e-Newsletter | February/March 2010 (pdf)

In This Issue

• Welcome by Elizabeth Nanas
• On Mary’s Mind by Mary Butler
• Bankruptcy, Restructuring, and Change by Emily Altimare
• NAPA Bulletin Summaries: Fall 2009 and Spring 2010
• Anthropology News CFPs

Welcome to NAPA e-News

Living in Hong Kong for the year has been both challenging and exciting.  As many of you know, nothing truly prepares you for fieldwork and I must admit that I feel quite taken with the ups and downs, the joys and distress of my experience. But 2010 is The Year of the Tiger! All of the festivities have given me renewed energy and so many opportunities to learn about some similarities and differences between the ways we celebrate the New Year in Detroit’s “Mexicantown” and the ways Mainland and Hong Kong Chinese celebrate the Lunar New Year.  We all love any excuse to light off fireworks, spend time with family, and indulge in great food. Yet in Hong Kong, the formal celebrations last longer and I don’t know anyone who is spending time in front of the television watching football. Shops have been closed down and outdoor markets have opened to sell beautiful flowers and miniature orange trees.  I am so pleased that I brought home-grown Detroit-dollars to give away.

According to tradition, the powerful grace and brave-independent spirit of the Tiger protects the household from fire, thieves, and ghosts. At the same time, the Tiger often finds trouble in its tendency to take risks and live dangerously. The brave courage of the Tiger is bolstered by the perpetual search for excitement. The Tiger protects and charms, leads and performs, rebels and stands for justice. Contemplating the meaning of the Tiger has me thinking about our own traditions in the United States generally, and Detroit’s Mexicantown specifically. What is the meaning of our celebration? How do totemic identifications shape New Year rituals and traditions? How do we negotiate the work and labor in the context of celebration? What do our symbols, rituals, and practices communicate to us and to others?

I hope you’ll let me know if you have any thoughts or observations about celebratory rituals in the United States or elsewhere. I am particularly interested in the ways that celebration informs or adds-value to the practice of applied anthropology.

In the meantime, I hope you will enjoy this edition of NAPA’s e-News. We have several great volunteer opportunities for you so please contact us. This edition features a great article about fieldwork at General Motors by Emily Altimare as well as information on AnthroNews CFPs and the Fall 2009 & Spring 2010 NAPA Bulletins.

Gong Xi Fa Cai! Kung Hei Fat Choy!

May you make lots of money! Happy New Year!

Elizabeth Nanas @

enanas@wayne.edu

On Mary’s Mind

Well, it’s wintertime everywhere.  I’m not sure what your problems may be, but here in the mid-Atlantic it has been the snowiest winter in memory.  At the high point I had 40 inches of snow in my yard.  The pond was frozen, the geese abandoned me, it was a depressing gray and white world.  In the midst of it all, there was an insane robin who was in complete denial of the whole thing.  Not a bad idea actually.

We all had a wonderful time at the AAA meeting in Philadelphia in December.  There were many NAPA events, including the Annual Business Meeting and the regular meeting of the NAPA Governing Council.  Especially productive was the “Stay Connected” Special Event in which many of us came together to talk about what you need from your organization and what we can do for you.  Events like this help the NAPA leadership to understand where we are reaching our constituency and where we might look for new ways to help.  I met many of you at this event and I kept a list of all who expressed an interest in becoming involved in NAPA’s work.  Stay tuned.

We have numerous volunteer opportunities in NAPA right now.  NAPA has committees for Communications (the Website among other things), Ethics, Local Practitioner Organizations, Membership, Mentoring, Organizational Relations (the Employer Expo), Program, Publications and Workshops.  We especially need people to work on the Communications Committee and on Organizational Relations.  However, all committees are eager for new people.  The names of committee chairs and the charters describing what their committees do will soon be up on the website.  For more information now, you may email me, maryobutler@verizon.net, and I will put you in touch with the chairperson of the committee you are interested in.

NAPA Special Interest Groups (SIGs) try to build community among practicing anthropologists working in specific employment sectors.  There are currently three SIGs: the Design Anthropology Interest Group, the Evaluation Anthropology Interest Group, and the Occupational Therapy Interest Group.  The Design Anthropology Interest group is gearing up for new activities under the leadership of Chris Miller.  The Evaluation Anthropology Interest Group, led by Eve Pinsker, will be working on developing sessions in Evaluation Anthropology at the 2010 American Evaluation Association Meeting San Antonio, Texas as well as the AAA meetings in New Orleans.  The Occupational Therapy Interest Group ran a highly successful field school for anthropology and Occupational Therapy in Antigua Guatemala during summer 2009 and will do so again in summer 2010.  Gelya Frank is the head of the OT SIG.  I urge you to take advantage of these interest groups if they are in areas of interest to you.

NAPA is working hard to improve and deepen the content of the website.  I have appointed a Task Force led by Ken Anderson to review the website and make recommendations for improvements.  NAPA has hired Mike Scroggins to help the Communications Committee develop content—news and job announcements—for the webpage.  I know that there have been some glitches in the startup of the new website.  I thank you all for your comments and your patience.  We are working on it.

Finally, as much as we would all like to go to the tropics right now, we have cancelled the NAPA Spring Governing Council meeting that was to be held in conjunction with the SfAA meeting in Merida, Mexico.  We are replacing this meeting with quarterly conference calls to discuss NAPA business with elected members of the GC, with program chairs, and with anyone else who is interested.  These calls—like all NAPA meetings—are open to all of you.  I will post announcements of them on the web page.  If you would like to call in, email me and I will send you dial in information.  The next GC meeting is as yet unscheduled but will be held in May.

Sincerely,

Mary Odell Butler, NAPA President

maryobutler@verizon.net

Bankruptcy, Restructuring, and Change: Ethnographic Fieldwork in GM’s Lansing Delta Township Assembly Plant

Emily Altimare

Michigan State University

In the winter of 2009 the future of General Motors (GM) looked bleak.  Having worked as an intern at GM’s Research and Development Center in Warren, MI for three consecutive summers under the mentorship of Elizabeth Briody I was both personally and professionally interested in what GM’s potential bankruptcy would mean.  After obtaining my master’s degree in Applied Anthropology from Northern Arizona University I decided to pursue my Ph.D. at Michigan State University (MSU).  MSU appealed to me for two main reasons.  First, it offered me the privilege to work with Marietta Baba, who focuses on organizational culture and who herself has completed research on GM.  Second, if I was in Michigan, dissertation research on an element of GM seemed promising.

With insecurity about GM’s future looming, Elizabeth suggested that I propose a research project to Randy Thayer—the plant manager of Lansing Delta Township (LDT) at that time.  LDT is one of GM’s most modern and impressive facilities, for which, great care and preparation went into the construction of the physical plant as well as the culture. I petitioned that anthropological investigation of the restructuring efforts offered an opportunity to learn directly from those most affected by the changes.  Field work and the cultural analyses resulting from it are designed to describe and subsequently explain cultural phenomena as those phenomena evolve through time.  Participants in the culture under study would reveal their beliefs, expectations, values, and behaviors in patterned ways; the patterns could then be examined for consistency and longevity.

In winter 2009, when my project began, LDT had weathered a number of recent challenges, including manpower replacement, work rules, team-build issues, issues with its Global Manufacturing System (GMS), a two-tier wage system, and outsourcing.  LDT also experienced a strike in April 2008.  In addition, LDT faced turmoil from ongoing uncertainty  about GM’s future as well as sweeping changes to be enacted to help keep the corporation viable (e.g., regionalization of plant management, two-tier wage systems).  These and other factors created and underscored the state of flux of the plant culture.

After receiving Randy’s permission to conduct my project at LDT, IRB approval, and my committee’s go ahead to collect pre-dissertation data I was allowed to being my fieldwork.  Initially, one of the greatest challenges, something my methods class did not explicitly cover, was feeling comfortable in an environment that was so foreign.  Despite being a brief twenty minute drive from MSU’s campus, the manufacturing environment felt other worldly—I had been naïve to think I would be exempt from some of the trials of fieldwork that one would anticipate when doing work abroad.  Additionally, I lacked a job on the line, and I often felt my comparative inactivity was as overt as someone doing pushups in the middle of a library.

Luckily, these types of challenges were not deal breakers.  To date my fieldwork—which is still in process—has been multifaceted.  I have been given the opportunity for participant observation on the plant floor of LDT.  This has included time spent in the body shop, paint shop, and general assembly.  I have completed and continue to conduct formal and informal interviews with both hourly and salaried individuals, and I have participated in countless activities at LDT such as new employee training.  As previously predicted the plant has been in a state of flux.  In particular, the last calendar year has included the following events for the corporation: loans from the Unites States government, corporate leadership changes, plant closures, product line changes, union concessions, bankruptcy, and finally emergence from bankruptcy.  At LDT some of the major changes that have occurred in addition to the large corporate events have included: transitioning from one shift to two with plans for a third shift in March of 2010, a regionalized plant management shared between LDT and the Lansing Grand River Plant, changes in production schedules, and tremendous changes in the workforce—in particular the transfer of nearly 500 employees from the now closed Springhill, TN, plant to LDT.  In addition, there have been changes to LDT’s plant management and the loss of many salaried positions.  My ongoing ethnographic fieldwork aims to document, analyze, and offer insight on the impact of these changes on the plant culture, the nature of work in a modern manufacturing plant, and the experience of a previously unimaginable event, bankruptcy, on a community that in many ways has been born and raised by GM.

• To discuss applied anthropology in transforming manufacturing settings, please feel welcome to contact Emily at altimare@gmail.com.

• If you have a fieldwork story to tell, please contact Elizabeth Nanas at enanas@wayne.edu.

NAPA Bulletin, Volume 32; Fall 2009

The Global Food Crisis: New Insights into an Age-old Problem

David Himmelgreen, Volume Editor

Satish Kedia, General Editor

The food riots and demonstrations that occurred in more than 50 countries in 2008 signaled the oncoming global economic recession. Skyrocketing food and fuel prices spurred on violence in poorer countries where there is no social safety net and in places impacted by food insecurity and malnutrition. Today, while the prices for some food staples have retracted some, the deepening economic recession poses a threat in wealthier nations including the United States and members of the European Union. The World Food Program (WFP) has cited the increase in world food prices as the biggest challenge in its 45-year history, calling the impact a “silent tsunami” that threatens to plunge millions into hunger. In this volume, practicing and applied anthropologists examine the current global food crisis in a variety of settings including Belize, Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Ethiopia, Lesotho, Mozambique, Tanzania, and the United States. Further, they use a variety of theoretical orientations and methodological approaches to understand the chronic nature of food insecurity and the ways in which global food policies and economic restructuring have resulted in increasing food inequities across the globe. Throughout this volume, the authors make suggestions for combating the global food crisis through the application of anthropological principles and practices.

Upcoming NAPA Volume 33: Spring 2010

Intersections of Faith and Development in Local-Global Contexts

Keri Vacanti Brondo and Tara Hefferan, Volume Editors

Satish Kedia and David Himmelgreen, General Editors

Over the past three decades, neoliberal economic models have encouraged states to withdraw from the provision of social and development services. In response, non-governmental organizations have mushroomed to meet the needs and promote the interests of those living in poverty. While scholarship on NGOs has exploded in recent years, anthropological attention to organizations and initiatives grounded in and inspired by religious faith has been scant. Through a case study approach, papers in this NAPA Bulletin engage with a range of religious development initiatives in health and social service delivery in Latin America, Africa, and the United States. Authors consider four central questions in their work: 1) How do the actors involved in faith-based initiatives perceive these endeavors as spaces to negotiate and contest social and economic injustices?; 2) To what extent do the individuals involved in faith-based development see a linkage between the provision of social, medical, and economic support service and evangelism?; 3) How are faith-based models shaped by the specific cultural contexts in which they emerge and evolve?; and 4) What is the role of the anthropologist as practitioner within studies of faith-based development initiatives? In exploring such questions, the volume also hopes to spur additional ethnographic investigation into the complex worlds of faith-based organizations and an expanded awareness of the varied ways that anthropologists are connected with them.

Anthropology News CFPs on Anthropology Education and Disaster Relief

Topic: Anthropology Education (September 2010)
Proposal Deadline: March 25, 2010

Many have argued that we have reached a dramatic transitional moment in education with recent shifts in the global economic climate, developments in communication technologies, and fierce debate on education policy. What do these far-reaching changes mean for the future of anthropology education as it is conveyed and experienced in the classroom? We welcome proposals for In Focus commentaries, Teaching Strategies, Field Notes articles, photo essays, news stories and interviews that examine this topic from the perspectives of teachers, advisors, educational researchers, administrators and students.

Although this series focuses on the anthropology classroom itself, authors can examine the issue on a number of scales, from reflections on personal classroom experiences to critiques of broader educational trends and their impacts. Between these two sides of the spectrum, contributors might discuss the implications of specific recent initiatives, such as the Royal Anthropological Institute’s effort to promote pre-university anthropology education through a new Advanced Level General Certificate of Education, the creation of new anthropology programs (from IUPUI to the Smithsonian) emphasizing hands-on training and practice, or Michael Wesch’s use of YouTube in the classroom.

For complete CFP, see: http://aaanet.org/issues/anthronews/CFP-AnthroEducation.cfm

Topic: Disaster Relief and Recovery (October 2010)
Proposal Deadline: March 25, 2010

On January 12, 2010, a catastrophic earthquake hit Port-au-Prince, Haiti, killing over 200,000 people and leaving an estimated 1,000,000 homeless. AAA immediately began receiving inquiries from members seeking information on the status of colleagues in Haiti and how they might contribute to recovery efforts through providing expertise or funds to organizations such as Paul Farmer’s Partners in Health. This outpouring of concern and interest in providing assistance was far from unanticipated, given our members’ frequent engagement with human rights, public health and social justice issues, as well as the involvement of both practicing and academic anthropologists in short- and long-term disaster relief and recover efforts throughout the world.

For the October issue of Anthropology News, we seek proposals for In Focus commentaries, Teaching Strategies, Field Notes articles, photo essays, news stories and interviews on the topic of post-disaster relief and recovery, in Haiti and elsewhere across the globe. Have you been involved in such an initiative through research, advocacy, service provision or program assessment? Do you see opportunities where anthropologists might contribute more or differently to relief efforts, or where contributions are problematic? What types of expertise might anthropologists provide in responding to emergency situations and helping to sustain longer-term development efforts that might mitigate the impact of future disasters or improve quality of life and infrastructure on broader levels? How can work at former disaster sites and longer-term research with previously impacted populations inform present-day situations? We welcome article proposals addressing these themes and more.
Guidelines
To participate, email a 300-word abstract and 50-100-word biosketch to Anthropology News editor Dinah Winnick. Proposals for photo essays should also include five high resolution photographs (tiff or jpg), each with a caption and credit. Selected authors will be notified of their status in early April, and full articles —commentaries of 1000-1400 words or shorter pieces of other article types —will be due early May.
Proposal submission deadline: March 25, 2010
Early submissions are encouraged

NAPA’s e-Newsletter is edited by

Elizabeth Nanas. Ideas & submissions may be addressed to her at:

E-Mail: enanas@wayne.edu

Skype Phone: 313-915-4933

Skype Chat: enanas72

As announced at the Section Assembly meeting in Philadelphia, in an effort to facilitate the participation of and increase members’ access to international and community-based scholars at the AAA annual meetings, registration waivers will be made available to all 38 section members of the Section Assembly. The SAEC requests applications from sections to redeem these registration waivers for qualifying scholars they hope to bring to the 2010 AAA meeting, on 17-21 November, in New Orleans. Qualifying scholars need not be current AAA members and cannot hold employment in university-based anthropology departments nor work as practicing anthropologists in any of the discipline’s four main subfields (archaeology, sociocultural, biological, linguistic). Registration and membership fees will be waived for the qualifying scholar nominated by sections to receive this waiver. Sections and individual qualifying scholars are responsible for all other conference-associated costs.

Each section is qualified to receive one waiver on a “use it or loose it” basis. Unused or unallocated waivers will go back into a pool and a lottery held to redistribute them. If you wish or anticipate the need for a second waiver, please let us know when you submit your original request by including information for a second qualifying scholar and rank each scholar accordingly.

Procedure:

Sections should email SA Convenor Mary Gray <mLg@indiana.edu> with a description of the proposed 2010 section-organized session, name of the qualifying scholar nominated to receive the section’s waiver, and a short description of the nature of the scholar’s proposed meeting participation as well as her or his credentials and qualifications (i.e., non-anthropologist, community-based scholar, international scholar, etc).

Deadline: 1 March 2010 (extended to March 12)

Waivers are not transferable. Sections are encouraged to pool resources through co-sponsorships.

This time it’s Joana writing on her own as for the past two years my life has been largely taken over by an enterprise in which Pál only plays a minor part. As much as I like popularizing anthropology I have discovered that I am even more enthusiastic about social entrepreneurship. Recently I read on this blog that anthropology was „leaning its trendy shoulder onto social media and new economy corporations“. Well, that is me and betterplace.org.

Starting betterplace.org

Three years ago when my family and I went on a trip around the world, we came across a number of local social initiatives, we really liked. There was one in particular – the Choki Traditional Arts School in Bhutan – which seemed to us to embody an alternative to the all too many ill-conceived or failed development projects the anthropological literature as well as other aid critics have documented.

The internet had already turned so many industries around by making the „the long tail“ of music or news visible, that it seemed timely to create a plattform for the long tail of help which matches local project managers with supporters/donors worldwide (many of the latter having serious doubts about the effectiveness and efficiency of large NGOs such as the German Red Cross.

Back in Berlin we linked up with another team, who had just began to conceive of a very similar plattform, whose head, Till Behnke became CEO of betterplace as well as an Ashoka fellow in 2008. Part of our team was also one of the founders and long-time CEO of eBay Germany, who brought highly valuable knowhow about online marketplaces to the table.

Crowdsourcing trust

As a plattform open to projects from all over the world (so far over 2.200 projects use betterplace, a figure which is growing by between 30-60 per week) one of the challenges was how to create trust mechanisms for the many grassroot projects. German donors knew UNICEF, which is not only a highly developed brand, but also registered as charitable by the German tax authorities. The Choki Traditional Arts School had no such references. But it had a number of individuals who knew and valued its work. In order to formalise bottom-up, crowdsourced trust mechanisms, we developed the „web of trust“: Every project on the plattform can be commented on and evaluated by its stakeholders; visitors can describe what they have seen on the ground, advocates can state why they believe in the project, beneficiaries can say whether the intenvention has had a positive impact on their lives (or not!). Donors looking for a project to support can thus get a much more differentiated impression of projects and make a more informed choice.

Shifting power-balances by giving beneficiaries a voice

I am very excited about the potential this bears: one of the reasons why so many social and development programmes fail has to do with the malfunctioning accountibility practices (especially towards beneficiaries) and we seriously hope that this can slowly be corrected by giving people a voice who have so far been mute.

Despite the obvious technological hurdles, we already see beneficiaries posting their own projects on the plattform. Let me give you one example: The small German NGO Twende Pamoja has been operating in Sansibar for many years, devising projects with their local counterparts. Last summer they organised a betterplace-workshop for their local partner organisation and shortly afterwards the Zanzibaris posted 2 projects themselves.

Increasing transparency by enabling easy feedback

Online donors can get in touch with project managers directly and collaborate with them, thus becoming co-creators and they get something back for their donations: direct feedback. In his blogpost about Social entrepreneurs Adam was asking how social entrepreneurs measure „para-economic value“. This is something we constantly ask ourselves: „what constitues success and how do we measure it?“ One answer we come back to is: „project needs fullfilled“ and „feedback received“, i.e. project managers are happy when they get money with which they can realise their projects and donors are satisfied if they get a story back, in writing, photos or videos. And we can proove that projects which give good feedback receive significantly more donations. (You may also want to take a look at Ashokas document on impact measurement in social entrepreneurship).

Enlarging the pie

It is important to us to reach groups who haven’t been socially active before. For example, the largest German online gaming website – Pennergame – invited its players to contribute to homeless-projects on betterplace, raising more than 27.000€ over the course of a few weekends. We also started a cooperation with Payback, a German loyalty card company with 20 million cardholders, who can now, instead of aquiring yet another frying pan or heating blanket, donate their points to a wide variety of small and large NGOs. Since we started the cooperation in mid December 2009 over 750.000€ were donated to social projects. Nearly all of this being „new money“.

Social Business

Our team currently consists of 30 people, from programmers to accountants and campaign managers and although many people volunteer for us, our young full-time employees need to be paid. The start-up capital was provided by us funders and we have since been able to attract a number of other high-powered individuals to support our work. Yet we need to be self-sustainable in the medium run and although we transfer 100% of all donations directly to project managers, we do charge commercial companies for their use of betterplace. Thus corporations such as Daimler pay us for our CSR-services, such as disaster relief actions. So far we are able to generate 1/3 of our income in this way.

Does any of this have to do with anthropology?

Writing Seeing Culture Everywhere was already a step away from deconstruction, as Pál and I really tried to think up very hands-on tools and rules which could help people critically interrogate the claims about culture they encountered in their workplaces and everyday lives.

At betterplace it’s all about application. But much of what I do is informed by what I learned as an anthropologist, from trying to give voice to a wide range of stakeholders to trying to inform donors about the many unintended consequences their donations may have. In contrast to my work as a writer, I love the way we can experiment with certain features, measuring their effects on project activity and donation volume, thus constantly testing our assumptions about how different people and groups act.

Call to action

I want to end this rather long post – sorry –  with asking you for support and advice:

Although betterplace.org mainly targets the German donation market, we have projects and visitors from all over the world . Among the ways we’d love to get anthropologists envolved, let me name just 3:

1. Tell us about organisations and projects you are excited about. We’ll contact them and invite them onto betterplace.
2. Visit projects already on the plattform while travelling and write down your impressions on the projects betterplace-page. This helps grow the Web of Trust.
3. Check out projects in categories you have some expertise in (health, education, good governance) and critically interrogate project managers on their theory of change etc.

Sourced from: Savage Minds

Andrew Flachs
1st Place Winner
Paper Title “The Capabilities Approach: Navigating Cultural Politics in Human Rights Discourse”
Oberlin College
aflachs@gmail.com
Prize $300

Amy Cooper
1st Runner up
Paper Title “The Preservation of Self in Everyday Life: Temporality and Personhood among Homeless Women in Chicago”
Department of Comparative Human Development
University of Chicago
coopera@uchicago.edu
Prize $100

Kathryn Bouskill
2nd Runner Up
Paper Title: “Practicing Neuroanthropology: Humor as a Coping Mechanism for Breast Cancer”
Emory University
kbouski@emory.edu
Prize $50

Kalfani N. Ture’
NAPA Student Representative

As a Senior Researcher you will employ qualitative and quantitative methods to support product development from discovery through concept preferences and usability testing. Quantitative skills are a must.

RESPONSIBILITIES, include the ability to juggle the following:
· Business development support
· Project delivery and oversight
· Practice Innovation
· Multidisciplinary collaboration
· Contributing to the overall HLB culture

REQUIREMENTS include:
· Educational background in design or anthropology

· Strong skills in programs including PTT, Word, and Excel, Illustrator, Photoshop and InDesign

· Excellent presenting, writing and visualization skills

Our client projects are extraordinarily diverse, ranging from medical, consumer and industrial sectors, both domestic and international. Successful candidates will have client-facing experience and a willingness to roll-up their sleeves.

If you are you are willing to get your hands dirty and jump in when needed, but can also provide structure to and facilitate teams and clients, you will be happy in our team environment.

Please send your resume, a visual sample of recent work (within the past year) and/or portfolio, and references to careers@hlb.com . No calls please.

HLB is a product design firm specializing in the design and development of industrial, medical and consumer products. We use design to create products that have meaning worldwide.

I was reminded of the importance of foreign language learning twice in the last week or so.  This morning I read a commentary in the New York Times about how poorly Americans do at foreign languages.  Several of the authors remind us that Americans have long done poorly at foreign language learning, and that demands for foreign language learning are declining in the United States, despite attempts by the Chinese government (and others) to get Americans into language classes.

I am also on a Facebook group emphasizing the importance of German language learning in the United States.  Last week, someone from the “Standup for German Language” Facebook Group sent me a message reminding me to re-emphasize the importance of that language.  Consider this post part of this re-emphasis!

The problem with language learning in the United States is that pragmatic Americans believe that science and math are the fields that have the greatest demand for jobs in the immediate future, and therefore schools are justified in beefing up math and science requirements, and canceling foreign language programs.  This may be true in the short-run.  But foreign language learning is not divorced completely from the development of cognitive abilities in other fields as well.

The best piece of evidence of this is that the countries which do best in various kinds of cross-national testing in math and science skills, like Finland, and South Korea, also have stiff requirements for foreign language learning.  Both require English in primary school, and push their children in to third and fourth languages as well, even as they cram on science and math.  While correlation does not always imply causation, it contributes to my belief that language learning as a cognitive process contributes to our abilities in other fields as well.

If nothing else, language learning also contributes to our sense of humility, too, which is always a good thing!

Sourced from: Ethnography.com

I have a friend at a location (# employees 1500) in Shanghai, China that is connected to a global organization. She is looking for an anthropologist or an organization of anthropologists who might be able to go to her site and train some of her research and development people in basic anthropological methods. I do not have experience in China and suggested that she may be served better by a person/org with some expertise in this area. Do you know of any anthropologists or organizations of anthropologists who might be a good fit?  If so, please forward contact information.

Sincerely,
Elizabeth Nanas
enanas@wayne.edu

In 2007-08, the Practicing Anthropology Working Group (PAWG), with Shirley Fiske serving as an editor, began the “Profiles in Practice” column in Anthropology News. The purpose was to increase awareness of work being done by anthropologists outside of academia.  Eleven columns were published.  Subsequently, a permanent column was established titled “Anthropology Works.”  In 2008,  PAWG was  replaced by a permanent standing committee of the AAA, the Committee of Practicing, Applied and Public Interest Anthropology (CoPAPIA) .

The Profiles in Practice columns focused on the following questions: (b) What was your career path to getting to where you are?  (b) Why are anthropologists or anthropology critical or important?  (c) What are the challenges in your work and what are the challenges that a national association, such as AAA, can address?  (d) Are there ethical, gender, structural, or political dimensions to those challenges?

CoPAPIA is building upon past Profiles in Practice columns with an online interview series geared towards students interested in anthropology but uncertain about the career paths that await them following graduation.  Practicing anthropologists are interviewed about how they obtained their jobs, the usefulness of their anthropological training, important skills to have, etc.  The series is hosted by Ruth Sando, owner of Sando and Associates, who is a practicing anthropologist and former board member of the Washington Association of Professional Anthropologists.

The podcast series features interviews with:

• [Listen] Kevin Bialy, an international program officer at the National Institutes of Health
• [Listen] Megan Hawkins, a cultural resource specialist with the Research Corporation of the University of Hawaii, where she is working with the US Army
• [Listen] Lee Cerveny, a research social scientist at the US Forest Service
• [Listen] Cheryl Levine, a social science analyst at the Department of Housing and Urban Development.

If you have trouble listening to the podcasts, please try downloading Quicktime.

If you are interested in participating in this podcast series, please contact Brian Estes at bestes@aaanet.org.

Everyone loves end of year reviews, even if they’re a couple days late. And we’re no exception. Here are some of the most popular posts, notable moments, and contributors’ favorites from the past twelve months.

SM picked up on the world of anthropology- from Dustin’s great post on Human Terrain in Oaxaca, Ethnic Studies Under Attack, Tom’s breakdown of the UK anthropology rankings, the burgeoning Open Anthropology Collective and even the youtube hit The Anthropology Song.

Rex gave advice to graduate students, offering them insight into what professors look for in applications, which he updated in December, told grant-seekers to read Michele Lamont’s How Professors Think, and suggested resources for preparing for fieldwork.

We stocked up on our popcorn, either to watch vividly or to throw it at the screen. Of course, the colonial, anticolonial, racist, liberatory, best thing since sliced bread, worst film ever Avatar got both Rex and Kerim going, but let us not forget that there have been other notable movies in the history of cinema. Rex reviewed the Librarian series…twice! Plus, where to find free documentary films online, Tristes Tropiques, and films for teaching anthropology.

Of course, online technologies constitute our media of choice, and SM had plenty to say about that. From Finding Anthropology on Twitter, to Virtual Worlds as Area Studies, to the profitability of social networking sites and a rereading of Imagined Communities in the digital and multinational age. Plus, Chris gave a rowsing, ‘the internet is dead, long live the internet’ cheer in recounting how his book has faired in the online creative commons.

This year, SM is it unethical to say something about someone that they cannot understand? And could the Henry Louis Gates affair be considered an American rorschach test on race? And there were plenty of opinions. Chris took a dressed-up call for the dismantling of the university to task, while Rex crowned the worst postmodern titlemaker. And Kerim compared Mendeley and other bibliographical tools.

We were lucky to have a number of great guest bloggers this year. Adam Fish wrote on celebrity journalists in North Korea, communes and online communities. Parvis Mahdavi contributed on her work on the sexual revolution in Iran. Anne Allison wrote about precarious socialities of Japanese youth. Ken MacLeish posted on the wounds of war and the dilemmas of stereotype. And Olumide Abimbola wrote pieces on consuming second hand clothing and anthropology in Nigeria.

Finally, we remembered the lives and contributions of Dell Hymes, Epeli Hau’ofa, and of course the one to whom we will always be in debt for our name, Claude Lévi-Strauss.

Sourced from: Savage Minds

Responsibilities: • Arrange and present WES seminars and information sessions for immigrants and training

sessions for staff/volunteers of immigrant service organizations. • Develop/adapt seminar curriculum in response to community needs, specific partners and

settings, and conduct regular program evaluations. • Establish and implement communications strategy including programmatic and policy updates

for community partners and broader immigrant-services community. • Monitor and respond to requests from community organizations serving immigrants; liaise with

external organizations and associations; monitor and respond to requests from immigrant

clients; direct questions and concerns to appropriate WES staff. • Represent WES at community events held for immigrants and immigrant services agencies and

at meetings with partner organizations. • Coordinate involvement of other WES staff and outreach volunteers.

Minimum Qualifications: • Substantial experience working with a broad range of community organizations, academic

institutions, licensing boards, government agencies, etc. that serve immigrants • Familiarity with concerns and issues of diverse immigrant communities, esp. those affecting

educated/highly qualified immigrants. • Excellent communications skills, including strong public speaking. • Excellent research, relationship building and networking skills. • Strong intercultural communications skills; ability to speak at least one foreign language

strongly desired • Bachelors degree (or U.S. equivalent, if foreign-educated) • Solid computer skills including Excel, PowerPoint, Word and Outlook.

Application Procedure: Submit resume and cover letter to: Ronnie Schaffer, Human Resources Manager at rschaffe@wes.org

Application Deadline: January 30, 2010