FACULTY
Sareeta Amrute received the Diana Forsythe Prize from the American Anthropological Association for her book, Encoding Race, Encoding Class: Indian IT Workers in Berlin (Duke University Press, 2016). The annual prize recognizes published articles or books in the spirit of Diana Forsythe’s feminist anthropological research on work, science, and/or technology, including biomedicine.
Laada Bilaniuk received a Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS) 2018 Invitational Fellowship for Research in Japan (Long Term), to conduct research for three months at the Slavic-Eurasian Research Center of Hokkaido University, in collaboration with Dr. Motoki Nomachi. Their research focuses on anglicization in eastern Europe, through a comparative study of English influence in Ukraine and Poland. The influence of English on Eastern European languages and linguistic landscapes has been growing exponentially. While English serves as a counterbalance to prior Russification and as a strategy to be globally competitive, it complicates understandings of local identities and nation-building.
Ben Fitzhugh also received a Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS) Invitational Fellowship for Research in Japan to collaborate with Dr. Katsunori Takase and other colleagues in Japan. The purpose of this three-month fellowship (April to July) is to inspect zooarchaeological collections and records from coastal archaeological sites around Hokkaido. The goal is to prepare for a future study of human-environment dynamics in the Hokkaido past through investigation of isotopic and ancient DNA proxies of climatic and marine ecosystem fluctuations over the several thousand years. This research is an outgrowth of more than a decade of research in the adjacent Kuril Islands and links to a broad comparative study of late Holocene human resilience to climate and ecological variability from the Gulf of Alaska to Hokkaido.
Radhika Govindrajan’s new book, Animal Intimacies: Interspecies Relatedness in India’s Central Himalayas, will be published by University of Chicago Press in June 2018. The book explores the number of ways that human and animal interact to cultivate relationships as interconnected, related beings. It breaks substantial new ground in animal studies, and will be of interest to cultural anthropologists and scholars of South Asia as the book offers a detailed portrait of the social, political and religious life of the region. The book was awarded the Edward Cameron Dimock Jr. Prize in the Indian Humanities by the American Institute of Indian Studies.
Jenna Grant organized the visit of diasporic Cambodian filmmaker Rithy Panh as a Walker Ames Scholar in December 2017. Panh's award-winning films deal with memory, genocide and its effects, French colonialism, and precarious life in present modernity. Free public screenings and discussion at the UW Henry Art Gallery and Mt. Baker Village Apartments brought together students, faculty, artists, and member of the Cambodian American community to discuss Panh's work and the issues it raises. In honor of Panh, Grant, filmmaker Adrian Alarilla, and historian Judith Henchy created an audiovisual installation, The Age of the Kampuchea Picture, utilizing materials from the archive of US journalist Elizabeth Becker, housed at UW Libraries. The installation screened for Panh's visit in December, Becker's visit in January 2018, and at ART of Survival, a landmark Cambodian arts event at Seattle City Hall. The Age of the Kampuchea Picture will travel to the Bophana Center in Phnom Penh and the Rhode Island School of Design.
Don Grayson’s new book, Sex and Death on the Western Emigrant Trail: The Biology of Three American Tragedies, was published by the University of Utah Press. The book examines three mid-nineteenth century western American emigrant groups, including the Donner Party, who became stranded in wintry conditions on their way west and shows that who lived or died can largely be explained by age, sex, and family ties. This biological approach reveals what happens when our cultural mechanisms for dealing with famine and extreme cold are reduced to only what our bodies can provide within structured social contexts.
Jessica Johnson’s new book, Biblical Porn: Affect, Labor, and Pastor Mark Driscoll's Evangelical Empire, was published in May 2018 by Duke University Press. This monograph is an ethnographic examination of the rise and fall of a neo-Reformed megachurch in Seattle founded by Pastor Mark Driscoll and considers how congregants participated in producing, branding, and embodying Driscoll’s teaching on biblical masculinity, femininity, and sexuality.
Nora Kenworthy’s new book, Mistreated: The Political Consequences of the Fight against AIDS in Lesotho, and was the recipient of the Norman L. and Roselea J. Goldberg Prize from Vanderbilt University Press for the best book in the area of medicine. The book is a critical ethnography of global health initiatives, showing how, even as they save lives, they can usher in new forms of disenfranchisement for citizens in African states.
Devon’s Peña’s edited volume, Mexican-Origin Foods, Foodways, and Social Movements | Decolonial Perspectives, was published by University of Arkansas Press. This collection of new essays offers groundbreaking perspectives on the ways that food and foodways serve as an element of decolonization in Mexican-origin communities.
Janelle Taylor, received funding from the National Institute of Aging for a new study entitled: “Health Outcomes for Patients with Dementia without Family Caregivers.” The project will be a collaboration between Janelle Taylor (PI) and colleagues from Kaiser Permanente Washington Health Research Institute (formerly Group Health Research Institute), VA Puget Sound Health Care System, and UW Medicine, Social Work, Anthropology, and CSDE: Marlaine Gray, Eric Larsen, Paul Crane, Elizabeth Vig, Stephanie Wheeler, Ann O’Hare, Clara Berridge, Cori Mar, and Bettina Shell-Duncan.
Sasha Su-Ling Welland’s new book, Experimental Beijing: Gender and Globalization in Chinese Contemporary Art, was published by Duke Press. The book examines the interlocking power dynamics in this transformational moment and rapid rise of Chinese contemporary art into a global phenomenon.