Abstracts (alphabetical by presenter)

Gabe Agree, Hampshire College

Filling the Void? Citizenship, Sovereignty, and the Implications of Non-Governmental Organizations in Northern Senegal

This paper, based on ethnographic research conducted in the town of Guede Chantier in northern Senegal, examines the implications of reliance on a broad spectrum on non-state service providers, particularly NGOs, to governance and citizenship within that community. Drawing on the work of James C. Scott (1976, 1998), I trace the permeation of Guede Chantier by state development agencies in the years between 1970 and 1990. The retraction of those state services under structural adjustment left Guede dependent on NGO service providers. By severing the material inclusion of Guede Chantier in the Senegalese state has dramatically altered political identities throughout the region.

Jessica Aither, University of Massachusetts Amherst

Patterns of Prehistoric Land Use in the Adirondack Mountains, NY

The Adirondack Mountain region has long been thought to lack archaeological evidence for Native American land use prior to European contact, due to assumptions about difficulty of navigation or even spiritual beliefs. It was not until the 1980’s that a large number of sites began to be recorded, although research into this area has continued to languish. Through collaboration with both the State Historic Preservation Office and the New York State Museum, this research reevaluated the patterning of known but unpublished Native American sites in the Adirondacks using Geographic Information Systems and archaeological site files.

Stephanie Amon, University of Massachusetts Amherst

In A State of Emergence: Time and Emotion in the Making of an Anthropologist

Knowledge production within anthropology has been vehemently critiqued for the male privilege at work in its content, voice, and canonization. Feminist self-reflexivity has challenged its parameters of legitimacy and has interrogated the masculine coding of “theoretical” work. The exclusion of emotion and experience as forms of knowledge informing theory is rarely noted in undergraduate work; this paper adds to this conversation an analysis of coming of age. Arguing that ideologies of time coercively structure the trajectory of maturation, I examine my frantic denial of vulnerability in the early stages my thesis and my first disciplinary pains as an emergent scholar.

Stephanie Amon, University of Massachusetts Amherst

The Selves of Vampires: Narrativizing Hipsterism”

The ubiquitous trope of the “hipster,” as an aloof, esoteric, and visually distinct caricature of American youth, is widely ridiculed for the ironies of its supposed critique. Seen as a disinterested and counterculture good-for-nothing, the “hipster” is scathingly depicted as unable to understand himself. Taking postmodern theory and the anthropology of selfhood as starting points, this paper complexifies this mocked subjectivity through an analysis of a “hipster” self-narrative. Exploring the poetics of self-revelation in the anthropological context, this work seeks to critique and combat this demeaning stereotype, arguing instead that “hipsters” expose a rupture of coherence in ideologies of time.

Steven Angell, Hampshire College

“Our Name is Solidarity itself”: The ‘Birth’ of the ‘New’ Education Movement and the Rise of Post-Racial Campus Activism

Recent scholarship on the California student movement situates the movement within the historical context of the state budget crisis, highlighting a longstanding political economy of disinvestment in higher education in the state (Newfield and Lye Chen 20011). Yet, little attention has been devoted to the contemporary national political context in which the movement emerged- namely the supposed post-racial politics that elected President Barack Obama in 2008. Central to the claim that the United States has become post-racial is what the Center for American Progress called the “The Political ideology of the Millennial Generation”, characterized by a “progressive ascendancy among young people”. In this paper I suggest that the unstable specters of “hope” and “change” in the Obama Era, shaped the politics of post-racial liberalism in the early stages of the Defend Education Movement at the University of California Berkeley- a moment when the “progressive ascendancy of young people” was on full display.

Maya Wiener Berkowitz, Hampshire College

Waterscapes: The Intersection of the Personal and Political in Northern New Mexico

Water in the Southwestern U.S. holds a particular significance both politically and culturally. Through participant observation and ethnographic interviews I track the political and personal impacts on lives of local women and their health in relation to water in northern New Mexico. This project focuses on two water sources, the Rio Grande River and the regional acequia irrigation system. These waterways are crucial to the local community’s subsistence, and hold specific political value. The contamination of these water sources has significant environmental and cultural implications. This is currently part of a larger project examining environmental impacts on women’s reproductive health.

Shayla Brown, Mount Holyoke College

Lives Lost: Understanding Pregnancy Loss Through the Cultural Lenses of Reproductive Technology and Consumerism

Pregnancy loss is a taboo subject within many societies. The death of an unborn “child” often goes unspoken. Within contemporary American culture, however, the fetus is being transformed from a private being to an exposed, public being. If these images of the fetus are so widely accepted by popular media, why is pregnancy loss so stigmatized in this very same cultural sphere? Along with the materializing of the public fetus, medical technological advances have made headway into reproductive and pregnancy discourses. American culture also highlights the importance of consumerism. This paper is meant to discuss how the American culture of maternal consumerism and obstetrical technologies influence the early ascription of unborn personhood and how drastically the negative effects on a pregnant individual can become should the unborn subject be lost.

Isabel Buckner, Hampshire College

Living The Moral Economy: reflections on a Catholic Worker inspired organization

Through a case study of a Catholic-Worker-inspired nonprofit organization, this paper interrogates the potential for positive social change and the logistical constraints involved in enacting alternative economic practices. The focus of the paper is on a community of full-time volunteers who live together above a soup kitchen, which they run collectively. Through interviews with the community members and various staff members, as well as the author’s experience working in the organization, the paper presents a constructive critique, as various actors assess the degree to which the organization fulfills its mission, and offer insights as to causes of its limitations.

Jamie Cohen, Amherst College
Moving Beyond Doctors: Nurse-based treatment models for HIV/AIDS patients in South Africa

South Africa, the country with the largest number of HIV-infected individuals, has achieved sub-par access to antiretroviral therapy (ART), despite efforts to reach universal coverage. Grounded in a historical analysis of South Africa’s health care system, this thesis uses a comparative framework to assess the efficacy of a nurse-based HIV treatment model. Case studies from Brazil, Rwanda and Lusikisiki and analysis of health care provider perspectives on a nurse-based HIV treatment model pilot contribute lessons for optimal health care delivery in resource-poor settings. Ultimately, I find that nurse-based ART is necessary but not sufficient for achieving universal coverage.

Rebecca Engell, Mount Holyoke College

“I’m Positive. So What?” HIV Illness Narratives from Zimbabwe and the United States

Storytelling is potentially an important resource for HIV-positive individuals as they grapple with the changes HIV brings to their lives and seek ways to make meaning of their experiences. Using fieldwork and open-ended interviews from America and Zimbabwe, I illustrate the multidimensionality of illness narratives and their value in helping to understand the experience of living with HIV. Experiences with and conceptualizations of stigma and discrimination, community and religion emerge as main themes throughout my participants’ narratives. I also problematize the notion that storytelling is inherently therapeutic and the implications this has for those associated with the epidemic.

Ariel Gregory, Smith College

Fez: Heritage and Identity in the Spaces and Places of Fās, Morocco

Fās, Morocco, is considered by locals and foreigners alike to be the cultural and spiritual “heart” of Morocco. This thesis examines how the discourse between religious and secular political power has impacted the construction and renovation of the built environment of Fās over time, and in turn shaped current notions of heritage and identity. Ethnographic interviews, participant observation, and archival research reveal that Fās’ historical diversity is necessary to create the tight neighborhoods and sacred community which formed much of the city’s Pre-Protectorate identity.

Rebecca Hollander, Amherst College
In Search of Art and Identity: A Social-History of New York City’s Jewish Museum

I will look into the way in which the Jewish Museum in New York City constructs a particular vision of Jewish identity in twenty-first century America by way of the art it displays. In particular, I will look at the question “what is Jewish art?” as a means of establishing the Museum’s vision of what it means to be Jewish. I will also discuss some of the limitations of the particular brand of Jewish identity the Museum constructs.

Ester A. Johansson-Lebrón, Amherst College

Old Terrain, New Ground: Emerging Subjectivities and Political Identity within the Tea Party Movement

In this paper I examine the forms of subjectivity and political identity emerging from within the conservative, grassroots social movement commonly described as the “Tea Party.” Based on ethnographic research with Tea Party activists living and working in western Massachusetts, I ask the following questions: what can be said about the relationship between political activists and their movements? How do political ideals and discourses affect individual experience? And what does it even mean to say that people are political subjects, or that their identities are shaped by political discourse?

Lilia Kilburn, Amherst College

Of Mimicry and Methodology: Contextualizing Homi Bhabha Through Anthropological Practice

The post-colonial thinker Homi Bhabha is known as much for his abstruseness as for his insights. I consider one of Bhabha’s signature concepts, mimicry, in the context of a particular postcolonial setting: the India of Ayurvedic practitioners. I argue that Bhabha’s theory of mimicry is instructive, but that its universality threatens to trivialize the particularities of colonial and post-colonial experience. In claiming that mimicry hides a void, Bhabha would necessitate mauvaise foi in the writing of ethnography—the ascription of incomplete narratives to those who assert wholeness. Rather than rejecting such theory altogether, I find that ethnographic practice can engage in dialogue with it, bringing mimicry down to earth and thus, to life.

Amanda Kohr, University of Massachusetts Amherst

Born in the USA: The experience of childbirth in contemporary America

This research explores contemporary traditional birth methods and common medical interventions in the United States. In the past decades, the medicalization of birth has saturated American culture, but evidence supporting the necessity and safety of these practices remains inconclusive. Other research shows that maternal attitude during childbirth significantly impacts the course of labor and delivery. By evaluating birth methods through a literature review and interviews with new mothers, this research provides a deeper understanding of the factors contributing to the experience of giving birth in America.

Sophie Lembeck, Hampshire College

Turnaround: An Autobioethnography of Adult Learners’ Dropout and Return to Education

I designed and facilitated a one-trimester creative writing and arts workshop at the Holyoke Community College Adult Learning Center. The students with whom I worked were adult learners between ages nineteen and fifty-five. I asked students to complete a number of assignments that explored their personal educational histories through art and writing. Through analyzing their work, I discovered that the five most common reasons students left school included transiency, family, pregnancy, violence, and/or not-learning. I examined these issues in depth, as well as offered solutions as to what can be done to lower the incidence of dropout in Holyoke.

Chloë Hall Lubell and Miriam Beth Shafer, Hampshire College
Healthy Women, Healthy Babies: A Young Woman’s Guide to Pregnancy Outcome Options

Over the course of the last two years, doulas Miriam Shafer and Chloë Lubell have collaborated to create a pregnancy outcome options resource targeted at young women. After noticing an absence of literature designed for young women trying to make decisions about abortion, adoption, and parenting in particular, Shafer and Lubell explored ideas of full spectrum pregnancy care and the rights of teenagers to remain in school while pregnant and parenting. This two hundred page book includes detailed guidance through pregnancy and early parenting, and illustrations and photo tutorials made by young parents from the Care Center in Holyoke, Massachusetts.

Schuyler Marquez, Mount Holyoke College

Negotiations of Iman: Religious Practice, Self and Identity among American Muslim College Students

The Muslim identity in Western media and politics is often represented in opposition to the secular and rational West. Utilizing ethnographic work and interviews among local American Muslim college students and Dorinne Kondo’s assertion that the self is an ongoing process in dialogue with cultural arenas, I argue that Muslims are far from isolated in their construction of identity. Muslim religious practice and identity is formed in contestation to dominant representations and through complex navigations within and outside Muslim communities, individual engagements with technology and religious knowledge and creative expressions meant to assert a more authentic American Muslim identity.

Caitlin Alvarado Saggese, Amherst College

Madres de Plaza de Mayo and Feminism in Argentina

Argentina’s Madres of the Plaza de Mayo created an identity movement called “motherism” to protest the dictatorship’s brutal kidnapping and murder of their children during the Dirty War. Through their public resistance they brought women out of the private sphere and into the public sphere, opening the door for post-dictatorship feminism. But they reject the feminist label. My thesis proves that the Madres are in fact feminists, demonstrates that the Madres’ human rights goals can be collapsed into the feminist framework, proposes a cultural explanation for their rejection of feminism, and suggests ways for feminists to “normalize” feminism in Argentina.

Susana Sánchez, Hampshire College

Costa Rican Immigrant Women in Trenton, NJ: Negotiating Legal Status, Access to Health Care, Family Settlement, and Social Mobility

This thesis is based on my ethnographic interviews with undocumented immigrant women from Costa Rica living in Trenton New, Jersey. It explores how these undocumented Ticas lose their “white” privilege and negotiate access to health care in the U.S. using the social capital they acquired in Costa Rica. This “know-how” helps these women to resist transnational motherhood, concretize settlement, and avoid the proletarization of their families in the U.S. However, their legal status precludes these women from accessing public benefits and prevents their children from attending college, which constrains these immigrants’ social mobility.

Rosalie Schurman, Mount Holyoke College

Holding the Space: Certified Nurse Midwives' Discourses of Empowerment and Informed Choice in Natural Childbirth Practice.

This project explores the ways that contemporary Certified Nurse Midwives (CNMs) think about and practice birth. Through ethnographic interviews, I have found that a new birth paradigm has arisen in recent decades that focuses less upon the “natural” aspects of birth and instead emphasizes informed choice. I present the argument that the recent professionalization of midwifery has resulted in an increasing integration of CNMs’ natural birth practices with modern obstetric techniques. Because of this integration, CNMs have changed their views on their role in birth, shifting away from “protector of the natural” to the “guardian” of women’s rights to make informed choices.

Miriam Beth Shafer and Chloë Hall Lubell, Hampshire College
Healthy Women, Healthy Babies: A Young Woman’s Guide to Pregnancy Outcome Options

Over the course of the last two years, doulas Miriam Shafer and Chloë Lubell have collaborated to create a pregnancy outcome options resource targeted at young women. After noticing an absence of literature designed for young women trying to make decisions about abortion, adoption, and parenting in particular, Shafer and Lubell explored ideas of full spectrum pregnancy care and the rights of teenagers to remain in school while pregnant and parenting. This two hundred page book includes detailed guidance through pregnancy and early parenting, and illustrations and photo tutorials made by young parents from the Care Center in Holyoke, Massachusetts.

Emily Shinay, Amherst College
Understanding Telangana: Politics, Culture, and Identity in the Telangana Separatist Movement

Telangana, the northwestern region of the south Indian state of Andhra Pradesh, has agitated for separate statehood since the mid-1950s in the hopes of ending the political, economic, and cultural inequalities that the region faces in united Andhra Pradesh. My experiences living and studying in Telangana from December 2010 through May 2011, during which time the separatist movement reached its contemporary peak, inspired the subject of my senior thesis, a historical, ethnographic, and critical effort to understand this movement and the “Telangana identity” at its heart. In this presentation I will share some of the field interviews that were integral to my work.

Lauren Wooten Smith, Mount Holyoke College

Embodiment through Conceptualizing the Individual: Savannah River Mercury Fish Advisories

Following research which discovered mercury contamination leading to a $3-million cleanup, this research complements natural-science investigation of hair mercury levels with social-science study of how anglers interpret mercury fish-advisories. It helps elucidate some of the complex interactions that place certain populations at greatest risk to adverse health effects from mercury exposure. Utilizing a political-economy framework, I examine how, through the principal of embodiment, nutritional practices are largely viewed by governmental agencies as behavioral choices that are to be managed through individual decision-making. Building on ethnographic research, this paper reassesses the conceptualization of "the individual" within the dominant health sphere.

Rebecca Thomas, Hampshire College

Community-Supported Agriculture and Social Justice

Community-supported agriculture (CSA) may offer a variety of benefits, from providing fresh, nutritious food to increasing transparency in the food system and building community. But are these benefits accessible to all? While CSA members tend to be privileged in terms of income, education, and race, many CSAs are making efforts to increase the accessibility of their food and the diversity of their membership. Informed by my primary ethnographic research at a CSA farm in Vermont as well as secondary research, I will explore both the promise and the shortcomings of CSAs in terms of social justice.

Jennifer E. Walsh, Mount Holyoke College
The Discourse of Reform: Shifting Cultural Perceptions towards Demographic Changes in Higher Education

Educational reform at the k-12 level in the United States has placed interest on getting students from high school to college. With legal protection in the public classroom new generations of students have opportunities to access post-secondary education. One of these targeted populations is that of students with diagnosed learning disabilities. Although a small population, students with learning disabilities are now more likely to attend college today. This research addresses the shifting perception of having this population of students as an integrated part into the fabric of higher education. I will question cultural understandings of ability, disability and the right to education.

Melissa Yang, Mount Holyoke College

Intersections Between Anthropology and Poetry

The idea that poetry serves an ethnographically legitimate and productive purpose in the field of anthropology has been defended by a small contingency of scholars since the 1980s reflexive turn, though the most famous anthropologist-poets are perhaps Franz Boas and his students, from the 1920s. By delving into moments in the history of American anthropology, I will explore the implications and possibilities in the intersections and collaborations between the two fields, and consider the place of poetry in anthropology today.

Jill Zuckerman, University of Massachusetts, Amherst

Faunal Analysis at the Sanderson Tannery Site

I chose to complete an independent study in the analysis of the faunal remains found at the Sanderson Tannery site in Petersham, Massachusetts. I decided to focus on several aspects of the remains including species, type of bone found, segment of bone, age, and the presence of cut marks. My analysis included learning how to look , feel, and even listen to the different aspects of a bone to determine type and species. I was ultimately able to identify over 300 bones, bone fragments, and teeth belonging to the domestic cow, horse, and other unidentified mammals.

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