GSU Anthropology

Hello y'all- The Anthro Club has organized an event with... YOUR GSU ANTHRO PROFESSORS on "Identity in Fieldwork"!! The link is: https://gsumeetings.webex.com/gsumeetings/j.php For questions, please email Dr. White @ [email protected] or Cassie Eng @ [email protected]

Check out this course being offered by Dr. Steven Black this fall (Selected Topics 4980/6980, The Anthropology of Global Health and NGOs):

Congratulations to our alum Jenail Marshall (BA, GSU Anthropology), currently a PhD candidate in Anthropology at Purdue:

TOMORROW!! (Wednesday, April 7, 4:30p.m.) we are hosting another event in our College to Career Initiative event series. Link: Meeting link:... https://gsumeetings.webex.com/gsumeetings/j.php Meeting number: 120 012 1077 Password: 2KWexWZkS43 Host key: 558585 Cohost: Bethany Turner; Cassandra White; Nicola Sharratt More ways to join Join by video system Dial [email protected] You can also dial 173.243.2.68 and enter your meeting number. Join by phone +1-415-655-0002 US Toll Access code: 120 012 1077 Global call-in numbers See more

Congratulations to our M.A. student, Shelby Anderson-Badbade, the winner of the 2021 Graduate Teaching Assistant Teaching Award from Center for Excellence in Teaching, Learning and Online Education! The award recognizes "Teaching Effectiveness, Innovation, and Engagement." Shelby has served as a TA and as an Instructor of Record for our Introduction to Cultural Anthropology course. GSU Center for Excellence in Teaching and Learning - CETL

https://www.facebook.com/events/192196335778404 Dr. Cassandra White of GSU Anthropology will be speaking today in this Facebook Live event (panel is in Portuguese) at 2p.m. EDT

2021 Spring Graduate Research Symposium: Wednesday, March 31, 4:30-6:30p.m. Meeting Information Meeting link:... https://gsumeetings.webex.com/gsumeetings/j.php Meeting number: 120 986 6158 Password: gsJqvSFk336 See more

Join us for an Instagram Q&A about the M.A. in Anthropology program! Current grad student Megan Sarmento will be taking your questions on our Instagram story on Feb. 15 at noon. Follow along here: https://www.instagram.com/gsuanthropology/

We have featured several of our alumni who have been working on the Covid-19 pandemic response. Today we want to highlight the work of one of our current MA students, Sydney Resler, who is in the second year of our graduate program at GSU Anthropology. Before coming to our department, Sydney served as a Peace Corps volunteer in Guinea and held an Americorps VISTA position with the Substance Abuse and HIV/STD Prevention at Alaska Native Tribal Health Consortium in Anchorage. ...Here she describes her recent pandemic-related work and research: "This past summer, I worked virtually as part of the Colorado COVID-19 Containment Response Corps (CCRC) as an AmeriCorps VISTA Summer Associate with the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment. I was a contact tracer and resource coordinator--I called people who had come in contact with someone who had tested positive for COVID-19, informed them on proper quarantine/isolation procedures, distributed COVID-19 test results, and helped people access local resources during quarantine and isolation, such as financial assistance, food, and medical care. Lindsay Wiley, a professor of health law at American University, perfectly described contact tracing as "epidemiological investigation plus social work" (https://twitter.com/ProfLWiley/status/1293253732814270464). My current graduate assistantship at GSU's Urban Studies Institute also involves helping people navigate community resources related to food security, medical care, and transportation in Atlanta. Although we were not originally focusing on COVID, it has become a significant factor during my counseling sessions as the pandemic has caused a lot of stress and difficulty in peoples' lives. People have an even harder time accessing healthcare, food, work, social services, and other resources that were already difficult to access before COVID. My anthropological training has helped understand the social determinants of health at play to best assist people impacted by COVID-19 and other issues that impact various aspects of health. Both of these roles are very patient-centered and patient-driven. There is a large focus on allowing the patient to lead their own session--my role is to help guide the patient to solutions to the problems they themselves identify. The patient is the expert of their own lives, so they know their problems, needs, and possible solutions more intimately than anyone else. I am mostly there to help them brainstorm, lead them to resources they may not have heard about, and help them get more information. You can find out more about CCRC here: https://crcamerica.org/asn/. You can learn more about the research project here: https://urbaninstitute.gsu.edu//mobility-solutions-to-bet/ "

The Covid-19 pandemic has limited data collection opportunities for many of our current graduate students. We asked Melissa McCarthy, M.A. candidate in our department, to tell us about the thesis research she was finally able to carry out early this year, following strict Covid protocols. She wrote: "As a graduate student, one of the most valuable social tools is a strong network of peers and professionals. At least that is what I have learned during my time as a GSU Departm...Continue reading

Mark your calendars for the first in a Department of Anthropology event series sponsored by Georgia State's College to Career Initiative Program. This event, with our alum Monet Burse, is next week. A link to the event will be posted in the comments.

We are excited to highlight the work of one of our alumni, Su Choe (MA, GSU Anthropology) with the Asian American Advocacy Fund in Georgia. An interview with her is featured in the blog post link below, and she sent us these details about her current position: "Currently, I am working as a Korean community organizer at Asian American Advocacy Fund, a grassroots organization dedicated to building a politically-conscious, engaged, and progressive Asian American base in Georgia.... As a Korean community organizer, I address immigrant issues that directly impact the everyday lives of immigrant communities in Georgia and help bring awareness to the communities about potential points of advocacy. I work to increase the Korean community's voter participation by creating in-language election and voting information resources and by organizing educational and informative sessions to address the significance of the community's political and civic involvement. Applying my trained anthropological research skills, I conduct qualitative research with different generations of Korean Americans to collect their stories and concerns around community and policy issues. With my research, I continuously publish articles and op-eds to deliver the community's narratives about the immigrant and communal issues and the collective power-building opportunities of the Korean American community." https://asianaaf.medium.com/bridging-generations-with-su-ch See more

Congratulations to Rachel Bragg (GSU Anthropology B.A. 2008, Historic Preservation M.A. 2014), who recently joined DeKalb County as a Senior Planner in the Planning and Sustainability Department. She will be working to implement and regulate Historic Preservation guidelines and zoning. She left Brockington and Associates and HW Exhibits after more than 10 years. Rachel started as an Archaeology Field Technician after completing her B.A. in Anthropology, and ended her time with the company as a Project Manager working to develop exhibits on behalf of communities, museums, and corporate clients.