Anthropology

Wrap up a very long winter with warm drinks, bright conversation, and a celebration of all things Anthropology at our spring AnthroCafe. Bring your ideas, questions, and news to share. Anthro-curious friends are always welcome!

-The Anthropology Department

The Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs program on Security and Global Affairs presents “Resilient Democratization: Social and Political Change in Iran and Beyond” with Norma Claire Moruzzi.

The Rohatyn Center for Global Affairs program on Global Health and Medicine presents “Assembling Networks of Care in Global Maternal Health; Technologies, Tasks, and Traditional Birth Attendants” with Prof. Margaret MacDonald.

Students in ANTH 211 and PSCI 214 will present their research projects on environmental anthro and environmental politics in a poster session.

Alexa Duchesneau will give the second talk in the annual Anthro & Friends Winter Speaker Series, titled “Simians and the Story of Us: What Biological Anthropology Brings to STEM.” In an increasingly divided world, Biological Anthropology and Primatology are a bridge between divided academic disciplines: the social sciences and the hard sciences. The combination of observational studies and hypothesis testing places these fields in the unique position of being truly interdisciplinary.

Jasmin Msuya will give the first talk in the annual Anthro & Friends Winter Speaker Series, titled “Rethinking Language of Instruction in Public Secondary Schools in Tanzania: Ethnographic Case Study on the Implementation of the Educational Language Policy in the Classroom.” Jasmin’s research centers on how the transition from Kiswahili instruction in primary school to English instruction in secondary education shapes teaching, learning, and language ideologies in a semi-urban Tanzanian public secondary school.

Faculty, staff, and students are invited to a conversation with Kenneth Stern, drafter of the IHRA Working Definition of Antisemitism, and Emma Saltzberg of the Diaspora Alliance, on its implications for teaching, research, and campus policy. Speakers will explore how universities can address antisemitism while safeguarding academic freedom and open discourse.

This event will be in hybrid format, with virtual speakers.
Register via the Middlebury website at: go/AAUPIHRA/

Join the Anthropology Department for delicious café beverages, good conversation, and a chance to celebrate the anthro community at Middlebury. Bring your questions, ideas, and news to share. All students are welcome!

Tabi Joda is an internationally influential figure in the ecological, sustainable development, and resilient agriculture movement. He is the Ambassador of the Great Green Wall Initiative of the African Union, UN Consultant, and coordinator for One Billion Trees for Africa—a movement promoting tree planting to combat the Sahara Desert and building sustainable micro-agriculture systems across the Sahel. While his work is in the realm of ecology, his work rests first on the local human ecosystems that must be strong and healthy for sustainable local projects to succeed.

In this talk, Greenhalgh (Professor of Chinese Society Emerita at Harvard University) tells the story of how, during 1995-2015, industry leader Coca-Cola mobilized allies in academia to create a soda-defense science that would protect profits by advocating exercise, not dietary restraint, as the priority solution to obesity, a view few experts accept.