Cultural Anthropology
The exploration the public lives of the “first ladies” of America’s Christian evangelical megachurches and an intimate portrait of the joys and hardships of rural life in Appalachia are among the new noteworthy books by Duke authors this fall. 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 Library. Some are available as e-books for quick download. Most can also be purchased through the Gothic Bookshop. [Duke Today will… read more about Fall Books: Clean Hands, Aging Brains, Evangelical Women and Other Great Reads »
This talk examines shifting meanings of human life and labor in an agribusiness company region where seven million pigs are born, raised, and killed each year. It rethinks the state of American industrial capitalism through these animals’ biological condition. Alex Blanchette is Assistant Professor of Anthropology and Environmental Studies at Tufts University. In addition to a forthcoming book with the same title as this talk, he is the co-editor of How Nature Works: Rethinking Labor on a Troubled Planet. read more about Porkopolis: American Animality, Standardized Life, and the Factory Farm »
The racial divisions that so permeate American society are not rooted in biology, a group of scholars agreed Wednesday at a public forum on race. The event, “RACE: Past, Present and Future,” featured scholars from Duke and N.C. A&T State University along with Kenyan paleoanthropologist and conservationist Richard Leakey, known for fossil discoveries that shed light on early human evolution. Humans are “genetically remarkably uniform,” Leakey said. “Race and color are totally different things. “It is uniquely American to… read more about Shaking Off Outmoded Ideas On Race »
Living with Grace Alexis Ligon Cultural Anthropology graduate student 2019 | 24 min | USADirector in Attendance Can exercise be a kind of medicine? Grace, the filmmaker’s mother, has been living with various cancers for 19 years. During that time, as a way of mastering her illnesses, she competed in countless road races and Ironman competitions. The more she pushes the limits of her body, the more the illness pushes back. Plays in Emerging Visual Anthropologists Showcase Part of … read more about "Living with Grace" a film by Alexis Ligon »
Fall 2020 Update: New sessions in this Mellon Seminar Series will occur October 8, 15 and 19. Details and links to register are included below. A seminar series focused on language discrimination in fragile and precarious communities proposed by faculty in the Trinity College of Arts & Sciences at Duke has attracted key funding from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. The project has been designated a Sawyer Seminar Series and awarded a grant of $225,000 over two years. Institutions must be… read more about Seminar Series to Raise Awareness of Language Discrimination »
The event will be a conversation exploring the ways in which, over time, different fields conceptualize, interpret, and utilize the race concept. read more about Race: Past, Present, and Future »
Senior Lecturer of Cultural Anthropology Robin Kirk discusses the aftermath when a Confederate statue was toppled in Durham, N.C. Read her full article in the American Scholar. read more about Reflections on a Silent Soldier »
https://today.duke.edu/2019/07/duke-flags-lowered-professor-emerita-naom... read more about DUKE FLAGS LOWERED: PROFESSOR EMERITA NAOMI QUINN DIES AT AGE 79 »
In support of Ayse Gul Altinay. Turkey’s Crackdown on Academics Represses History Once Again A campaign of silencing and prosecution is creating a vacuum at a pivotal moment. By Brennan Cusack Ms. Cusack, a journalist, was based in Cairo and Istanbul from 2017 to 2018. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/08/opinion/turkey-crackdown-academics.html?action=click&module=Opinion&pgtype=Homepage read more about Turkey’s Crackdown on Academics Represses History Once Again »
The Turkish government is prosecuting hundreds of academics who signed a petition by a group called "Academics for Peace" advocating a peaceful solution to the Kurdish conflict. It is part of the on-going crackdown on free expression and speech in the country. A beloved academic and renowned scholar, Ayse Gul Altinay, was last week sentenced to 25 months in prison by the Istanbul 25th Heavy Penal Court. Dr. Altinay is noted for her commitment to a peaceful future for her country shaped by nonviolence, democracy, and a… read more about Statement of Support for Ayşe Gül Altinay »
https://www.dukeupress.edu/the-fixer read more about The Fixer: Visa :Lottery Chronicles »
Senior Seminar Thesis Presentations Room 225 Friedl Building, East Campus 1:30-3:00PM Lunch will be provided Please join us to celebrate our senior thesis writers! Erick Daniel Aguilar: A Home of Our Own: Social Reproduction of a Precarious, Migrant Class Margaret Darko: Theatre of Health: Exploring Female Physician Well-being in Accra, Ghana Using Theatre-Based Interventions… read more about Senior Seminar Presentations »
The Regulator welcomes Orin Starn and Miguel La Serna for a book reading and signing of The Shining Path: Love, Madness, and Revolution in the Andes. The Shining Path tells the gripping history of the unlikely Maoist rebellion that nearly took power in Peru before its final defeat. Cosponsored by The Regulator Bookshop and Duke's Forum for Scholars and Publics. Thursday, April 18 7:00 PM The Regulator Bookshop 720 Ninth Street, Durham read more about The Shining Path: Love, Madness and Revolution in the Andes »
Tenure Standards for Digital Scholarship, a conversation with Professor Anne Allison Thursday, April 11 | 12pm – 1pm | Lunch served at 12pm Smith Warehouse Bay 4, C105 | Ahmadieh Family Lecture HallRSVP | Facebook event Professor Allison co-authored the May 2018 “Tenure Standards Committee Report” that was commissioned by the Provost as part of the implementation of the Strategic Plan, “Together Duke.” Participants are encouraged to review the Report, especially the section focused on Digital Scholarship… read more about Anne Allison: Tenur Standards for Digital Scholarship »
Cultural anthropology graduate student on NPR's big morning show, 1A, Monday, February 18. Amazon Changed How We Shop. Will It Change How We Eat? read more about Amazon Changed How We Shop. Will It Change How We Eat? »
Friday, February 22, 2019 Harris Solomon, “On Life Support” 9:30am (Breakfast available at 9am) Ahmadieh Family Lecture HallC105, Bay 4, Smith Warehouse This paper considers the phenomenon of breath to understand the edges of living and dying. It is based on ethnographic research in a trauma intensive care unit in one of Mumbai's busiest public hospitals. The paper examines how patients, their kin, and doctors navigate the thorny state of… read more about Harris Solomon, “On Life Support” »
This past Sunday in Los Angeles, an album produced by Eric Oberstein, CulAnth major Duke '07, Back to the Sunset, by the Dafnis Prieto Big Band (DPBB), won the GRAMMY Award for Best Latin Jazz Album. Eric has had the pleasure of collaborating with Cuban-born drummer, composer, bandleader, and 2011 MacArthur “Genius” Fellow Dafnis Prieto on this project for the past three years. He also was fortunate to collaborate with two Duke alums on this project — Harsha Murthy '81 (Executive Producer) and John Hahn '74 (… read more about CulAnth major Eric Oberstein, Duke '07 produces Grammy winning album »
A key goal of Together Duke is to invest in faculty as scholars and leaders of the university’s intellectual communities. To foster collaboration around new and emerging areas of interest, Intellectual Community Planning Grants (ICPG) are available to groups of faculty. These grants cover the cost of food, meeting venues, external speakers or other meeting costs, and exploratory research into potential collaborators at Duke and elsewhere. The offices of the Vice Provost for Interdisciplinary Studies and the… read more about Faculty to Pursue Collaboration through 2019 Intellectual Community Planning Grants »
Monday, January 28, 2019 6-8pm Perkins 217 Credible reports have revealed that China has detained over a million Uyghurs and other Turkic Muslims in internment camps, where they are forced to denounce their religion and ethnic identity. An Uyghur survivor of the camp system, Mihrigul Tursun, will provide testimony of her experiences. This event will shed light on the situation in East Turkestan/Xinjiang - specifically on the ethnic cleansing of Uyghurs, mass surveillance state, crackdown on religion, internment campus, a… read more about China's Concentration Camps: What's at Stake? »
Cultural Anthropology is pleased to present Airing Grievances and the Atmospherics of Chinese Legal Reform Julie Y. Chu Dr. Chu is Associate Professor of Anthropology at the University of Chicago and the author of Cosmologies of Credit: Transnational Mobility and the Politics of Destination in China. She is currently completing a new book entitled The Hinge of Time: Infrastructure and Chronopolitics at China's Global Edge. Monday, November 26, 2018 1:30pm Friedl Building, Room 225 This talk considers the… read more about "Airing Grievances and the Atmospherics of Chinese Legal Reform" »
The John Hope Franklin Center has chosen to feature Prof. Anne-Maria Makhulu's "Millennial Capitalism: Global Perspectives” (CULANTH 530S) course in its spring 2019 global course highlights. Please join us in spreading word about this fantastic course. Attached are two digital files that can be used in either print promotion or on social media. Monday afternoon the course was listed in a student mailing featuring global course: https://mailchi.mp/92ff7298aa7c/bookbagging-consider-global-studies. Share this link on social… read more about "Millennial Capitalism: Global Perspectives” (CULANTH 530S) »
The #metoo Movement Comes to the Kitchen The free, public events Alexander organized include a conversation with Severson and other food writers Thursday, Oct. 4, at the Durham Hotel and a Friday, Oct. 5, panel discussion on ‘Violence in the Kitchen’ at 11 a.m. at Duke’s Forum for Scholars and Publics, the co-sponsor of the event, in 011 Old Chemistry on West Campus. An accomplished food writer who formerly worked at Saveur and Food & Wine magazines, Alexander is now a doctoral student in Duke’s cultural anthropology… read more about The #metoo Movement Comes to the Kitchen »
Eric Oberstein graduated from Duke in 2007 with a degree in Cultural Anthropology. He is currently a producer and Associate Director, Duke Performances as well as Adjunct Faculty, Arts Management and Innovation & Entrepreneurship at Duke. An album Eric produced, Back to the Sunset, by the Dafnis Prieto Big Band (DPBB), was nominated for a Latin GRAMMY Award for Best Latin Jazz Album! Full listing of nominees here. Congratulations, Eric! read more about Eric Oberstien nominated for a Latin Grammy Award »
Jieun Cho wins the 2018 Theodore C. Bestor Prize for Outstanding Graduate Student Paper for the Society of East Asian Anthropology. She will be awarded the prize at American Anthropological Association Meetings in November. read more about Jieun Cho wins best graduate student paper prize for the Society of East Asian Anthropology. »
https://www.newsobserver.com/opinion/article213452879.html read more about Charlie Thompson: Small towns can rebuild from the ground up. »
Jieun Cho’s research will take her to Japan this summer, where she will be meeting with refugees and returnees of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster. “I will continue to work with the nuclear-affected, as well as scientists, lawyers, and activists, to see how low-level exposure to radiation is made sense of in different fields.” One of Cho’s specific areas of interest is residents living in irradiated environments who are caretakers of children. She plans to work with a group of citizen-scientists studying this sub-… read more about Fellows’ Summer Research Considers the Anthropocene in Madagascar, Japan, and Birmingham, Alabama »
America’s Sacred Spaces A new documentary research initiative poised to tell the stories of 40 essential American places that enhance our understanding of the United States The United States possesses singular places where citizens and others can visit to absorb elements of the nation’s depth of pain, triumph, awe, reverence, disappointments and dreams. “Sacred spaces” in this context refers to understanding America by literally standing in places and taking in layers of meaning that plumb the… read more about America's Sacred Spaces - Bass Connections »
Cultural Anthropology is pleased to present Ambient Thickness: The Atmospheric Materiality of the Anthropocene Gastón Gordillo The atmospheric, elusive, but powerful materiality of the droughts, wildfires, intense rainfalls, and toxic environments that define the Anthropocene cannot be accurately explained by our existing theories about place and space in the humanities. Based on ethnographic research among rural residents in northern Argentina who have been negatively affected by deforestation, agrichemical exposure, and… read more about Ambient Thickness: The Atmospheric Materiality of the Anthropocene »