Reproductive Justice work” draws from Black feminist and intersectionality theory, participant observation and interviews with various organizations and activists, to argue that community building is integral to the Reproductive Justice Movement. Corali is a recipient of a Hart Fellowship and will spend next year continuing her work for racial and gender justice alongside the Bantu Institute in Bahia Brazil. As a Mellon-Mays Fellow, Corali plans to go on to graduate studies in anthropology.
– Professor Katya Wesolowski
Huiyin Zhou
“Reimagining Intimacies: Art, Politics, and Relational Building in Transnational Chinese Queer Feminist Community Organizing," explores the intricate interplay between art, organizing, and community-building. Through her examination of community-based social practice art within the Chinese Artists and Organizers (CAO) Collective, which she helped to found, she shares with us the transformative power of collective action in transcending geopolitical, geographical, and affective boundaries. Beyond her scholarly achievements, it is Huiyin's unwavering commitment to community care and grassroots activism that truly sets her apart. She embodies the ethos of engaged activist scholarship. We honor her with the prestigious Paul Farmer Award for Justice and Social Responsibility.
– Graduate Student Yidi Zheng