Cultural Anthropology
MY FIRST DAY OF work in an Amazon warehouse I was nervous. I was beginning undercover anthropology fieldwork—and worried about being found out. Plus, I’d read horror stories about soul-crushing work demands inside the company’s giant facilities. I’m a longtime Amazon shopper. But I’ve also felt guilt about patronizing a company accused of putting local bookstores out of business, underpaying its taxes, and treating workers badly. A coalition of anti-Amazon groups called Athena wants us to kick the habit.… read more about The Anthropology Professor in an Amazon Warehouse »
The first day of the inaugural Duke Climate and Sustainability Teaching Fellows’ weeklong workshop series is wrapping up when Alex Glass assigns homework to the assembled faculty participants: “Before tomorrow, I challenge you to come up with a topic from your course that you think doesn’t relate to climate change at all. Tomorrow we’ll discuss ways it does.” The Climate and Sustainability Teaching Fellows Program may be new, but for its three faculty co-leads — Charlotte Clark, Associate Professor of the Practice of… read more about For the Climate and Sustainability Teaching Fellows, the Connections are Myriad »
Congratulations to the seventeen students who received a 2023 Benenson Award in the Arts. This year's group of awardees submitted a wide range of projects to be explored this summer – including printmaking, film, visual arts, music, dance and creative writing. Read more. read more about CulAnth students Rebekah Alvanerga and Huiyin Zhou among the 2023 Benenson Award Winners »
Michelle Liang’s senior distinction project might have turned out very differently if it hadn’t been for COVID-19. The Cultural Anthropology and Biology major was taking a class about food cultures during the spring that the pandemic began. “The class piqued my interest in the politics around food and eating practices, and food and different cultures. This was fueled by what was happening at that time with COVID. I wrote a paper that centered around how COVID reignited this fear of eating Chinese food that was present in U… read more about Eating Chinese/American: Michelle Liang Explores the Racialization of Food »
When Preetha Ramachandran went to Togo last summer with Professor Charlie Piot’s Duke Engage program, she wasn’t expecting to experiment with a new methodology for fieldwork. She was looking for a way to combine her two majors, Cultural Anthropology and Neuroscience, into a research project that drew on her interests in both disciplines. The result is her senior distinction project, “Entangled Madness: Walking, Talking and Caring for Folie in Farendé, Togo.” “I wanted to think about the psychiatry apparatus as it… read more about “Walking” Madness: Preetha Ramachandran’s Research in Togo Experiments With an Alternative Methodology for Fieldwork »
We, faculty in the Department of Cultural Anthropology, acknowledge the right of Duke graduate students to form an employer-recognized union. We will not penalize graduate students in any way for engaging in unionizing efforts nor will we endorse any disciplinary measures directed at graduate students who have participated in such efforts or against those who have not. We strongly believe in free discussion, and we urge both student and university leaders to engage in a constructive dialogue. read more about Faculty Statement in Support of the Right to Unionize »
Anne Allison, professor of Cultural Anthropology, has spent decades researching political economy and everyday life in modern Japan. Being Dead: Otherwise, released by Duke University Press in March, examines emerging practices surrounding death and burial as the Japanese adapt to an aging society where birthrates are falling, prices are rising and people are living longer than ever. We caught up with Allison to ask what her research reveals about shifting mortuary practices in Japan, and how these innovations in… read more about Grave Friends and Automated Tombs: “Being Dead: Otherwise” Examines Emerging Burial Practices in Japan »
Anyone who knew doctoral candidate Samar Zora deeply understood that she was an intellectual force to be reckoned with, with an ability to connect with people from all walks of life. “She was a teacher to all of us … we all learned something very different from her,” said one of Zora’s best friends, Demi Vrettas. “Being together with her friends is kind of like a mirror of all her pieces together.” Zora, who was born in Kuwait but moved to Canada when she was five years old, moved back to Kuwait during her sophomore… read more about Samar Zora remembered for outgoing nature, intellectual curiosity »
Please join Cultural Anthropology as we celebrate recent publications by our colleagues Anne Allison, Harris Solomon, and Katya Wesolowski. Readings from all three books will be followed by a conversation about ethnographic writing. Monday, April 3 :: 1:30-3:00PM :: 225 Friedl read more about Celebrate Recent Publications by our colleagues Anne Allison, Harris Solomon, and Katya Wesolowski »
In Capoeira Connections: A Memoir in Motion, Katya Wesolowski—a capoeirista and Duke lecturing fellow of cultural anthropology and dance—explores her personal journey from novice to instructor as well as her research in Brazil, Angola, Europe, and the United States. Watch the video. Wesolowski will teach her next Capoeira: Practice and Culture course (CULANTH221/AAAS221/DANCE235) in Fall 2023. read more about Katya Wesolowski on Capoeira Connections »
In Capoeira Connections: A Memoir in Motion, Katya Wesolowski — a capoeirista and Duke lecturing fellow of Cultural Anthropology and Dance — explores her personal journey from novice to instructor as well as her research in Brazil, Angola, Europe, and the United States. "My relationship to capoeira is as a researcher, but also just as importantly as a practitioner and now also as an instructor," says Wesolowski. She will teach her next Capoeira: Practice and Culture… read more about Katya Wesolowski on Capoeira Connections »
As a Duke undergraduate, Tracie Canada took The Anthropology of Sport with Professor Orin Starn — a course she remembers as formative to her engagement with anthropology and eventually leading to her Ph.D. at the University of Virginia. Today, Assistant Professor Tracie Canada focuses her ethnographic research on the experiences of athletes, and Black college football players, in particular. And in Fall 2022, she got the opportunity to teach the Duke course in which she was once enrolled, tweaking the syllabus to include… read more about Sports and Society Course Applies Anthropological Practice to our Obsession with Athletes »
Celebrate the renewal of spring with a book from a Duke author. This season of new and upcoming books that cover a variety of times, places and subjects from the arts to computer science. The writings include studies of body shaming in the theater, civil defense in Japan, intellectual conformity in higher education and a cautionary look at the future of brain hacking. Many of the books, including new editions of previous titles, can be found on the “Duke Authors” display shelves near the circulation desk in Perkins… read more about Spring Books from Duke Authors from Wittgenstein to Capoeira »
The Duke Graduate School has announced the recipients of its 2023 Dean's Awards, which recognize outstanding efforts by graduate students, faculty, and departments/programs in mentoring, teaching, and creating inclusive spaces for graduate education. The recipients will be recognized at an in-person reception on March 30. More details about each recipient will be posted closer to the event. Read more. read more about Orin Starn receives 2023 Dean's Award for Excellence in Mentoring »
In Capoeira Connections: A Memoir in Motion, Katya Wesolowski—a capoeirista and Duke University lecturing fellow of cultural anthropology and dance—explores her personal journey from novice to instructor as well as her decades of research as an anthropologist in Brazil, Angola, Europe, and the United States. We asked Katya Wesolowski some questions about her new book, which we’re sharing below. Read more. read more about Q&A with Katya Wesolowski, author of Capoeira Connections »
The Cultural Anthropology “Fieldwork Methods” class, a core requirement for the major, shone a spotlight on the ways that Cultural Anthropology holds space for students to explore their intellectual vision. On Wednesday, December 7th, 2022, Professor Katya Wesolowski held a mock American Anthropological Association (AAA) conference as a culminating feature of the course. Each of the students worked on semester-long ethnographic research projects, presented their findings in front of peers and graduate CulAnth students.… read more about Fieldwork Methods, Fall 2023: A Mini-Conference »
The Duke Chronicle's Christina Ferrari interviews Professor Lewis about her class CULANTH102: American Indian Nations Today and her advocacy as a new faculty member at Duke, including her work with the Native American/Indigenous Student Alliance (NAISA). read more about Meet Courtney Lewis, Trinity's first American Indian professor who’s changing the game »
“This book is going to get me in trouble,” Kathryn Mathers says. It’s not because the associate professor of the practice of International Comparative Studies and Cultural Anthropology is looking for it. In fact, she thought long and hard about whether she had a right to tackle the subjects she analyzes in the book in question, “White Saviorism and Popular Culture: Imagined Africa as a Space for American Salvation.” Ultimately she decided it was worth the risk, because the book was born from the questions her students kept… read more about Kathryn Mathers’ New Book Debunks Common Myths About Duke Students’ Work in Africa »
IN-PERSON! Edible North Carolina: In conversation with Marcie Cohen Ferris, Andrea Reusing, and Courtney Lewis Epilogue 109 E Franklin Street Suite 100 Chapel Hill, NC December 7 @ 6:30 pm - 7:30 pm FREE – $35.00 Edible North Carolina documents and shares the vibrant voices and places of North Carolina’s contemporary food movement—an exciting intersection of culinary excellence, creative entrepreneurship, changing populations, historic yet evolving foodways, and a… read more about IN-PERSON! Edible North Carolina: In conversation with Marcie Cohen Ferris, Andrea Reusing, and Courtney Lewis »