Summer 2011 Wilk named Provost Shahrani receives TASAM Professor Strategic Vision Award Richard Wilk is one of the most rofessor Nazif Shahrani has been named the recipient of a important, prolific, and widely recog- Strategic Vision Award Offered for Scientist by the Turk- nized anthropologists of his genera- ish Asian Center for Strategic Studies (TASAM), a Turk- tion. Among the highest distinctions P ish think tank. The awards ceremony took place in December in at IU, the title of Provost Professor Istanbul, Turkey. Shahrani is professor of Anthropology, professor recognizes Wilk’s groundbreaking of Central Eurasian Studies, and professor and finishing a term research and commitment to teaching as chair of Near Eastern Languages and Cultures. His geographi- and mentoring. He has contributed in cal areas of specialization are Afghanistan, former Soviet Central major ways to the fields of economic Asian Republics (Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan anthropology, environment and sus- and Turkmenistan), Iran, and Turkey. Wilk tainability, consumer culture, and Now in its fifth year, the TASAM Strategic Vision Awards are food studies, nationally and internationally. given each year in honor of statesmen, scientists, public institu- Wilk’s book, Economies and Cultures, is in its third edition, has tions, businessmen, artists and journalists – writers who share a been translated into seven languages, and is considered today the strategic vision with their ideas, works and scientific approaches in most important textbook for graduate and undergraduate courses in order to continuously improve Turkey’s respectable position in its economic anthropology. region and the world on the basis of power and justice, and who According to Michael Jackson, professor of anthropology at Har- make serious endeavors for bringing a vision of contemporaneous vard University, Wilk is “one of the world’s leading anthropological issues to Turkey. Congratulations, Professor Shahrani! authorities on the economic anthropology of households, the eth- nography of consumerism, the anthropology of the Caribbean (espe- cially Belize), the anthropology of food, fashion, and globalization.” Wilk is a “a leader in our local food and sustainability community and is involved in local planning for the development of a Blooming- ton Food Policy Council,” says Jeanne Sept, professor, IU Depart- ment of Anthropology. Not least, and perhaps most importantly, Wilk’s work has had an enormous impact in Belize. Last year, the Supreme Court of Belize relied on Wilk’s research to grant land rights to indigenous commu- nities which have been confronting energy and mining corporations for decades. Wilk said, “Throughout my career, I have often won- dered if my academic research really mattered, if it was ever going to make a real positive contribution to the world. People in Belize have hosted me, taught me, and helped me throughout my career, and I am proud that I have been able to pay back some of that debt.” Nazif Shahrani accepts a Strategic Vision Award Offered for Congratulations, Professor Wilk! Scientist at the TASAM Awards Ceremony in Istanbul, Turkey. Undergraduate discovers unique primate skull on archaeological dive Dominican Republic dive reveals only 15 feet under water in the Padre Nuestro peoples to contact Europeans, but during the third primate cranium from any cavern in the Dominican Republic, gather- one dive, Keller recognized the distinctive of the Caribbean Islands ing archaeology material as part of a team cranial features of a primate. Primates are under the supervision of Charles Beeker extinct in the Dominican Republic, so the In July 2009, IU student Jessica Keller was and Geoffrey Conrad. The IU team’s discovery was completely unexpected. The engaged in what passes for “normal” in the main mission was to learn more about the skull is only the third primate cranium life of an underwater archaeologist. She was Taino people, the first Native American continued on page 3 INSIDE: LETTER FROM THE CHAIR, PAGE 2 • FOOD STUDIES PROGRAM HIGHLIGHTS, PAGE 7 Around the Department continued on page 7 Letter from the chair Recent faculty publications Rising above adversity to The Anthropology Department faculty is prolific. Here is just a small sampling of recently published books and volumes. grow our program • Teaching Environmental Literacy: Across Campus and Across the Curriculum, edited by Heather L. Reynolds, Eduardo S. This has been a rewarding yet challenging Brondízio, and Jennifer Meta Robinson with Doug Karpa and year for the Department. Despite difficult Briana L. Gross. Indiana University Press. budget cuts, the department continued to • The Human Brain Evolving: Paleoneurological move forward on all fronts with renewed Studies in Honor of Ralph L. Holloway, Douglas strength. Faculty and graduate student pro- Broadfield, Michael Yuan,Kathy Schick, and ductivity in terms of research grants, publica- Nicholas Toth. The Stone Age Institute Press. tions, and fieldwork show the department at • African Market Women: Seven Life Stories from the forefront of established and new research Ghana, Gracia Clark, Indiana University Press. areas. Every week new proposals are submit- Brondizio ted, and publications are produced. • Coffee Culture: Local Experiences, Global Not least of our accomplishments, our attention to soci- Connections, by Catherine Tucker. Routledge etal issues has helped to highlight the commitment of the IU Press. anthropology community and the importance of anthropology • Babylon East: Performing Dancehall, Roots to topics of direct interest to the populations and places to which Reggae, and Rastafari in Japan by Marvin D. we dedicate our careers, including Bloomington and Indiana Uni- Sterling. Duke University Press. versity. This ranges from issues of cultural heritage, sustainability, and health, to education, community outreach and land rights. • The Portuguese translation of Emilio Moran’s Perhaps this helps to explain, among other things, the continuous book, Environmental Social Science: Human- growth in enrollment and majors, now over 300. This is twice as Environment Interactions and Sustainability, was much as just few years ago. Students realize that anthropology published in February (originally published in the makes a difference! UK in Jan. 2010 by Wiley/Blackwell). We received with enthusiasm the 2006 National Research • Human Evolutionary Biology, edited by Michael Council (NRC) assessment of graduate programs, published dur- Muehlenbein. Cambridge University Press. continued on page 7 • Anya Royce’s The Anthropology of Performing Arts: Virtuosity, Artistry, and Interpretation in a Cross-Cultural Context (first published in 2004) Congratulations to newly tenured was translated into Polish by Warsaw University and promoted faculty! Press. • Re-Imagining Milk: Cultural and Biological Perspective, by Andrea Wiley. Routledge Press. Tenure: Shane Greene, Laura Scheiber, Marvin Sterling, and Daniel Suslak • Disability and Mobile Citizenship in Postsocial- ist Ukraine by Sarah Phillips. Indiana University Promotion: Gracia Clark and Frances Trix Press. ADJUNCT FACULTY NEWS Timothy Baumann received the 75th Anni- Longing and the Lament of the Raccoon ference, organized by Apple Computer to versary Achievement Award from Missouri Dog,” sponsored by the Center for Folk- explore open access issues in higher educa- Archaeological Society. lore Studies and the Institute for Japanese tion. He is finishing work on a book about Ilena Gershon’s Break Up 2.0 was Studies, Ohio State University, Columbus, the history of the Yuchi Nation and editing published from Cornell University Press Ohio, Nov. 19. the journal Museum Anthropology Review. in July 2010. Gershon also gave a keynote Mary Gray accepted a six-month Vis- Stephanie Kane received funding from address at a conference at Cambridge iting Researcher position at Microsoft Indiana University Office of the Vice Pro- University called “Reconsidering Detach- Research in New England. She is working vost Research Boundaries for her project, ment: The Ethics and Analytics of Discon- on a comparative ethnography that looks “In Water: An Ethnographic Exploration nection.” She was the guest editor for a at different groups of socially marginalized of Art, Law, and Engineering in Kerala’s special issue of the Journal of Linguistic urban and rural young people and their ac- Waterways,” conducted in Travancore Anthropology, 20(2), the issue called “Me- cess to and use of social mobile media. Malabar Coast, Southwest India, in sum- dia Ideologies.” Jason Baird Jackson (Folklore and mer 2010. Michael Foster was awarded an IUB Ethnomusicology) was elected to the A Blackwell Companion to Anthropology Outstanding Junior Faculty Award this Executive Board of the American Folklore of Education, co-edited by Bradley Levin- year. Foster also gave an invited lecture Society and spoke at a number of confer- son and Mica Pollock, was published from titled “Haunting Modernity: Legends, ences, including the Academix 2010 con- Wiley-Blackwell in May. 2 FACULTY & RESEARCH NEWS In February, Joëlle Bahloul gave the On Sept. 28, keynote lecture, “The Social and Cul- Anya Royce Welcome new tural Meaning of Reading and Books was awarded in the 21st Century,” at the Interna- an Honorary faculty, staff tional Conference on “La Lectura en Doctorate, We are pleased to el Mundo de los Jovenes,” Universi- D.Litt, honoris welcome Professor dad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico, causa, from Mexico City. Brian Gilley