racticing Anthropology Practicing Anthropology in a time of crisis: 2009 Year n Review Keri Vacanti Rondo ABSTRACT The breadth and reach of practicing anthropologists in 2009 suggests that anthropology has entered a new phase of advanced engagement at local, national, and international levels. In this article, I review thematic areas in which practicing anthropologists made significant contributions in 2009, including fiscal crisis and business anthropology: U.S. race relations, civil rights, and policy reforms; human rights, environmental change, and displace. ment; global health and human rights; and war and peace. New areas of expansion are also discussed in the arenas of public archaeology, museums and heritage, and engaged scholarship Innovations in anthropological research and communicating ethnographic findings with the broader public are reviewed Keywords: practicing anthropology public anthropology, 2009 trends, anthropological impacts PRACTICING ANTHROPOLOGY IN A TIME poration or community); and commitment to social justice OF CRISIS: 2009 YEAR IN REVIEW Rather than take up this debate, my approach is to apply the In 2008, anthropologists undoubtedly distinguished them- broadest possible definition of public anthropology and re selves as relevant to public debates on disaster recovery, main inclusive of the variety of ways in which anthropologists warfare, climate change, and health inequalities(see Checker gage in pl blic dial 2009a). With the dawning of 2009, anthropologists contin- Topical areas to which anthropologists made substantial ued to speak to the fiscal, ecological, and human crises that contributions in 2009 are organized to reflect the contin- defined the year for the majority of the globe. The election uum of engagement, from contract anthropology and public ama and transfer of power from the previous policy work toward more advocacy-oriented ethnograph eight years of the Bush administration ushered in a message These include:(1)fiscal crisis and business anthropology of "hope"that a more equitable world was on the horizon (2)U.S. race relations, civil rights, and policy reforms through the possibility of meaningful healthcare reform, cli- (3)human i ts,environmental change, and displacement nate talks, and the withdrawal of troops from u.S.(4)global health and human rights; and (5)war and pea anthropology engaged these and other key dialogues with In addition to these topical areas, I cover four areas of ex oth optimism and caution through a variety of new venues, pansion for public anthropology: (1)the growth of public invo/ again highlighting the importance of the discipline's archaeology and evolving relationship between museums In this article, I highlight a series of broad topical areas action-oriented anthropologists; (3)advancements within in which practicing and public anthropologists have made professional associations to better serve practicing anthro substantive contributions over the 2009 calendar year. In ologists; and(4) new methods for engaging and bridging accordance with the framing of the public anthropology re- multiple publics. It is clear that, at the close of the first view section for AA, I use the labels"practicing anthropology" decade in the new millennium, anthropology has established 2008: 172). The discussion over what constitutes "public" ernance settings as well as in community engagement, oor and"public anthropology"interchangeably(see Johnston its place in both international and domestic policy and gov It focuses on uestions over the degree of collaboration and the nature of the contractual relationships between anthropologists and FISCAL CRISIS AND BUSINESS ANTHROPOLOGY the communities they study place of research origination In the wake of the u.S. economic collapse and sub- (university or beyond); beneficiaries of findings(e.g,, cor- sequent government bailouts to the auto and financia AMERICAN ANTHROPOLOGIST, Vol. 112, Issue 2, pp. 208-218, ISSN 0002-7294 online ISSN 1548-1433. 2010 by the American Anthropological Association. All rights reserved. DOL: 10.1111/j.1548-1433201001220.x
Practicing Anthropology Practicing Anthropology in a Time of Crisis: 2009 Year in Review Keri Vacanti Brondo ABSTRACT The breadth and reach of practicing anthropologists in 2009 suggests that anthropology has entered a new phase of advanced engagement at local, national, and international levels. In this article, I review thematic areas in which practicing anthropologists made significant contributions in 2009, including fiscal crisis and business anthropology; U.S. race relations, civil rights, and policy reforms; human rights, environmental change, and displacement; global health and human rights; and war and peace. New areas of expansion are also discussed in the arenas of public archaeology, museums and heritage, and engaged scholarship. Innovations in anthropological research and communicating ethnographic findings with the broader public are reviewed. Keywords: practicing anthropology, public anthropology, 2009 trends, anthropological impacts PRACTICING ANTHROPOLOGY IN A TIME OF CRISIS: 2009 YEAR IN REVIEW In 2008, anthropologists undoubtedly distinguished themselves as relevant to public debates on disaster recovery, warfare, climate change, and health inequalities (see Checker 2009a). With the dawning of 2009, anthropologists continued to speak to the fiscal, ecological, and human crises that defined the year for the majority of the globe. The election of Barack Obama and transfer of power from the previous eight years of the Bush administration ushered in a message of “hope” that a more equitable world was on the horizon through the possibility of meaningful healthcare reform, climate talks, and the withdrawal of troops from Iraq. U.S. anthropology engaged these and other key dialogues with both optimism and caution through a variety of new venues, once again highlighting the importance of the discipline’s involvement in public discourse. In this article, I highlight a series of broad topical areas in which practicing and public anthropologists have made substantive contributions over the 2009 calendar year. In accordance with the framing of the public anthropology review section for AA, I usethe labels “practicing anthropology” and “public anthropology” interchangeably (see Johnston 2008:172). The discussion over what constitutes “public” versus “practicing” anthropology is ongoing. It focuses on questions over the degree of collaboration and the nature of the contractual relationships between anthropologists and the communities they study; place of research origination (university or beyond); beneficiaries of findings (e.g., corAMERICAN ANTHROPOLOGIST, Vol. 112, Issue 2, pp. 208–218, ISSN 0002-7294 online ISSN 1548-1433. c 2010 by the American Anthropological Association. All rights reserved. DOI: 10.1111/j.1548-1433.2010.01220.x poration or community); and commitment to social justice. Rather than take up this debate, my approach is to apply the broadest possible definition of public anthropology and remain inclusive ofthe variety of ways in which anthropologists engage in public dialogue. Topical areas to which anthropologists made substantial contributions in 2009 are organized to reflect the continuum of engagement, from contract anthropology and publicpolicy work toward more advocacy-oriented ethnography. These include: (1) fiscal crisis and business anthropology; (2) U.S. race relations, civil rights, and policy reforms; (3) human rights, environmental change, and displacement; (4) global health and human rights; and (5) war and peace. In addition to these topical areas, I cover four areas of expansion for public anthropology: (1) the growth of public archaeology and evolving relationship between museums and communities; (2) the expansion of academically based action-oriented anthropologists; (3) advancements within professional associations to better serve practicing anthropologists; and (4) new methods for engaging and bridging multiple publics. It is clear that, at the close of the first decade in the new millennium, anthropology has established its place in both international and domestic policy and governance settings as well as in community engagement. FISCAL CRISIS AND BUSINESS ANTHROPOLOGY In the wake of the U.S. economic collapse and subsequent government bailouts to the auto and financial
Brondo Year in Review Public Anthropology 209 ndustries, anthropologists were motivated to take action, Consumption, " has global reach and will shape the way in striving to ensure that marginalized peoples and communities which the AP puts together the news in the digital age not be left out of discussions to reprioritize corporate agen das. In early fall of 2009, anthropologists working with or in RACE RELATIONS CIVIL RIGHTS AND POLICY industry joined together in Chicago at the fifth Ethnographic REFORMS Praxis in Industry Conference(EPIC)to discuss"Taking Care With the historic inauguration of the first African American of Business: Having an Impact and Staying Relevant as Ethno- U.S. president, there has been renewed public and poli graphers in Today's Economic Climate. EPIC participants attention to the critical analysis of race relations and racial worked toward building strategies to utilize ethnography perceptions in the United States. An example of public me- to lower risk, drive innovation, and maximize return on dia concern includes the February 2009 PBS broadcast of investments through business models that are sensitive to " Herskovits at the Heart of Blackness, "a film that explores peoples and cultures. One example is Elizabeth Tunstall's Melville J. Herkovits's(1895-1963)contributions to an- participation in the u. S. National Design Policy Initiative thropological theorization on power, race, representation Summit held in December of 2009 in Washington, D. C. and defining culture and includes interviews of anthropol Participants developed strategic priorities for 2010, which ogists Lee Baker and Johnnetta Cole. An example of the included the following: introducing K-12 educational cur- convergence of public and policy conversations on race is riculum learning modules on design creativity and innova- the "teachable moments"initiated by the White House to of d preparing and publishing cases studies and examples improve race relations(e.g, the July"Beer Summit"be- of design's social, economic, and environmental positive tween Harvard Professor Henry Louis Gates ]r and police impacts;and developing roundtables with the design com- Sergeant James Crowley) government agencies, ar communal ity stakeholders Increasingly, anthropologists have been invited to help (seewww.designpolicy.org shape the national dialogue about race on Capitol Hill. For Gillian Tett and Karen Ho made headlines de emonstrat example, Michael Blakey, Goodman, and other schol- ing the value ethnography brings to understanding the finan- ars from the RACE project were invited to participate in cial crisis. Tett's New York Times list bestseller Fool's Gold: How "A Discussion on Race and Politics, an event sponsored by the Bold Dream of a Small Tribe at J.P. Morgan Was Corrupted by the Congressional Black Caucus(CBC)on November 18 Wall Street Greed and Unleashed a Catastrophe(2009)describes 2009, to commemorate the 25th anniversary of Reverend how the invention of credit-derivate obligations--which at Jesse Jackson Sr 's first run for the U.S. presidency. Blakey first seemed a win-win in the financial world as they freed and other anthropologists reported on the emergence of up capital, increased profits, and diversified risk--led to the a"new American racism"a phrase used to describe the financial crisis when banks began to take on subprime mort- current sociocultural and political environment wherein ef gages to the derivatives and securitization. For this work forts to redress the effects of our long history of structural Tett was named the journalist of the Year at the March 2009 racism(e. g, through affirmative-action policies)are deemed British Press Awards. Karen Ho's Liquidated: An Ethnography " racist"and they urged a paradigm shift from the of Wall Street(2009)suggests that, without significant orga- ration of race as genetics toward a focus on the biol nizational culture change, the road to economic recovery consequences of race and racism(AAA 2009). This engage is far from over. Ho shows how the organizational culture ment served to further increase anthropological involvement of Wall Street and investment bankers are both"cultures of(and the articulation of scientific research findings) in the na- liquidity" and that one cannot be separated from the struc- tional conversation on race tures and practices of the e other New investment bankers Public anthropologists made advances in the area of jus socialized into a high-risk, high-reward culture that creates tice, incarceration, and access to higher education for under a perception that job insecurity builds character and leads represented populations in 2009. Addressing juvenile crime efficient business practices. Yet, rather than lead to financial policies, Robert Hahn's(the Centers for Disease Control) stability, Ho demonstrates that such a work culture produces interdisciplinary work to assess the effectiveness of laws and crisis and breeds financial insecurity. The social impact of policies that facilitate the transfer of juveniles to the adul this analysis was significantly broadened with media cover- criminal-justice system informed reconsiderations of state age of her book, including an interview with Ho by Time and federal policies in 2009. The finding that transferring Magazine in July(Kiviat 2009) juveniles to the adult justice system does not prevent or At the 108th Annual Meeting of the American An- reduce violence but actually serves to increase rates of vi- ropological Association (AAA) in Philadelphia, Robbie oler transferred youth(McGowan et al. 2007) Blinkoff and his firm, Context-Based Research, were rec- is cited in transfer-policy revisions included in the pend gnized with the Washington Association of Professional ing U.S. legislation, the Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Anthropologists's(WAPA)2009 Praxis Award for helping Prevention Reauthorization Act. Similar policy revisions are the Associated Press(AP)understand the way young people now being considered in Virginia, North Carolina, and other learn about news globally. Their project, "A New Model for states. At the local level, Bill McKinney addressed juve- News: Studying the Deep Structure of Young-Adult News nile justice through his work with Men in Motion in the
Brondo • Year in Review: Public Anthropology 209 industries, anthropologists were motivated to take action, strivingto ensurethat marginalized peoples and communities not be left out of discussions to reprioritize corporate agendas. In early fall of 2009, anthropologists working with or in industry joined together in Chicago at the fifth Ethnographic Praxis in Industry Conference (EPIC)to discuss “Taking Care of Business: Having an Impact and Staying Relevant as Ethnographers in Today’s Economic Climate.” EPIC participants worked toward building strategies to utilize ethnography to lower risk, drive innovation, and maximize return on investments through business models that are sensitive to peoples and cultures. One example is Elizabeth Tunstall’s participation in the U.S. National Design Policy Initiative Summit held in December of 2009 in Washington, D.C. Participants developed strategic priorities for 2010, which included the following: introducing K–12 educational curriculum learning modules on design creativity and innovation; preparing and publishing cases studies and examples of design’s social, economic, and environmental positive impacts; and developing roundtables with the design community, government agencies, and community stakeholders (see www.designpolicy.org). Gillian Tett and Karen Ho made headlines demonstrating the value ethnography brings to understanding the financial crisis. Tett’sNew York Times list bestseller Fool’s Gold: How the Bold Dream of a Small Tribe at J.P. Morgan Was Corrupted by Wall Street Greed and Unleashed a Catastrophe (2009) describes how the invention of credit-derivate obligations—which at first seemed a win–win in the financial world as they freed up capital, increased profits, and diversified risk—led to the financial crisis when banks began to take on subprime mortgages to the derivatives and securitization. For this work, Tett was named the Journalist of the Year at the March 2009 British Press Awards. Karen Ho’s Liquidated: An Ethnography of Wall Street (2009) suggests that, without significant organizational culture change, the road to economic recovery is far from over. Ho shows how the organizational culture of Wall Street and investment bankers are both “cultures of liquidity” and that one cannot be separated from the structures and practices of the other. New investment bankers are socialized into a high-risk, high-reward culture that creates a perception that job insecurity builds character and leads to efficient business practices. Yet, rather than lead to financial stability, Ho demonstrates that such a work culture produces crisis and breeds financial insecurity. The social impact of this analysis was significantly broadened with media coverage of her book, including an interview with Ho by Time Magazine in July (Kiviat 2009). At the 108th Annual Meeting of the American Anthropological Association (AAA) in Philadelphia, Robbie Blinkoff and his firm, Context-Based Research, were recognized with the Washington Association of Professional Anthropologists’s (WAPA) 2009 Praxis Award for helping the Associated Press (AP) understand the way young people learn about news globally. Their project, “A New Model for News: Studying the Deep Structure of Young-Adult News Consumption,” has global reach and will shape the way in which the AP puts together the news in the digital age. RACE RELATIONS, CIVIL RIGHTS, AND POLICY REFORMS With the historic inauguration of the first African American U.S. president, there has been renewed public and policy attention to the critical analysis of race relations and racial perceptions in the United States. An example of public media concern includes the February 2009 PBS broadcast of “Herskovits at the Heart of Blackness,” a film that explores Melville J. Herkovits’s (1895–1963) contributions to anthropological theorization on power, race, representation, and defining culture and includes interviews of anthropologists Lee Baker and Johnnetta Cole. An example of the convergence of public and policy conversations on race is the “teachable moments” initiated by the White House to improve race relations (e.g., the July “Beer Summit” between Harvard Professor Henry Louis Gates Jr. and police Sergeant James Crowley). Increasingly, anthropologists have been invited to help shape the national dialogue about race on Capitol Hill. For example, Michael Blakey, Alan Goodman, and other scholars from the RACE project were invited to participate in “A Discussion on Race and Politics,” an event sponsored by the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) on November 18, 2009, to commemorate the 25th anniversary of Reverend Jesse Jackson Sr.’s first run for the U.S. presidency. Blakey and other anthropologists reported on the emergence of a “new American racism”—a phrase used to describe the current sociocultural and political environment wherein efforts to redress the effects of our long history of structural racism (e.g.,through affirmative-action policies) are deemed “racist”—and they urged a paradigm shift from the exploration of race as genetics toward a focus on the biological consequences of race and racism (AAA 2009). This engagement servedto further increase anthropological involvement (and the articulation of scientific research findings) in the national conversation on race. Public anthropologists made advances in the area of justice, incarceration, and access to higher education for underrepresented populations in 2009. Addressing juvenile crime policies, Robert Hahn’s (the Centers for Disease Control) interdisciplinary work to assess the effectiveness of laws and policies that facilitate the transfer of juveniles to the adult criminal-justice system informed reconsiderations of state and federal policies in 2009. The finding that transferring juveniles to the adult justice system does not prevent or reduce violence but actually serves to increase rates of violence among transferred youth (McGowan et al. 2007) is cited in transfer-policy revisions included in the pending U.S. legislation, the Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention Reauthorization Act. Similar policy revisions are now being considered in Virginia, North Carolina, and other states. At the local level, Bill McKinney addressed juvenile justice through his work with Men in Motion in the
210 American Anthropologist Vol 112, No. 2. June 2010 Community(MIMIC. MIMIC is an emergent nonprofit sight of the agency by the EPA, other federal agencies, and founded by a group of ex-offenders in Philadelphia that fo- Congress. A step in this direction was his successful 2009 cuses on mentoring young people and recently released for tition drive to have the a for Toxic Substances and mer offenders. McKinney also headed up a special task force Disease Registry(ATSDR), a federal agency in the division for the Philadelphia School Reform Commission(Board of of CDC and under the Department of Health and Human Education)to address the black and Latino male dropout Services, conduct a long-term assessment on the impact of rate. At the national level, McKinney continued work with the spill the Howard Samuels Center at the City University of New In November of 2009, Marty Otanez pre York,'s Graduate Center to increase access to higher educa public anthropology visual project about Australian-based tion for underrepresented populations Paladin and its uranium mining activities in Malawi, Africa Yellowcake Rising was shown at the Tanzania Uranium Aware- HUMAN RIGHTS, ENVIRONMENTAL CHANGE ness Conference. "Uranium Mining and Nuclear Power AND DISPLACEMENT Tanzanian Future?" in Dar es salaam. Tanzania. The video In a time of resource scarcity, global warming, and the ever- explores the health and socioecological costs of uranium ncreasing power of transnational corporations to control with a focus on water contamination the absence of the natural world, the profound need for anthropologists living wages, and other exploitative social and environmental to document the effects on marginalized peoples continued conditions associated with Paladins mining activities. Sub to grow in 2009. Several sessions at the Society for Al tantively, this work raises questions about nuclear energy plied Anthropology(SfAA)and AAA annual meetings were In?"energy source, showing how this toxic com- focused on"development disasters, "issues also considered modity is far from clean. Otanez's work was highlighted in Anthony Oliver-Smith's edited volume Development and in the Tanzanian local press as a caution and challenge to Dispossession: The Crisis of Forced Displacement and Resettlement the Tanzanian government to prepare guidelines on extrac- tion transportation and revenues collections from uranium Examples of public engagement on these issues can be mining to prevent potential dangers to the local populati seen in Gregory Button and his Ph D. students'research (Mgwabati 2009). Yellowcake Rising releases in June of 2010 on the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) December 2008 (see Yellowcake Rising 2009 for the film trailer) ash spill disaster in Kingston, Tennessee, and environmental Resurgent critiques of the linkages among resource injustice in Perry County, Alabama. In 2009, Button wrote scarcity, global warming, ecocide, and ethnocide were sug- two national op-ed pieces on the effects of the collapse. But- gested in several venues. The "Pulse of the Planet"op-ed tons July Counterpunch article covers the EPA approval to column on Counter Punch that was begun in 2008 contin- ship the toxic ash coal waste to Perry County, a primarily ued in 2009, with columns questioning the human rights frican American low-income community. The decision re- dimensions of proposed carbon-credit schemes( Checker flects a clear case of environmental injustice: the EPa did not 2009c), exploring environmental justice and the TVa ash conduct a complete and meaningful justice review, which spill ( Button 2009a, 2009b), and addressing water, culture would have considered a host of factors including public wars, and nuclear militarism (ohnston 2009a, 2009b) health, social costs, and welfare impacts(Button 2009a) Barbara rose Johnstons"Water/Culture Wars"Coun Button's December Counterpunch article describes how the terpunch column, for example, shows how although water is TVA underreported the magnitude of the spill, declaring central to cultural and environmental sustainability, water the situation "safe"despite the hazardous nature of ash and development projects frequently violate human rights, lead- without any scientific studies conducted to assess the immi- ing to displacement and resettlement, particularly among nent harm to public health or the environment. The TVa ethnic minorities and indigenous peoples. Johnston and oth- also failed to implement a National Incident Management ers have drawn international attention to these issues through System in accordance with Homeland Security Presidential the Water and Cultural Diversity project, established by Directive 5, which would have eased emergency-response the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Or- communications. Button(2009b) points out that the remedy ganization International Hydrological Programme in 2008 TVAs mishandling of the disaster requires careful atten- Staffed by anthropologist Lisa Hiwasaki and led by an inter- tion to the infrastructural policies and practices and overall national and interdisciplinary expert-advisory panel (with Johnston serving as the U. S. representative), this grou corporate culture that prevent a full and effective respons launched a water and cultural-diversity policy brief and) to disasters Over the course of 2009, Button advised several non- ticipated in a full day of special events and scientific sessions profit organizations, delivered numerous guest lectures on at the Fifth World Water Forum in Istanbul, Turkey,in and was interviewed and quoted on ngs and conferences, March of 2009. Other participating anthropologists included college campuses and at national meet the disaster over 34 Marcus Barber, Ameyali Ramos Castillo, Kelly Alley, Ro times by international, national, and regional public radio Hassoun and Suzanne hanchett TV, and print media. By uncovering the TVA's(in)actions Revised versions of the world water forum Button demonstrates the pressing need for greater over- were presented at a three-day international symposium on
210 American Anthropologist • Vol. 112, No. 2 • June 2010 Community (MIMIC). MIMIC is an emergent nonprofit founded by a group of ex-offenders in Philadelphia that focuses on mentoring young people and recently released former offenders. McKinney also headed up a special task force for the Philadelphia School Reform Commission (Board of Education) to address the black and Latino male dropout rate. At the national level, McKinney continued work with the Howard Samuels Center at the City University of New York’s Graduate Center to increase access to higher education for underrepresented populations. HUMAN RIGHTS, ENVIRONMENTAL CHANGE, AND DISPLACEMENT In a time of resource scarcity, global warming, and the everincreasing power of transnational corporations to control the natural world, the profound need for anthropologists to document the effects on marginalized peoples continued to grow in 2009. Several sessions at the Society for Applied Anthropology (SfAA) and AAA annual meetings were focused on “development disasters,” issues also considered in Anthony Oliver-Smith’s edited volume Development and Dispossession: The Crisis of Forced Displacement and Resettlement (2009). Examples of public engagement on these issues can be seen in Gregory Button and his Ph.D. students’ research on the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) December 2008 ash spill disaster in Kingston, Tennessee, and environmental injustice in Perry County, Alabama. In 2009, Button wrote two national op-ed pieces on the effects of the collapse. Button’s July Counterpunch article covers the EPA approval to ship the toxic ash coal waste to Perry County, a primarily African American low-income community. The decision re- flects a clear case of environmental injustice: the EPA did not conduct a complete and meaningful justice review, which would have considered a host of factors including public health, social costs, and welfare impacts (Button 2009a). Button’s December Counterpunch article describes how the TVA underreported the magnitude of the spill, declaring the situation “safe” despite the hazardous nature of ash and without any scientific studies conducted to assess the imminent harm to public health or the environment. The TVA also failed to implement a National Incident Management System in accordance with Homeland Security Presidential Directive 5, which would have eased emergency-response communications. Button (2009b) points out that the remedy to TVA’s mishandling of the disaster requires careful attention to the infrastructural policies and practices and overall corporate culture that prevent a full and effective response to disasters. Over the course of 2009, Button advised several nonprofit organizations, delivered numerous guest lectures on college campuses and at national meetings and conferences, and was interviewed and quoted on the disaster over 34 times by international, national, and regional public radio, TV, and print media. By uncovering the TVA’s (in)actions, Button demonstrates the pressing need for greater oversight of the agency by the EPA, other federal agencies, and Congress. A step in this direction was his successful 2009 petition drive to have the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (ATSDR), a federal agency in the division of CDC and under the Department of Health and Human Services, conduct a long-term assessment on the impact of the spill. In November of 2009, Marty Otanez previewed his ˜ public anthropology visual project about Australian-based Paladin and its uranium mining activities in Malawi, Africa. Yellowcake Risingwas shown at the Tanzania Uranium Awareness Conference, “Uranium Mining and Nuclear Power: Tanzanian Future?” in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. The video explores the health and socioecological costs of uranium mining, with a focus on water contamination, the absence of living wages, and other exploitative social and environmental conditions associated with Paladin’s mining activities. Substantively, this work raises questions about nuclear energy as a “clean” energy source, showing how this toxic commodity is far from clean. Otanez’s work was highlighted ˜ in the Tanzanian local press as a caution and challenge to the Tanzanian government to prepare guidelines on extraction transportation and revenues collections from uranium mining to prevent potential dangers to the local populations (Mgwabati 2009). Yellowcake Rising releases in June of 2010 (see Yellowcake Rising 2009 for the film trailer). Resurgent critiques of the linkages among resource scarcity, global warming, ecocide, and ethnocide were suggested in several venues. The “Pulse of the Planet” op-ed column on CounterPunch that was begun in 2008 continued in 2009, with columns questioning the human rights dimensions of proposed carbon-credit schemes (Checker 2009c), exploring environmental justice and the TVA ash spill (Button 2009a, 2009b), and addressing water, culture wars, and nuclear militarism (Johnston 2009a, 2009b). Barbara Rose Johnston’s “Water/Culture Wars” Counterpunch column, for example, shows how although water is central to cultural and environmental sustainability, waterdevelopment projects frequently violate human rights, leading to displacement and resettlement, particularly among ethnic minorities and indigenous peoples. Johnston and others have drawn international attentiontothese issuesthrough the Water and Cultural Diversity project, established by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization International Hydrological Programme in 2008. Staffed by anthropologist Lisa Hiwasaki and led by an international and interdisciplinary expert-advisory panel (with Johnston serving as the U.S. representative), this group launched a water and cultural-diversity policy brief and participated in a full day of special events and scientific sessions at the Fifth World Water Forum in Istanbul, Turkey, in March of 2009. Other participating anthropologists included Marcus Barber, Ameyali Ramos Castillo, Kelly Alley, Rosina Hassoun, and Suzanne Hanchett. Revised versions of the world water forum papers were presented at a three-day international symposium on
Brondo Year in Review: Public Anthropology 211 Water. Cultural Diversity. and Environmental Change"at homes(Checker 2009c). Checker's work demonstrates th the Research Institute for Humanity and Nature in Kyoto, flaws of the market-based REDD initiatives(UN Collabora- Japan, in October of 2009. At that conference, anthropol- tive Programme on Reducing Emissions from Deforestation gists joined geographers, philosophers, civil engineers, hy- and Forest Degradation in Developing Countries)that trades drologists, and indigenous leaders from around the world to public-health and human rights protections of local com discuss traditional water-resource management, water cul- munities for corporate carbon-trading profits and provides tures and waterscapes, and the varied relationships among incentives to pollute rather than protect, doing very little in ultural diversity and the privatization of water, deterio- the end to slow global warming or reduce our dependence rating water quality, diminishing or lack of access, and the on fossil fuels mpending complications of climate variability. Outcomes Other practicing anthropologists conducting research from these meetings include substantive contributions to on land-based carbon-offset projects reported on their work a"Water, Cultural Diversity and Environmental Change" in a double session organized by Shirley Fiske and Stephanie textbook project, the launching of an international commu- Paladino at the SfAA meetings in 2009. Organized with nityofpractice(www.waterandculturaldiversity.org),andafocusonequityandparticipationpanelistssharednu- the formation of working groups to develop a"culture and anced views of ways in which carbon-offset projects are water"course for water managers in graduate programs being formulated that contrast with the more visible, large and propose scientific sessions as part of the September scale commercial projects that have raised serious equity 2010 Stockholm Water week. Anthropologists involved in concerns. They highlighted, for instance, the contrasting these initiatives are hoping to make real contributions to ns taken by indigenous peopl carbon credi the models and methods that guide water-resource man- for avoided deforestation, a national program that has been agement by exploring the culturally diverse ways in which reshaped by civil-society organizations, and on locally gener water resou are valued, used, and managed; introduc- ated projec cts atte mpting to use carbon revenues to sup ing"cultural flows"and "rightsholder"concepts as central to indigenous and locally directed development, such as th ater-resource management;and by demonstrating the im- one Paladino reported on in Chiapas, Mexico(see Scolel'te portance of biocultural health as a key indicator in planning d. assessment, and management systems The population displa cement tr The threat that climate change brings to increasing the change disasters and"solutions" to climate change was also marginalization of impoverished and indigenous peoples the subject of increasing anthropological engagement in compelled anthropologists to play an important advocac 2009. For example, Oliver-Smith, one of four Munich Re role in international climate-change negotiations in 2009. Foundation(MRF) chairs at the Un University Institute Some of this work was conducted through publications, for Environment and Human Security(UNU-EHS)in Bonn such as Susan Crate and Mark Nuttall's edited volume, (2005-09), gave a variety of presentations at Expert Work- Anthropology and Climate Change: From Encounters to Action ing Groups; participated in the Climate Change, Environ- (2009). The volume is the first comprehensive assessment ment and Migration Alliance(CCEMA) workshops spon anthropology's engagement with climate change, focus- sored by the International Organization on Migration ing on the impact of climate change on indigenous commu UNU-EHS. the Munich Re Foundation. and the Rockefeller nities around the world. It also includes a call to action, Foundation; and produced several briefing papers on envi- omplete with tips on innovative communication forums ronmental migration and sea-level rise for UNESCO and the or engaging the public on climate change and for shaping UNU-EHS Over a dozen members of the AAA were present for the In a less formal, although perhaps more public, media UN Framework Convention on Climate Change(UNFCCC) venue, Melissa Checker's Counterpunch article detailed the n Copenhagen, December 7-18, 2009. The relevant activ human costs of carbon offsets through examples like FACE, ities associated with the meetings took place simultaneously the Forests Absorbing Carbon Dioxide Emissions, a partner-in throughout Copenhagen. To organ ship between the Dutch Electricity Generating Board and the their efforts, Janet Chernela and Soren Hvalkof convene uganda Wildlife Authority(UwA)that led to the displace- a meeting at the Danish Institute for International Studies ment of 6,000 people from Mount Elgon. The displaced lost (DIIS)that allowed the group to form a strategy to cope with the challenges of conducting event anthropology (i.e, coor clared their former home a national park and then suffered dinating the activities of many researchers so as to improve violent attacks by rangers when they continued to attempt to intersectorial understanding and bring a holistic anthropo- use parkland. The Mount Elgon project enabled the building logical presence to a large-scale international meet of several coal-fired plants, which brought a whole additional event-engagement strategy and follow-up communications set of human costs through mountaintop removal, a contro- network are intended to accompany the UNFCCC proce versial method of coal extraction that dumps tons of toxic over the next several years. Crate was one of two anthro- waste into streams and valleys, leads to flooding of highly pologists to formally share her research on the human di- toxic debris, and drives nearby residents to move from their mensions of climate change, making presentations during
Brondo • Year in Review: Public Anthropology 211 “Water, Cultural Diversity, and Environmental Change” at the Research Institute for Humanity and Nature in Kyoto, Japan, in October of 2009. At that conference, anthropologists joined geographers, philosophers, civil engineers, hydrologists, and indigenous leaders from around the world to discuss traditional water-resource management, water cultures and waterscapes, and the varied relationships among cultural diversity and the privatization of water, deteriorating water quality, diminishing or lack of access, and the impending complications of climate variability. Outcomes from these meetings include substantive contributions to a “Water, Cultural Diversity and Environmental Change” textbook project, the launching of an international community of practice (www.waterandculturaldiversity.org), and the formation of working groups to develop a “culture and water” course for water managers in graduate programs and propose scientific sessions as part of the September 2010 Stockholm Water week. Anthropologists involved in these initiatives are hoping to make real contributions to the models and methods that guide water-resource management by exploring the culturally diverse ways in which water resources are valued, used, and managed; introducing “cultural flows” and “rightsholder” concepts as central to water-resource management; and by demonstrating the importance of biocultural health as a key indicator in planning, assessment, and management systems. The threat that climate change brings to increasing the marginalization of impoverished and indigenous peoples compelled anthropologists to play an important advocacy role in international climate-change negotiations in 2009. Some of this work was conducted through publications, such as Susan Crate and Mark Nuttall’s edited volume, Anthropology and Climate Change: From Encounters to Action (2009). The volume is the first comprehensive assessment of anthropology’s engagement with climate change, focusing on the impact of climate change on indigenous communities around the world. It also includes a call to action, complete with tips on innovative communication forums for engaging the public on climate change and for shaping policy. In a less formal, although perhaps more public, media venue, Melissa Checker’s Counterpunch article detailed the human costs of carbon offsets through examples like FACE, the Forests Absorbing Carbon Dioxide Emissions, a partnership between the Dutch Electricity Generating Board and the Uganda Wildlife Authority (UWA) that led to the displacement of 6,000 people from Mount Elgon. The displaced lost their rights to livelihood when the Ugandan government declared their former home a national park and then suffered violent attacks by rangers when they continued to attempt to use parkland. The Mount Elgon project enabled the building of several coal-fired plants, which brought a whole additional set of human costs through mountaintop removal, a controversial method of coal extraction that dumps tons of toxic waste into streams and valleys, leads to flooding of highly toxic debris, and drives nearby residents to move from their homes (Checker 2009c). Checker’s work demonstrates the flaws of the market-based REDD initiatives (UN Collaborative Programme on Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation in Developing Countries) that trades public-health and human rights protections of local communities for corporate carbon-trading profits and provides incentives to pollute rather than protect, doing very little in the end to slow global warming or reduce our dependence on fossil fuels. Other practicing anthropologists conducting research on land-based carbon-offset projects reported on their work in a double session organized by Shirley Fiske and Stephanie Paladino at the SfAA meetings in 2009. Organized with a focus on equity and participation, panelists shared nuanced views of ways in which carbon-offset projects are being formulated that contrast with the more visible, largescale commercial projects that have raised serious equity concerns. They highlighted, for instance, the contrasting positions taken by indigenous peoples on carbon credits for avoided deforestation, a national program that has been reshaped by civil-society organizations, and on locally generated projects attempting to use carbon revenues to support indigenous and locally directed development, such as the one Paladino reported on in Chiapas, Mexico (see Scolel’te´ n.d.). The population displacement triggered by climatechange disasters and “solutions” to climate change was also the subject of increasing anthropological engagement in 2009. For example, Oliver-Smith, one of four Munich Re Foundation (MRF) chairs at the UN University Institute for Environment and Human Security (UNU-EHS) in Bonn (2005–09), gave a variety of presentations at Expert Working Groups; participated in the Climate Change, Environment and Migration Alliance (CCEMA) workshops sponsored by the International Organization on Migration, the UNU-EHS, the Munich Re Foundation, and the Rockefeller Foundation; and produced several briefing papers on environmental migration and sea-level rise for UNESCO and the UNU-EHS. Over a dozen members of the AAA were present for the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in Copenhagen, December 7–18, 2009. The relevant activities associated with the meetings took place simultaneously in numerous venues throughout Copenhagen. To organize their efforts, Janet Chernela and Soren Hvalkof convened a meeting at the Danish Institute for International Studies (DIIS) that allowed the group to form a strategy to cope with the challenges of conducting event anthropology (i.e., coordinating the activities of many researchers so as to improve intersectorial understanding and bring a holistic anthropological presence to a large-scale international meeting). The event-engagement strategy and follow-up communications network are intended to accompany the UNFCCC process over the next several years. Crate was one of two anthropologists to formally share her research on the human dimensions of climate change, making presentations during
212 American Anthropologist Vol 112, No. 2. June 2010 the Danish Energy Agency's Polar Science Day and at th GLOBAL HEALTH AND HUMAN RIGHTS GRID-Arendal's United Nations Environment Programme's Without a doubt, the health of the individual and commu Many Strong Voices"event. Noor Johnson played a coor- nities became a topic of popular discussion in 2009. Media dinator role by helping to organize the activities of the Inuit exposure of issues like genetically modified food produc Circumpolar Council of Canada(ICC), a UNFCCC accred tion, the growth of CSAs(community supported agricul ited observer organization. Other participants in the event ture), the u.S. health-care-reform debate, and the global anthropology team included Brandon Derman(a human ge- swine-flu epidemic incited a focus on healthy lifes grapher), Ted Maclin, and Bob Pokrant. Collectively, the thropologists were active in bringing to light long-standin group focused their coverage on the following: participation issues of health disparities and global health-related huma by forest and Arctic indigenous communities and NGOs in rights violations, as well as in providing recommendations olicy development; knowledge flows among constituencies for national and community-level policy initiatives in the (scientific, governmental, nongovernmental, and civil soci- wake of this renewed public interest ty)present at the Climate Summit; and human rights and For example, David Himmelgreen's(2009)The Global social justice issues entailed in the framing of a"democratic" Food Crisis: New Insights into an Age-Old Problem brought to UNFCCC process gether a series of applied and practicing anthropologists to Mite anet Chernela, Janis Alcorn, Robert Hitchcock, Mark shed light on the ways in which food policies and economic Nuttall, and others covered indigenous responses to the restructuring have contributed to increasing food inequities REDD initiatives and UNFCCC process. Collectively, they across the globe. Contributors offer a range of ways in which documented meetings that led to Copenhagen, working with anthropology can play a role in formulating locall ly appropr indigenous communities and their advocates to ensure that ate solutions to the global food crisis. Barbara Ryklo-Bauer cultural rights would be recognized within the agreements eagles ar nd others took up the impact of structural Chernela, for example, reported on the indigenous peo- military, and communal violence on health and healthcare les and climate-change meeting of the Brazilian indigenous delivery in their edited volume, Global Health in Times of association COIAB( Seminario Povos Indigenas e Mudan- Violence(2009). And Nancy Scheper-Hughes's decade-lon cas Climaticas) held on September 10, 2009. She translated research on illegal organ trafficking entered the u. S.main and shared with colleagues the letter that seminar partic- stream in July of 2009 with widespread media coverage oduced, calling on the Brazilian government and of the federal arrest of 44 people-including New jersey signatories of the UN convention on climate to for- state legislators, government officials, and rabbis--for their recognize the role of indigenous peoples in the pro- involvement in an international laundering scheme that traf tection and conservation of the Amazon forests. Others, ficked human organs. Scheper-Hughes's research and the such as Chris Erni of the International Work Group for data collected by her nonprofit organization Organs Watch Indigenous Affairs and members of the Forest Peoples Pro-(a human rights group in Berkeley, CA) played a key sup gram, lent their support to indigenous organizations whose porting role in building the FBI case. The specific case-and fforts to obtain title to ancestral tropical rainforest are the global black market in organ trafficking, in general- adversely impacted by climate-change "solutions, " which, was the subject of television, radio, and media interviews among other things, represent a commoditization of sacred with Scheper-Hughes by Newsweek, CNN, NPR'S Talk of the erritor The overall concern of these and other anthropologists Public engagement with national-level health and hu who work with indigenous peoples is that, despite the 2007 man rights concerns is also illustrated with the May 2009 UN Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, indi publication of Philippe Bourgois and Jeff Schonberg's pho nous peoples'basic human rights--especially their rights toethnography, Righteous Dopefiend. Part of the University of o land, employment, resources, and residence--remained California's Series in Public Anthropology, the book makes threatened via the climate-change talks. Communicating a case for "critically applied public anthropology" through these concerns in various ways up to and at the Copenhagen its focus on the unintended consequences of public policies meeting had some impact, as illustrated in the December that inadvertently exacerbate the suffering of street-based 12, 2009, climate-change statement on the proposed REDD drug users in the United States. The work was on exhibit mechanisms, which included a statement on indigenous peo- at the Slought Foundation of Philadelphia from December ples. It was the first in the UNFCCC Process to refer to 3 to 31, 2009, and at the University of Pennsylvania Ar- ration on Mo shts, and it made note of the 2007 UN Decla- chaology and Anthropology Museum from December 5 Rights of Indigenous peoples. Unfortunately, through May of 2010. The exhibition was designed as a this language was not contained in the final Copenhagen Ac- public conversation in conjunction with the Penn Center for cord, and indigenous peoples worldwide have sharply criti- Public Health Initiatives's 2009-10 series, Creative Action: The cized the emerging statements. Anthropological research on Arts in Public Health. Policy recommendations that emerg the effects of climate change on indigenous peoples, thus from their research include the expansion of single-re becomes all the more pressing in 2010 cupancy hotels with in-house medical staffs, mobile health
212 American Anthropologist • Vol. 112, No. 2 • June 2010 the Danish Energy Agency’s Polar Science Day and at the GRID-Arendal’sUnitedNations Environment Programme’s “Many Strong Voices” event. Noor Johnson played a coordinator role by helping to organize the activities of the Inuit Circumpolar Council of Canada (ICC), a UNFCCC accredited observer organization. Other participants in the event anthropology team included Brandon Derman (a human geographer), Ted Maclin, and Bob Pokrant. Collectively, the group focused their coverage on the following: participation by forest and Arctic indigenous communities and NGOs in policy development; knowledge flows among constituencies (scientific, governmental, nongovernmental, and civil society) present at the Climate Summit; and human rights and social justice issues entailed in the framing of a “democratic” UNFCCC process. Janet Chernela, Janis Alcorn, Robert Hitchcock, Mark Nuttall, and others covered indigenous responses to the REDD initiatives and UNFCCC process. Collectively, they documented meetingsthat ledto Copenhagen, working with indigenous communities and their advocates to ensure that cultural rights would be recognized within the agreements. Chernela, for example, reported on the indigenous peoples and climate-change meeting of the Brazilian indigenous association COIAB (Seminario Povos Indigenas e Mudancas Climaticas) held on September 10, 2009. She translated and shared with colleagues the letter that seminar participants produced, calling on the Brazilian government and other signatories of the UN convention on climate to formally recognize the role of indigenous peoples in the protection and conservation of the Amazon forests. Others, such as Chris Erni of the International Work Group for Indigenous Affairs and members of the Forest Peoples Program, lent their support to indigenous organizations whose efforts to obtain title to ancestral tropical rainforest are adversely impacted by climate-change “solutions,” which, among other things, represent a commoditization of sacred territory. The overall concern of these and other anthropologists who work with indigenous peoples is that, despite the 2007 UN Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, indigenous peoples’ basic human rights—especially their rights to land, employment, resources, and residence—remained threatened via the climate-change talks. Communicating these concerns in various ways up to and at the Copenhagen meeting had some impact, as illustrated in the December 12, 2009, climate-change statement on the proposed REDD mechanisms, which included a statement on indigenous peoples. It was the first in the UNFCCC process to refer to indigenous rights, and it made note of the 2007 UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous peoples. Unfortunately, this language was not contained in the final Copenhagen Accord, and indigenous peoples worldwide have sharply criticized the emerging statements. Anthropological research on the effects of climate change on indigenous peoples, thus, becomes all the more pressing in 2010. GLOBAL HEALTH AND HUMAN RIGHTS Without a doubt, the health of the individual and communities became a topic of popular discussion in 2009. Media exposure of issues like genetically modified food production, the growth of CSAs (community supported agriculture), the U.S. health-care-reform debate, and the global swine-flu epidemic incited a focus on healthy lifestyles. Anthropologists were active in bringing to light long-standing issues of health disparities and global health–related human rights violations, as well as in providing recommendations for national and community-level policy initiatives in the wake of this renewed public interest. For example, David Himmelgreen’s (2009) The Global Food Crisis: New Insights into an Age-Old Problem brought together a series of applied and practicing anthropologists to shed light on the ways in which food policies and economic restructuring have contributed to increasing food inequities across the globe. Contributors offer a range of ways in which anthropology can play a role in formulating locally appropriate solutions to the global food crisis. Barbara Ryklo-Bauer and colleagues and others took up the impact of structural, military, and communal violence on health and healthcare delivery in their edited volume, Global Health in Times of Violence (2009). And Nancy Scheper-Hughes’s decade-long research on illegal organ trafficking entered the U.S. mainstream in July of 2009 with widespread media coverage of the federal arrest of 44 people—including New Jersey state legislators, government officials, and rabbis—for their involvement in an international laundering scheme that traf- ficked human organs. Scheper-Hughes’s research and the data collected by her nonprofit organization Organs Watch (a human rights group in Berkeley, CA) played a key supporting role in building the FBI case. The specific case—and the global black market in organ trafficking, in general— was the subject of television, radio, and media interviews with Scheper-Hughes by Newsweek, CNN, NPR’s Talk of the Nation, and others. Public engagement with national-level health and human rights concerns is also illustrated with the May 2009 publication of Philippe Bourgois and Jeff Schonberg’s photoethnography, Righteous Dopefiend. Part of the University of California’s Series in Public Anthropology, the book makes a case for “critically applied public anthropology” through its focus on the unintended consequences of public policies that inadvertently exacerbate the suffering of street-based drug users in the United States. The work was on exhibit at the Slought Foundation of Philadelphia from December 3 to 31, 2009, and at the University of Pennsylvania Archaeology and Anthropology Museum from December 5 through May of 2010. The exhibition was designed as a public conversation in conjunction with the Penn Center for PublicHealthInitiatives’s 2009–10 series, Creative Action: The Arts in Public Health. Policy recommendations that emerged from their research include the expansion of single-roomoccupancy hotels with in-house medical staffs, mobile health
Brondo Year in Review: Public Anthropology 213 clinics, and methadone clinics and better case management human rights advocates and the challenges of engaging in room human rights research within highly militarized contexts Clementine Fujimura, who teaches ethnographic methods WAR PEACE AND ETHICS IN ANTHROPOLOGY to the military community at the u.S. Naval Academy With a new u.S. president whose military policy is of grad- Dave Matsuda of the HTS, and Laura McNamara of Sandia ual withdrawal of troops from Iraq and intensified war efforts National Laboratories all feel their work for military, intelli- in Afghanistan, the debate over anthropology role in war nce, or other national security organizations is exercising contexts continued to be a main focus of 2009. At the core their scholarly and civil commitments in a time of war. These of this debate are questions concerning the social respon- practicing anthropologists raise subtle ethical questions that sibility of anthropologists, our role in shaping the contexts are difficult to answer, such as the following: What are our in which we work, our obligations with regard to how thical obligations when using anthropology to train the war work is used in the broader world, and the extent to which riors who do battle in a time when peace through war is the anthropologists are and should be activists. If activism or ad- primary philosophy of our military policy? How do inter vocacy is indeed a core component of anthropology, do we rogation practices reflect changes in institutional worldview of it? Public anthropologists have addressed this issue of the Global War on Terror cies charged with prosecuting the engage in that activism from within an institution or outside among the federal agend ethical concerns for a militarized anthropology from both di Although McNamara and others are positioned to shape rections: some as insider-anthropologists and employees or national security policy in a more nuanced and humane contractors working with the military, others as passionate shion from the inside, other public anthropologists sup ported by academic institutions are documenting human In 2007, the involvement of anthropologists as mem- rights abuses within conflict zones. Danny Hoffmans recent bers of the U.S. Department of Defense's Human Terrain work focuses on the outsourcing of war to local, surrogate Systems(HTS)sparked a discussion over revising the AAA militia forces and the training of indigenous groups for coun Code of Ethics(Gonzalez and Gusterson 2009). AAA mem- terinsurgency Daniel Rothenberg, Emilio Spadola, Kathryi bership approved an initial revision in February of 2009 and Libal, Amahl Bishara, Michael Perez, and Lori Allen work set up an ad hoc committee to explore further revisions. with victims of human rights violations in Iraq and Palestine Throughout the year, reaction and debate surrounding the In 2009, Lori Allen contributed to an amicus brief to be filed ethics of military anthropology continued at national con- in the U. S Supreme Court against a statute that could hinde ferences, on public anthropology blogs, in Anthropology News or even criminalize the work of anthropologists who work and Counterpunch, and through activist networks such as the in conflict zones, and she provided expert advice to lawyers Network of Concerned Anthropologists epresenting individuals seeking political asylum in the U The Commission on the Engagement of Anthropo Michael Perez spent a significant portion of 2009 as an invited ogy with the U.S. Security and Intelligence Communities lecturer during campus teach-ins on war and peace in Iraq (CEAUSSIC), formed in 20 071 undertake a review of the Afghanistan, and Palestine. One of Perez's HTS, released its final report in October of 2009. In the re- is that, rather than addressing the human rights abuses of port, CEAuSSIC recommended that the AAA emphasize in- Palestinian refugees, the peace-negotiation process ends up compatibility of the HTS with our discipline's code of ethics, erasing their rights, including the right to property, through autioning that"when ethnographic investigation is deter- its focus on humanitarian needs and"rehabilitation "Perez mined by military missions, not subject to external review also served as editor and occasional column contributor for [and] integrated into the goals of counterinsurgency, Islamica, the leading English-language publication produced and in a potentially coercive environment--all characteris- by Muslims in 2009, and kept a regular blog on the Middle tic factors of the HTS concept and its application-it can East and Islam(see gir Rosemary Joyce and Adrienne Pine introduced a res- of anthropology"(CEAUSSIC 2009: 4). Roberto Gonzalez olution at the 2009 AAA Business Meeting that called on (2009), Robert Lawless(2009), and David Price(2009)took the u. S. government to recognize the human rights abuses this position further in 2009 Counterpunch articles, arguing caused by the Honduran military coup of June 28, 2009. The that hrs work is not "neutral" and limited to humanitar resolution, which went to Aaa membership for a vote in ian projects but, rather, an arm of u.S. military January of 2010, offers support to those in resistance, many berto gonzalez also released American Counterinsurgent of whom are from the indigenous populations and popular Human Science and the Human Terrain?(2009). In this book, movements with whom anthropologists collaborate. Pine Gonzalez links HTS theory and methods to those used by also began full-time coverage of the Honduran coup on her anthropolog con- log(quoth. net), where she provides first-hand accounts cluding that social-science objectives become subservient of resistance from honduras at center stage. pine calls this counterinsurgency within the HTS context form of engagement with the public "militant solidarity an At both the SfAA and AAA annual meetings, a vari- thropology"(Pine 2009). In addition to her blog, Pine spent ety of sessions focused on the role of anthropologists as a good deal of the latter part of 2009 as an invited lecturer
Brondo • Year in Review: Public Anthropology 213 clinics, and methadone clinics and better case management for emergency room “frequent flyers.” WAR, PEACE, AND ETHICS IN ANTHROPOLOGY With a new U.S. president whose military policy is of gradual withdrawal of troops from Iraq and intensified war efforts in Afghanistan, the debate over anthropology’s role in war contexts continued to be a main focus of 2009. At the core of this debate are questions concerning the social responsibility of anthropologists, our role in shaping the contexts in which we work, our obligations with regard to how our work is used in the broader world, and the extent to which anthropologists are and should be activists. If activism or advocacy is indeed a core component of anthropology, do we engage in that activism from within an institution or outside of it? Public anthropologists have addressed this issue of the ethical concerns for a militarized anthropology from both directions: some as insider-anthropologists and employees or contractors working with the military, others as passionate critics. In 2007, the involvement of anthropologists as members of the U.S. Department of Defense’s Human Terrain Systems (HTS) sparked a discussion over revising the AAA Code of Ethics (Gonzalez and Gusterson 2009). AAA mem- ´ bership approved an initial revision in February of 2009 and set up an ad hoc committee to explore further revisions. Throughout the year, reaction and debate surrounding the ethics of military anthropology continued at national conferences, on public anthropology blogs, in Anthropology News and Counterpunch, and through activist networks such as the Network of Concerned Anthropologists. The Commission on the Engagement of Anthropology with the U.S. Security and Intelligence Communities (CEAUSSIC), formed in 2007 to undertake a review of the HTS, released its final report in October of 2009. In the report, CEAUSSIC recommended that the AAA emphasize incompatibility of the HTS with our discipline’s code of ethics, cautioning that “when ethnographic investigation is determined by military missions, not subject to external review ... [and] integrated into the goals of counterinsurgency, and in a potentially coercive environment—all characteristic factors of the HTS concept and its application—it can no longer be considered a legitimate professional exercise of anthropology” (CEAUSSIC 2009:4). Roberto Gonzalez ´ (2009), Robert Lawless (2009), and David Price (2009)took this position further in 2009 Counterpunch articles, arguing that HTS work is not “neutral” and limited to humanitarian projects but, rather, an arm of U.S. military expansion. Roberto Gonzalez also released ´ American Counterinsurgency: Human Science and the Human Terrain? (2009). In this book, Gonzalez links HTS theory and methods to those used by ´ anthropologists employed by colonial governments, concluding that social-science objectives become subservient to counterinsurgency within the HTS context. At both the SfAA and AAA annual meetings, a variety of sessions focused on the role of anthropologists as human rights advocates and the challenges of engaging in human rights research within highly militarized contexts. Clementine Fujimura, who teaches ethnographic methods to the military community at the U.S. Naval Academy, Dave Matsuda of the HTS, and Laura McNamara of Sandia National Laboratories all feel their work for military, intelligence, or other national security organizations is exercising their scholarly and civil commitments in a time of war. These practicing anthropologists raise subtle ethical questions that are difficult to answer, such as the following: What are our ethical obligations when using anthropology to train the warriors who do battle in a time when peace through war is the primary philosophy of our military policy? How do interrogation practices reflect changes in institutional worldview among the federal agencies charged with prosecuting the Global War on Terror? Although McNamara and others are positioned to shape national security policy in a more nuanced and humane fashion from the inside, other public anthropologists supported by academic institutions are documenting human rights abuses within conflict zones. Danny Hoffman’s recent work focuses on the outsourcing of war to local, surrogate militia forces and the training of indigenous groups for counterinsurgency. Daniel Rothenberg, Emilio Spadola, Kathryn Libal, Amahl Bishara, Michael Perez, and Lori Allen work with victims of human rights violations in Iraq and Palestine. In 2009, Lori Allen contributed to an amicus brief to be filed in the U.S. Supreme Court against a statute that could hinder or even criminalize the work of anthropologists who work in conflict zones, and she provided expert advice to lawyers representing individuals seeking political asylum in the U.K. Michael Perez spent a significant portion of 2009 as an invited lecturer during campus teach-ins on war and peace in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Palestine. One of Perez’s main insights is that, rather than addressing the human rights abuses of Palestinian refugees, the peace-negotiation process ends up erasing their rights, including the right to property, through its focus on humanitarian needs and “rehabilitation.” Perez also served as editor and occasional column contributor for Islamica, the leading English-language publication produced by Muslims in 2009, and kept a regular blog on the Middle East and Islam (see gimmetruth.wordpress.com). Rosemary Joyce and Adrienne Pine introduced a resolution at the 2009 AAA Business Meeting that called on the U.S. government to recognize the human rights abuses caused by the Honduran military coup of June 28, 2009. The resolution, which went to AAA membership for a vote in January of 2010, offers support to those in resistance, many of whom are from the indigenous populations and popular movements with whom anthropologists collaborate. Pine also began full-time coverage of the Honduran coup on her blog (quotha.net), where she provides first-hand accounts of resistance from Honduras at center stage. Pine calls this form of engagement with the public “militant solidarity anthropology” (Pine 2009). In addition to her blog, Pine spent a good deal of the latter part of 2009 as an invited lecturer
214 American Anthropologist Vol. 112, No. 2 June 2010 t on dozens of radio and television shows te opologists working discuss the situation in Honduras itarized contexts in 2010 is to find a constructive avenue for Many public anthropologists released the results of their applying our ethnographic findings to advocate for social jus research on the environmental, socioeconomic, and health tice and human rights. This is especially thorny given that our effects of military presence across the world this year. New ernment sul pports peace through war and, thus, increased titles in 2009 include Catherine Lutz,'s Bases of Empire: The militarization. The role of U. S anthropology becomes that Global Struggle against U.S. Military Posts(2009), which inter- of providing nuance to the effects of governmental policy on rogates the political, environmental, and economic impact the peoples and cultures of the world during this seemingly of these bases on their surrounding communities across the contradictory moment where, on the one hand, there is globe, and David Vine's Island of Shame: The Secret History global movement toward a peace agenda based on universal of the U.S. Military Base on Diego Garcia(2009), which de- human rights while, on the other hand, there are several tails the forced relocation of the indigenous Chagossian examples from 2009 of u.S. support for the increased mili- from Diego Garcia by the United States so that the u.S. tarization of the world. could build a naval base vine documents the human rights abuses--extreme poverty, lack of compensation, and health PUBLIC ARCHAEOLOGY, MUSEUMS, problems-that were covered up the United States AND CULTURAL HERITAGE Tone Bleie, Jennifer Hays, and Robert Hitchcock par- Museums and archaeology continued to increase their civic icipated in the 2009 Forum for Development Coopera- engagementin 2009 Collaborative Anthropologies contains sev- tion with Indigenous Peoples conference, "Violent Con- eral examples of collaborative archaeological research in flicts, Ceasefires, and Peace Accords through the Lens of cluding the work of Liam Brady, Elizabeth Chilton, T. J Indigenous Peoples, held at the University of Tromso in Ferguson, Siobhan Hart, Michael Heckenberger, Sunny Ly Norway, on October 22-23, 2009. The conference came barger, Nicholas C. Laluk, Barbara Mills, Wendi Field Mur at a time when conflict, war, and intergroup struggles af- ray, and Nancy Parezo. In 2009, these anthropologists have fecting indigenous peoples across the world were(and are) collectively used their expertise in support of land claims heightening. The meeting, s objectives were to develop sus- and land-use rights, to aid descendent groups in the federal tainable strategies for addressing violence, negotiating peace recognition process in the United States, and in develop- accords, and addressing postconfict issues. Anthropologists archaeological resources for public display and contributions included outlining strategies to manage con ultural tourism( Lassiter 2009: 3-4). For instance, Michael flicts(e.g, supporting traditional mechanisms of address- Heckenberger's ethnoarchaeological work with the Kuikuro ing disputes)and developing postconflict reconstruction and in the Amazon illuminated ancestral places for the Kuikora development programs, as seen, for example, in the Chit Chip Colwell-Chanthaphonh's(2009)and Jordan tagong Hill Tracts of Bangladesh, where a new commission Jacobs's(2009) work on the repatriation of human re- is in place, and in Guatemala, where indigenous peoples are mains and sacred artifacts pursuant to the Native Ameri- orking with anthropologists and others in the implemen- can Graves Protection and Repatriation Act is illustrative tation of the peace accord of the sustained and meaningful collaborative working re gh Gusterson(2009a)explored the increasing u.S. lationships being fostered among archaeologists, museum militarization of the world in his column for the Bulletin anthropologists, and the Native American co of the Atomic Scientists. In addition to exploring the expen are expanding our intellectual understanding of identity and and symbolism of u.S. overseas military bases, Gusterson's heritage nonthly column serves as an example of anthropologists n 2009, Robert Connolly introduced a shift in how keeping journalists on mark by painting a fuller picture of exhibits are created at Memphis's C. H. Nash Museum at the relationships among nuclear weapons, global power, Chucalissa, situated on a late-prehistoric earthwork com- war,and peace. For example, Gusterson(2009b)expands plex, by inviting the Chocktaw and Chickasaw to move fror our knowledge beyond the New York Times reporting on " actors to director and producers"of new exhibit creation he recently completed Lawrence Livermore National Lab- In a similar vein, in 2010 the museum will hire and train oratory's National Ignition Facility(NIF), showing that, al- area high school students to create an exhibit on the African though the press has publicized the facility as a potential sav- American experie ence In ior to our nations energy problems, it was funded through Hoerig has maintained a commitment to integrate the the nuclear-weapons budget and serves as a training site for Apache community into the museum planning in his role the next generation of nuclear-weapons scientists as the director of Nohwike' Bagowa(House of Our Foot Scott Atran brought anthropologically driven recom- prints), the White Mountain Apache Cultural Center and mendations on U.S. policy and intelligence gathering Museum, in Fort Apache, Arizona. Besides simple exhibit al Qaeda and related terrorist efforts to massive numb creation, the goals of public archaeologists like those men- of people through his New York Times article, To Beat Al tioned here are to promote cultural heritage as a tool of Queda, Look to the East, "which ran in the Opinion Section empowerment and to invite descendent community voices in December of 2009(Atran 2009) to be stakeholders and active voices in shaping the direction
214 American Anthropologist • Vol. 112, No. 2 • June 2010 and as a guest on dozens of radio and television shows to discuss the situation in Honduras. Many public anthropologists released the results of their research on the environmental, socioeconomic, and health effects of military presence across the world this year. New titles in 2009 include Catherine Lutz’s Bases of Empire: The Global Struggle against U.S. Military Posts (2009), which interrogates the political, environmental, and economic impact of these bases on their surrounding communities across the globe, and David Vine’s Island of Shame: The Secret History of the U.S. Military Base on Diego Garcia (2009), which details the forced relocation of the indigenous Chagossians from Diego Garcia by the United States so that the U.S. could build a naval base. Vine documents the human rights abuses—extreme poverty, lack of compensation, and health problems—that were covered up the United States. Tone Bleie, Jennifer Hays, and Robert Hitchcock participated in the 2009 Forum for Development Cooperation with Indigenous Peoples conference, “Violent Con- flicts, Ceasefires, and Peace Accords through the Lens of Indigenous Peoples,” held at the University of Tromso in Norway, on October 22–23, 2009. The conference came at a time when conflict, war, and intergroup struggles affecting indigenous peoples across the world were (and are) heightening. The meeting’s objectives were to develop sustainable strategies for addressing violence, negotiating peace accords, and addressing postconflict issues. Anthropologists’ contributions included outlining strategies to manage con- flicts (e.g., supporting traditional mechanisms of addressing disputes) and developing postconflict reconstruction and development programs, as seen, for example, in the Chittagong Hill Tracts of Bangladesh, where a new commission is in place, and in Guatemala, where indigenous peoples are working with anthropologists and others in the implementation of the peace accords. Hugh Gusterson (2009a) explored the increasing U.S. militarization of the world in his column for the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists. In addition to exploring the expense and symbolism of U.S. overseas military bases, Gusterson’s monthly column serves as an example of anthropologists keeping journalists on mark by painting a fuller picture of the relationships among nuclear weapons, global power, war, and peace. For example, Gusterson (2009b) expands our knowledge beyond the New York Times reporting on the recently completed Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory’s National Ignition Facility (NIF), showing that, although the press has publicized the facility as a potential savior to our nation’s energy problems, it was funded through the nuclear-weapons budget and serves as a training site for the next generation of nuclear-weapons scientists. Scott Atran brought anthropologically driven recommendations on U.S. policy and intelligence gathering on al Qaeda and related terrorist efforts to massive numbers of people through his New York Times article, “To Beat Al Queda, Look to the East,” which ran in the Opinion Section in December of 2009 (Atran 2009). The challenge for U.S. anthropologists working in militarized contexts in 2010 is to find a constructive avenue for applying our ethnographic findings to advocate for social justice and human rights. This is especially thorny given that our government supports peacethrough war and,thus, increased militarization. The role of U.S. anthropology becomes that of providing nuance to the effects of governmental policy on the peoples and cultures of the world during this seemingly contradictory moment where, on the one hand, there is global movement toward a peace agenda based on universal human rights while, on the other hand, there are several examples from 2009 of U.S. support for the increased militarization of the world. PUBLIC ARCHAEOLOGY, MUSEUMS, AND CULTURAL HERITAGE Museums and archaeology continued to increase their civic engagement in 2009. Collaborative Anthropologiescontains several examples of collaborative archaeological research including the work of Liam Brady, Elizabeth Chilton, T. J. Ferguson, Siobhan Hart, Michael Heckenberger, Sunny Lybarger, Nicholas C. Laluk, Barbara Mills, Wendi Field Murray, and Nancy Parezo. In 2009, these anthropologists have collectively used their expertise in support of land claims and land-use rights, to aid descendent groups in the federal recognition process in the United States, and in developing archaeological resources for public display and attracting cultural tourism (Lassiter 2009:3–4). For instance, Michael Heckenberger’s ethnoarchaeological work with the Kuikuro in the Amazon illuminated ancestral places for the Kuikora. Chip Colwell-Chanthaphonh’s (2009) and Jordan Jacobs’s (2009) work on the repatriation of human remains and sacred artifacts pursuant to the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act is illustrative of the sustained and meaningful collaborative working relationships being fostered among archaeologists, museum anthropologists, and the Native American community that are expanding our intellectual understanding of identity and heritage. In 2009, Robert Connolly introduced a shift in how exhibits are created at Memphis’s C. H. Nash Museum at Chucalissa, situated on a late-prehistoric earthwork complex, by inviting the Chocktaw and Chickasaw to move from “actors to director and producers” of new exhibit creation. In a similar vein, in 2010 the museum will hire and train area high school students to create an exhibit on the African American experience in the region. Like Connolly, Karl Hoerig has maintained a commitment to integrate the Apache community into the museum planning in his role as the director of Nohwike’ Bagowa (House of Our Foot- ´ prints), the White Mountain Apache Cultural Center and Museum, in Fort Apache, Arizona. Besides simple exhibit creation, the goals of public archaeologists like those mentioned here are to promote cultural heritage as a tool of empowerment and to invite descendent community voices to be stakeholders and active voices in shaping the direction
Brondo Year in Review Public Anthropology 215 of the museums that represent their heritage. Barbara Little, Memphis's Strengthening Communities Grant Initiative who has been particularly vocal in this arena, gave the Dis- Program(2009), a new program inspired by Stanley Hyland tinguished Lecture for the Archaeology Division of the AAa and Katherine Lambert -Pennington, is designed to build ca- meetings this year. Her talk, "Reintegrating Archaeology in pacity in neighborhoods and community organizations while the Service of Sustainable Culture, called on archeologists furthering the engaged scholarship agenda of the university tousetheirskillsetstobecometoolsofcivicengagementfaculty(http://www.memphis.edu/scgrants) Meanwhile, the Smithsonian's new project, "Recover Master's degree programs focused on pre ing Voices: A Learning Archive fo ologists for careers in public service, community organiz- and Indigenous Knowledge, seeks to utilize the museum's g, and social advocacy have seen some growth within the collections and position on the National Mall to help indige- year,as well as programs in"Public Interest Anthropology nous communities around the world to continue and grow (University of Pennsylvania). Public anthropologists met for language and culture programs Housed at the National Mu- the Sixth Annual Public Anthropology Conference at Amer- seum of National History, this project will both learn from ican University in Washington, D. C, under the charge of and help sustain this diversity into futue <enous knowledg the worlds diversity of languages and ind "Advancing Social Justice in Times of Crisis. "Dozens of erations(Bell conference sessions dedicated to the" engaged universit 2009:45) ared on the programs of both the sfaa and aaa annual A new critical title in public archeology was Tom Kings meetings; this was also a focus of Setha Lows presidential Unprotected Heritage: Whitewashing Destruction of Our Cultural address at the annual meeting, reflecting the move toward and Natural Environment(2009), which uncovers the inner universitv-commu from the perspective of someone who worked within the publically engaged research, protect their right to academic CRM system for decades, King points the finger at the freedom. or recognize their efforts through the tenure and tem's watchdogs who serve as advocates for environmen- promotion process unprotection. He offers solutions to strengthen NEPA To address this issue of the e value ar d meaning of pub through a coml ens lic anthropology work in an academic-review process, in 2009 the AAA Committee on Practicing, Applied and Pub- DISCIPLINARY AND ORGANIZATIONAL lic Interest Anthropology( CoPAPIA)and the Consortium of ADVANCEMENTS Practicing and Applied Anthropology Programs(COPAA) An exciting emerging trend is the increasing number of began working on a proposal to the AAA Executive Board university-based anthropologists working in collaborative to create guidelines for Tenure and Promotion committees action-oriented community-based research. The Universit to evaluate and recognize these ethnographic contributions of North Carolina at Chapel-Hill's Center for Integrating Other 2009 CoPAPIA efforts to advance public and practic Research and Action(CIRA), organized by James Pea anthropology include a self-review and strategic planning cock, brings together university researchers and commu- with AAA sections to increase their practitioner base; a sur nity leaders to collaborate on projects to advance sustain- vey of anthropology masters alumni(who presumably are able development, community well-being, and social justice largely employed in practice); support for the"ungating"of inNorthCarolinaandbeyond(http://cira.unc.edu).Asarticlesofinteresttonon-aaamembers(i.e.,"thepublic) the executive director of the University of Minnesota's Ur- support for the creation of a gray literature and technical re- ban Research and Outreach/Engagement Center(URO ort portal; and ongoing discussions with the AAA Program ship with the city of minneapol. laurin works in partner n.edu), Irma Mcc Committee to revise the format and structure of conference community-based orga- sessions in a way that is more inviting to practicing anthro that face North Minneapolis, one sf ne complex problems pologists(e.g, moving trom paper sessions to dialogue and nizations. and residents to address the st underserved debate) communities in the area. In 2009. the UROC worked with ommunity stakeholders to redevelop a derelict shopping INNOVATIVE MEANS OF ENGAGING center into a multiuse community facility. In December of AND BRIDGING MULTIPLE PUBLICS 2009, the White House announced a $2.9 million grant to In 2009, blogs not only served to expand the democratize- UROC to develop public community-based computer cen- tion of knowledge and to bring anthropology to the pub ters throughout underserved neighborhoods in the twin lic but also contributed to an increasing dialogue between Cities; it was the only award given from the recovery members of the public and anthropologists. Marty Otarez's Act funds to a university and the largest grant given in Sidewalk Radio provides a tool to communicate and spur its category. This form of public anthropology is respond- the public to action with regard to issues affecting commu ing to the what's in it for me question"that communi- nities across the world fre om an ant anthropological perspective tiesandpopulationsareaskinganthropologistswhenap-(www.sidewalkradio.net).Createdaspartofaclassproject proached to participate in research studies. The University of Culture and the Environment, Anthropology Department
Brondo • Year in Review: Public Anthropology 215 of the museums that represent their heritage. Barbara Little, who has been particularly vocal in this arena, gave the Distinguished Lecture for the Archaeology Division of the AAA meetings this year. Her talk, “Reintegrating Archaeology in the Service of Sustainable Culture,” called on archeologists to use their skill sets to become tools of civic engagement. Meanwhile, the Smithsonian’s new project, “Recovering Voices: A Learning Archive for Endangered Languages and Indigenous Knowledge,” seeks to utilize the museum’s collections and position on the National Mall to help indigenous communities around the world to continue and grow language and culture programs. Housed at the National Museum of National History, this project will both learn from the world’s diversity of languages and indigenous knowledge and help sustain this diversity into future generations (Bell 2009:45). A new critical title in public archeology was Tom King’s Unprotected Heritage: Whitewashing Destruction of Our Cultural and Natural Environment (2009), which uncovers the inner workings of—and failures—of the National Environmental Policy Act and National Historic Preservation Act. Written from the perspective of someone who worked within the CRM system for decades, King points the finger at the system’s watchdogs who serve as advocates for environmental unprotection. He offers solutions to strengthen NEPA through a community advocacy lens. DISCIPLINARY AND ORGANIZATIONAL ADVANCEMENTS An exciting emerging trend is the increasing number of university-based anthropologists working in collaborative action-oriented community-based research. The University of North Carolina at Chapel-Hill’s Center for Integrating Research and Action (CIRA), organized by James Peacock, brings together university researchers and community leaders to collaborate on projects to advance sustainable development, community well-being, and social justice in North Carolina and beyond (http://cira.unc.edu). As the executive director of the University of Minnesota’s Urban Research and Outreach/Engagement Center (UROC; www.uroc.umn.edu), Irma McClaurin works in partnership with the city of Minneapolis, community-based organizations, and residents to address the complex problems that face North Minneapolis, one of the most underserved communities in the area. In 2009, the UROC worked with community stakeholders to redevelop a derelict shopping center into a multiuse community facility. In December of 2009, the White House announced a $2.9 million grant to UROC to develop public community-based computer centers throughout underserved neighborhoods in the Twin Cities; it was the only award given from the Recovery Act funds to a university and the largest grant given in its category. This form of public anthropology is responding to the “what’s in it for me question” that communities and populations are asking anthropologists when approachedto participate in research studies. The University of Memphis’s Strengthening Communities Grant Initiative Program (2009), a new program inspired by Stanley Hyland and Katherine Lambert-Pennington, is designed to build capacity in neighborhoods and community organizations while furthering the engaged scholarship agenda of the university faculty (http://www.memphis.edu/scgrants). Master’s degree programs focused on preparing anthropologists for careers in public service, community organizing, and social advocacy have seen some growth within the year, as well as programs in “Public Interest Anthropology” (University of Pennsylvania). Public anthropologists met for the Sixth Annual Public Anthropology Conference at American University in Washington, D.C., under the charge of “Advancing Social Justice in Times of Crisis.” Dozens of conference sessions dedicated to the “engaged university” appeared on the programs of both the SfAA and AAA annual meetings; this was also a focus of Setha Low’s presidential address at the annual meeting, reflecting the move toward university–community collaborations. In spite of these advances, there also remains concern among anthropologists that their employment institutions will not support their publically engaged research, protect their right to academic freedom, or recognize their efforts through the tenure and promotion process. To address this issue of the value and meaning of public anthropology work in an academic-review process, in 2009 the AAA Committee on Practicing, Applied and Public Interest Anthropology (CoPAPIA) and the Consortium of Practicing and Applied Anthropology Programs (COPAA) began working on a proposal to the AAA Executive Board to create guidelines for Tenure and Promotion committees to evaluate and recognize these ethnographic contributions. Other 2009 CoPAPIA efforts to advance public and practicing anthropology include a self-review and strategic planning with AAA sections to increase their practitioner base; a survey of anthropology masters alumni (who presumably are largely employed in practice); support for the “ungating” of articles of interest to non-AAA members (i.e., “the public”); support for the creation of a gray literature and technical report portal; and ongoing discussions with the AAA Program Committee to revise the format and structure of conference sessions in a way that is more inviting to practicing anthropologists (e.g., moving from paper sessions to dialogue and debate). INNOVATIVE MEANS OF ENGAGING AND BRIDGING MULTIPLE PUBLICS In 2009, blogs not only served to expand the democratization of knowledge and to bring anthropology to the public but also contributed to an increasing dialogue between members of the public and anthropologists. Marty Otanez’s ˜ Sidewalk Radio provides a tool to communicate and spur the public to action with regard to issues affecting communities across the world from an anthropological perspective (www.sidewalkradio.net). Created as part of a class project (Culture and the Environment, Anthropology Department
216 American Anthropologist Vol 112, No. 2. June 2010 University of Colorado, Denver, fall of 2009), Sidewalk Ra CONCLUSIONS dio illustrates new ways to engage students and the public In many ways, 2009 can be seen as both a year of promise and through visual and web-based mediums. In 2009, posts took change and a discouraging time of"business as usual. "From up such diverse debates as natural birth, teen drinking the standpoint of u.S. anthropology, the new administration bacco farming, and Otarez's own work on the health effe offered cautious optimism and a renewed sense of hope that of uranium mining in Malawi. At Kansas State University, human rights would become a funding priority, espe Michael Wesch's Digital Ethnography offers ethnographies of in the areas of healthcare and environmental and for You Tube and the World Simulation Project, an experiential policy. A year wrought with fiscal and environmental crisis approach to teaching introductory cultural anthropology revitalized anthropologists fervor to ensure that the voices esch was named one of the National Geographic Societys of marginalized peoples and cultures are heard as well as to Emerging Explorers"for 2009. Although these two exa rally behind the wake-up call that our planet and its peoples les are more general in content, other anthropologists keep cannot afford to continue along the path we have so far issue-specific blogs. At the close of December 2008, Holly paved McCarthy(2008)created a list of the" Top 100 Anthropo- However, as the research of public anthro In logy Blogs 2009 demonstrates. there has been little action taken to veer Other anthropologists continued a long-standing disci from the market-driven approach to the commodification of plinary tradition of using journalism to communicate their people and natural resources. Neoliberal conservation mod- research to wider audiences. For example, Melissa Checker els, carbon offsetting as a dominating force of the climate wrote several articles for print and online magazines about talks, increased dam construction, development disasters the ways that carbon offsetting ignores human rights both and significant cuts to state-funded universities, resulting in in developed and developing countries. As well, Checker furloughs, early retirements, and departmental merges, call wrote a series of articles for the Gotham Gazette, an online into question the degree to which anthropology is indeed NYC-based newspaper, critiquing the Bloomberg adminis- considered by the"public. " But these same points also illus- tration s sustainability plan and analyzing the ways in which it trate the pressing need of and for anthropology in the com- helped or hindered the efforts of local environmental-justice decade. as we continue to the lead the social scien activists. These efforts led her to"break"a story about a as the primary discipline that strives to document the ef highly radioactive site in Staten Island, which had been part fects of change from the perspective of those most impacted f the Manhattan Project( Checker 2009b) by it An innovative example of reaching out and attempt The current fiscal and ecological crisis provides an op- ing to bridge multiple publics is Amahl Bishara's work to por ortunity to reimagine our communities through the lens A translate feature articles from u.S. news from Arabic into peace and equity. As evidenced by this article, public an glish and then have Palestinians interpret and analyze the thropologists are generating new possibilities for the future news articles. Although public commentary in the United through innovative means of collaboration and dialogue in- States on Palestinian society and politics abounds, Pales cluding university-community development partners tinian response to this commentary is scant. Bishara's work engagement in policy setting ricina makes available the kinds of Palestinian political and media dialogues on indigenous rights, war, water rights, and cli- analysis that seldom appear in the news. By choosing to in- mate change; and the expansion of interactive, web-based terview nonelite Palestinians, and bringing representations venues for communicating and entering a dialogue with the of community back to the community for scrutiny, Bishara's public(e.g, blogs, video projects, online newspapers). The work provides an opportunity to reflect on a diverse and challenge for 2010 is to transform these relationships into engaging set of u. S. news articles in a new light(from socially and environmentally sustainable policy change rab an s articles that employ well-worn stereotypes about Arab and Muslim gender relations to uncovering car Keri Vacanti rondo depar ent of Anthropology, University of nuanced depictions of cultural practices rarely seen in u.S. Memphis, Memphis, TN 38152: kbrondoememphis edu http://anthronow.com/category/fieldnotessdetailedon mainstream media). This innovative approach The Advancement of Science's(AAAS)new"On-call Scientists program offers an innovative means through which NOTE can become engaged in global human Acknowledgmen ly talented and dynamic public anthro- work(see oncallscientists. aaas. org). The AAAS Science and pologists supported the development of this article. I am particularly Human Rights Coalition was developed to increase commu- grateful to Linda Bennett, Janet Chernela, Shirley Fiske,Robert nication and collaboration between the scientific community Hitchcock, and Michael Perez for their excellent contributions and and the human rights community to protect and advance help in the development of specific sections of this article.I thank universal human rights. Anthropologists can now join other Lori Allen, Kelly Alley,Amahl Gregory Button, Melissa scientists in volunteering their expertise to human rights Checker, Chip Colwell-Chanthaphonh, Saul Cohen, Robert Con- organizations and affected communities nolly, Susan Crate, T. J. Ferguson, Robert Hahn, Janice Harper
216 American Anthropologist • Vol. 112, No. 2 • June 2010 University of Colorado, Denver, fall of 2009), Sidewalk Radio illustrates new ways to engage students and the public through visual and web-based mediums. In 2009, posts took up such diverse debates as natural birth, teen drinking, tobacco farming, and Otanez’s own work on the health effects ˜ of uranium mining in Malawi. At Kansas State University, Michael Wesch’s Digital Ethnography offers ethnographies of YouTube and the World Simulation Project, an experiential approach to teaching introductory cultural anthropology. Wesch was named one of the National Geographic Society’s “Emerging Explorers” for 2009. Although these two examples are more general in content, other anthropologists keep issue-specific blogs. At the close of December 2008, Holly McCarthy (2008) created a list of the “Top 100 Anthropology Blogs.” Other anthropologists continued a long-standing disciplinary tradition of using journalism to communicate their research to wider audiences. For example, Melissa Checker wrote several articles for print and online magazines about the ways that carbon offsetting ignores human rights both in developed and developing countries. As well, Checker wrote a series of articles for the Gotham Gazette, an online NYC-based newspaper, critiquing the Bloomberg administration’s sustainability plan and analyzing the ways in which it helped or hindered the efforts of local environmental-justice activists. These efforts led her to “break” a story about a highly radioactive site in Staten Island, which had been part of the Manhattan Project (Checker 2009b). An innovative example of reaching out and attempting to bridge multiple publics is Amahl Bishara’s work to translate feature articles from U.S. news from Arabic into English and then have Palestinians interpret and analyze the news articles. Although public commentary in the United States on Palestinian society and politics abounds, Palestinian response to this commentary is scant. Bishara’s work makes available the kinds of Palestinian political and media analysis that seldom appear in the news. By choosing to interview nonelite Palestinians, and bringing representations of community back to the community for scrutiny, Bishara’s work provides an opportunity to reflect on a diverse and engaging set of U.S. news articles in a new light (from criticizing articles that employ well-worn stereotypes about Arab and Muslim gender relations to uncovering carefully nuanced depictions of cultural practices rarely seen in U.S. mainstream media). This innovative approach is detailed on http://anthronow.com/category/fieldnotes. The Advancement of Science’s (AAAS) new “On-call” Scientists program offers an innovative means through which anthropologists can become engaged in global human rights work (see oncallscientists.aaas.org). The AAAS Science and Human Rights Coalition was developed to increase communication and collaboration between the scientific community and the human rights community to protect and advance universal human rights. Anthropologists can now join other scientists in volunteering their expertise to human rights organizations and affected communities. CONCLUSIONS In many ways, 2009 can be seen as both a year of promise and change and a discouraging time of “business as usual.” From the standpoint of U.S. anthropology, the new administration offered cautious optimism and a renewed sense of hope that human rights would become a funding priority, especially in the areas of healthcare and environmental and foreign policy. A year wrought with fiscal and environmental crisis revitalized anthropologists’ fervor to ensure that the voices of marginalized peoples and cultures are heard as well as to rally behind the wake-up call that our planet and its peoples cannot afford to continue along the path we have so far paved. However, as the research of public anthropologists in 2009 demonstrates, there has been little action taken to veer from the market-driven approach to the commodification of people and natural resources. Neoliberal conservation models, carbon offsetting as a dominating force of the climate talks, increased dam construction, development disasters, and significant cuts to state-funded universities, resulting in furloughs, early retirements, and departmental merges, call into question the degree to which anthropology is indeed considered by the “public.” But these same points also illustrate the pressing need of and for anthropology in the coming decade, as we continue to the lead the social sciences as the primary discipline that strives to document the effects of change from the perspective of those most impacted by it. The current fiscal and ecological crisis provides an opportunity to reimagine our communities through the lens of peace and equity. As evidenced by this article, public anthropologists are generating new possibilities for the future through innovative means of collaboration and dialogue including university–community development partnerships; engagement in policy settings; participation in international dialogues on indigenous rights, war, water rights, and climate change; and the expansion of interactive, web-based venues for communicating and entering a dialogue with the public (e.g., blogs, video projects, online newspapers). The challenge for 2010 is to transform these relationships into socially and environmentally sustainable policy change. Keri Vacanti Brondo Department of Anthropology, University of Memphis, Memphis, TN 38152; kbrondo@memphis.edu NOTE Acknowledgments. Many talented and dynamic public anthropologists supported the development of this article. I am particularly grateful to Linda Bennett, Janet Chernela, Shirley Fiske, Robert Hitchcock, and Michael Perez for their excellent contributions and help in the development of specific sections of this article. I also thank Lori Allen, Kelly Alley, Amahl Bishara, Gregory Button, Melissa Checker, Chip Colwell-Chanthaphonh, Saul Cohen, Robert Connolly, Susan Crate, T. J. Ferguson, Robert Hahn, Janice Harper, Jim
Brondo Year in Review Public Anthropology 217 Igoe, Noor Johnson, Ted Maclin, Irma McClaurin, Bill McKinney, Crate. Susan and Mark Nutta Laura McNamara, Anthony Oliver-Smith, Marty Otanez, Adrienne 2009 Anthropology and Climate Change: From Encounters Pine. Bob pokrant suzanne schneider and elizabeth tunstall for Action. Walnut Creek. CA: Left Coast haring their work or that of their colleagues, and Daniel Vacanti for Gonzalez, Roberto J his excellent editorial guidance on tone and content. Finally, I am 2009 American Counterinsurgency: Human Science and the Hu specially grateful for Barbara Rose Johnston's patient mentorship man Terrain? Chicago: University of Chicago through the writing and editing process and her overall inspiration Gonzalez, Roberto J and Hugh Gusterson and dedication to the burgeoning field of public anthropology 009 Taking the Next Step: Why We Should Continue Strength- ning the AAA Ethics Code. Anthropology News 50(6) Gusterson, Hugh REFERENCES CITED 2009a Empire of Bases. Bulletin of Atomic Scientists American Anthropological Association(AAA March18,2009.http://www.thebulletin.org/web-edition/ 2009 Congressional Black Caucus Calls on AAA Ex columnists/hugh-gusterson/empire-of-bases, accessed Jan- perts.http://www.aaanet.org/issues/policy-advocacy/aaa- 3.2010 members-talk-about-race-on-capitol-hill, cfm, accessed J 009b Why Thomas Friedman Is Wrong about the National Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, April 27, 200 Atran. Scott http://www.thebulletin,org/web-edition/columnists/hugh 2009 To Beat Al Queda, Look to the East. New York Times gusterson/why-thomas-friedman-wrong-about-the-national- December12.http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/13/ ignition-facility, accessed January 3, 2010 opinion/13atran. html, accessed January 17, 2010 Himmelgreen, David, ed Bell, Joshua 2009 The Global Food Crisis: New Insights into an Age-Old 2009 Recovering Voices: A New Smithsonian Initiative. Anthro- Problem. NAPA Bulletin 32(1) pology News 50(8): 45 Ho. Karen Bourgois, Philippe, and Jeff Schonberg 2009 Liquidated: An Ethnography of Wall Street. Durham, NC 2009 Righted nd. Berkeley: University of California Duke u Jacobs, Jordan Button, Gregory 2009 Repatriation and the Reconstruction of Identity. Museum 2009a The Search for Environmental Justice in Perry County, Anthropology 32(2): 75-90 Alabama, Counterpunch, July 16, 2009 Www Johnston, Barbara Rose counterpunch. org/button07162009. html, accessed January 2008 From the Associate Editor for Practicing Anthropology 2,2010. American Anthropologist 110(2): 172 2009b The TVA Ash Spill One Year Later: Lessons 2009a Water Culture Wars. Counterpunch, March 27-29 Learned.CounterpunchDecember16,2009.http://www http://www.counterpunch.org/johnston03272009.html rg/button12162009 h cessed January accessed January 3, 2010 3,2010. 2009b War, Peace and the Obamajority. Counterpunch Checker. melissa October19.http://www.counterpunch.org/johnston 2009a Anthropology in the Public Sphere, 2008: Emerging 10192009. html, accessed January 13, 2010 Trends and Significant Impacts. American Anthropologist King. t 111(2):162-169 2009 Our Unprotected Heritage: Whitewashing the Destruction 009b Staten Island's Toxic Stew. Gotham Gazette, May of Our Cultural and Natural Environment. Walnut Creel 26,2009.http://www.gothamgazette.com/print/2923,ac CA: Left Coast Kiviat. Barbara 2009cCounterpunch,September9,2009.http://www 2009 An Anthropologist on What's Wrong with Wall Street terpunch. org/checker09092009. html, accessed Jar TimeMagazineJuly22.http://www.time.com/tim 3,2010 business/article/0, 8599, 1912085,00. html, accessed January Colwell-Chanthaphonh, Chip 16.2010 2009 Reconciling American Archaeology and Native America Lassiter. Luke eric Daedalus138(2):94-104 2009 Collaborative Anthropologists, vol. 2: Collaborative Ar- mmission on the Engagement of Anthropology with U.S. Military apologies. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press and Intelligence Communities( CEAUSSIC) Lawless. Robert 2009 CEAUSSIC Final Report on The Army's Human Terrain Sy 2009 Empires and the Sullying of Anthropology. Coun- em Proof of Concept Program Submitted to the Executive terpunch,November6-8.http://www.count Board of the American Anthropological Association, Octo- ber14,2009.http://www.aaanet.org/cmtes/commissions/ Lutz. Catherine ceaussic/upload/ceaussic-hts_final_report. pdf, accessed Jan- 2009 Bases of Empire: The Global Struggle against U. S Military uary3,2010 Posts. New York: New York University Press
Brondo • Year in Review: Public Anthropology 217 Igoe, Noor Johnson, Ted Maclin, Irma McClaurin, Bill McKinney, Laura McNamara, Anthony Oliver-Smith, Marty Otanez, Adrienne ˜ Pine, Bob Pokrant, Suzanne Schneider, and Elizabeth Tunstall for sharing their work or that of their colleagues, and Daniel Vacanti for his excellent editorial guidance on tone and content. Finally, I am especially grateful for Barbara Rose Johnston’s patient mentorship through the writing and editing process and her overall inspiration and dedication to the burgeoning field of public anthropology. REFERENCES CITED American Anthropological Association (AAA) 2009 Congressional Black Caucus Calls on AAA Experts. http://www.aaanet.org/issues/policy-advocacy/aaamembers-talk-about-race-on-capitol-hill.cfm, accessed January 6, 2010. Atran, Scott 2009 To Beat Al Queda, Look to the East. New York Times, December 12. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/13/ opinion/13atran.html, accessed January 17, 2010. Bell, Joshua 2009 Recovering Voices: A New Smithsonian Initiative. Anthropology News 50(8):45. Bourgois, Philippe, and Jeff Schonberg 2009 Righteous Dopefiend. Berkeley: University of California Press. Button, Gregory 2009a The Search for Environmental Justice in Perry County, Alabama. Counterpunch, July 16, 2009. http://www. counterpunch.org/button07162009.html, accessed January 12, 2010. 2009b The TVA Ash Spill One Year Later: Lessons Learned. Counterpunch, December 16, 2009. http://www. counterpunch.org/button12162009.html, accessed January 3, 2010. Checker, Melissa 2009a Anthropology in the Public Sphere, 2008: Emerging Trends and Significant Impacts. American Anthropologist 111(2):162–169. 2009b Staten Island’s Toxic Stew. Gotham Gazette, May 26, 2009. http://www.gothamgazette.com/print/2923, accessed January 3, 2010. 2009c Counterpunch, September 9, 2009. http://www. counterpunch.org/checker09092009.html, accessed January 3, 2010. Colwell-Chanthaphonh, Chip 2009 Reconciling American Archaeology and Native America. Daedalus 138(2):94–104. Commission onthe Engagement of AnthropologywithU.S. Military and Intelligence Communities (CEAUSSIC) 2009 CEAUSSIC Final Report on The Army’s Human Terrain System Proof of Concept Program. Submitted to the Executive Board of the American Anthropological Association, October 14, 2009. http://www.aaanet.org/cmtes/commissions/ ceaussic/upload/ceaussic_hts_final_report.pdf, accessed January 3, 2010. Crate, Susan, and Mark Nuttal 2009 Anthropology and Climate Change: From Encounters to Action. Walnut Creek, CA: Left Coast. Gonzalez, Roberto J. ´ 2009 American Counterinsurgency: Human Science and the Human Terrain? Chicago: University of Chicago. Gonzalez, Roberto J., and Hugh Gusterson ´ 2009 Taking the Next Step: Why We Should Continue Strengthening the AAA Ethics Code. Anthropology News 50(6):4. Gusterson, Hugh 2009a Empire of Bases. Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, March 18, 2009. http://www.thebulletin.org/web-edition/ columnists/hugh-gusterson/empire-of-bases, accessed January 3, 2010. 2009b Why Thomas Friedman Is Wrong about the National Ignition Facility. Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, April 27, 2009. http://www.thebulletin.org/web-edition/columnists/hughgusterson/why-thomas-friedman-wrong-about-the-nationalignition-facility, accessed January 3, 2010. Himmelgreen, David, ed. 2009 The Global Food Crisis: New Insights into an Age-Old Problem. NAPA Bulletin 32(1). Ho, Karen 2009 Liquidated: An Ethnography of Wall Street. Durham, NC: Duke University Press. Jacobs, Jordan 2009 Repatriation and the Reconstruction of Identity. Museum Anthropology 32(2):75–90. Johnston, Barbara Rose 2008 From the Associate Editor for Practicing Anthropology. American Anthropologist 110(2):172. 2009a Water Culture Wars. Counterpunch, March 27–29. http://www.counterpunch.org/johnston03272009.html, accessed January 3, 2010. 2009b War, Peace and the Obamajority. Counterpunch, October 19. http://www.counterpunch.org/johnston 10192009.html, accessed January 13, 2010. King, Tom 2009 Our Unprotected Heritage: Whitewashing the Destruction of Our Cultural and Natural Environment. Walnut Creek, CA: Left Coast. Kiviat, Barbara 2009 An Anthropologist on What’s Wrong with Wall Street. Time Magazine, July 22. http://www.time.com/time/ business/article/0,8599,1912085,00.html, accessed January 16, 2010. Lassiter, Luke Eric, ed. 2009 Collaborative Anthropologists, vol. 2: Collaborative Archaeologies. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press. Lawless, Robert 2009 Empires and the Sullying of Anthropology. Counterpunch, November 6–8. http://www.counterpunch.org/ lawless11062009.html, accessed January 3, 2010. Lutz, Catherine 2009 Bases of Empire: The Global Struggle against U.S. Military Posts. New York: New York University Press