Month: May 2021

Congratulations to our 2021 Anthropology Honors Students!

The Anthropology department is proud to recognize our 2021 honors graduates: Margot Bailowitz, Olivia Blackman, Isabella Cantor, Makda Mulugeta, and Anna Wachspress.  In a year which presented unusual research challenges, these students persevered with creativity and resourcefulness, completing rich projects on topics ranging from Native American COVID-19 campaign artwork to the experience of couples aging together in assisted living.  One project, a documentary film following an Atlanta-based civil rights organization, was the first film-based project to be completed in the Anthropology department. All projects were completed under the supervision of faculty advisors and committee members from within and outside of Anthropology, with support from faculty honors coordinator Dr. Debra Vidali.  These students were honored in a virtual Anthropology Honors and Awards Ceremony on May 3rd, and graduated with honors at the Emory College graduation ceremony on Sunday, May 16.

You can read more about this year’s honors students and their projects at http://anthropology.emory.edu/home/undergraduate/opportunities/honors-2021.html.  Please join us in congratulating these students on their hard work and accomplishment! 

Congratulations to our Student Award Winners

The Anthropology Department is pleased to announce our 2021 student award winners!  Please join us in congratulating undergraduates Isabella Cantor, Katherine Morgan, William Johnson, and Phoebe Einzig-Roth, and graduate students Elena Lesley and Luisa Rivera.  Undergraduate awards were conferred at a virtual celebration on Monday, May 3.   

Photo left to right: Isabella Cantor, Katherine Morgan, William Johnson, Phoebe Einzig-Roth

2021 Undergraduate Student Awards

Outstanding Senior Award: Isabella Cantor and Katherine Morgan

Outstanding Junior Award: William Johnson

Marjorie Shostak Award for Excellence and Humanity in Ethnography

  • Isabella Cantor  for her honors thesis “End-of-Life Perspectives Among Couples Aging Together in Assisted Living: A Narrative Approach”, advised by Mel Konner.
  • Phoebe Einzig-Roth for her class project “Coping with COVID: Patient Perspectives”, directed by Debra Vidali.

2021 Graduate Student Awards: 

George Armelagos Award for Excellence in Teaching by a Graduate Student: Elena Lesley and Luisa Rivera

For award descriptions and past winners, visit our Departmental Awards webpage.

Dr. Peggy Barlett receives Sustainability Lifetime Achievement Award

Goodrich C. White Professor Emerita Peggy Barlett was recently honored during the Emory Office of Sustainability Initiative’s Virtual Earth Day Celebration with a Lifetime Achievement Award. Prof. Barlett has served on the faculty of the Department of Anthropology at Emory since 1976. In her tribute to Prof. Barlett, who retired in Summer 2020, Prof. Bobbi Patterson highlighted Prof. Barlett’s many contributions to Emory’s national leadership in campus sustainability, her service to students, and her numerous academic accomplishments.

From Professor Barlett’s innumerable contributions to the field and practice of sustainable food, her ignition of long-term commitments to sustainability among Emory faculty through her creation of the Piedmont Project, and her path-breaking leadership on behalf of women faculty at Emory, her impact has been immeasurable. 

At the same event, Anthropology staff Eva Stotz was named Outstanding Sustainability Representative.  Prof. Bobbi Patterson (Religion) and Prof. Eloise Carter (Biology – Oxford) were also honored with Sustainability Lifetime Achievement Awards.  Videos of the event are available online. 

Tsering Bum Co-publishes article in The Journal of Peasant Studies

Focusing on pastoralism, this article reflects on five diverse cases across Africa, Asia and Europe and asks: how have COVID-19 disease control measures affected mobility and production practices, marketing opportunities, land control, labour relations, local community support and socio-political relations with the state and other settled agrarian or urban populations? In response to the lockdown measures, the article explores what innovations have emerged to secure livelihoods, through new forms of social solidarity and ‘moral economy’. The cases examine how impacts and responses have been differentiated by class, age, wealth and ethnicity, and explore the implications for socio-economic processes and political change in pastoral settings.

The article is availabe online, full list of the authors and publication details: Simula, Giulia, Bum, Tsering, Farinella, Domenica, Maru, Natasha, Mohamed, Tahira S., Taye, Masresha, Tsering, Palden. 2020. COVID-19 and Pastoralism: Reflections from Three Continents. The Journal of Peasant Studies 48(1): 48-72.