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Featured Biographies
Elizabeth BriodyFollowing my PhD at The University of Texas at Austin, my career has been centered in anthropological practice – first as an organizational-culture and change researcher at General Motors R&D, and now as the founder and principal of Cultural Keys which specializes in improving organizational culture, increasing partnership effectiveness, and understanding and reaching customers. In both organizations, I have initiated and managed research projects for clients domestically and abroad. I have held adjunct positions at six universities, most recently at Purdue University. At Purdue, I am also a Co-PI on a five-year NSF RED (Revolutionizing Engineering Departments) grant in the School of Mechanical Engineering. I am currently Secretary of the AAA and Past President of NAPA. Much of my career has been dedicated to raising awareness of careers in business, non-profits, government agencies and NGOs. I have been involved in roles such as:
1) Co-Executive Producer of the NAPA/AAA careers video “Anthropologists at Work: Careers Making a Difference”
2) Co-Author of the textbook The Cultural Dimensions of Global Business (8th ed., 2017), the edited volume Cultural Change from a Business Anthropology Perspective (2018), and the book Transforming Culture: Creating an Sustaining a Better Manufacturing Organization (2010).
3) Co-Leader of the Business Anthropology on the Road program that promotes the value of business anthropology scholarship, employment, and professional organizations to students, faculty, and staff
4) Organizer of eleven 2020 AAA career webinars and workshops
5) PI of a 2020 Wenner-Gren grant “Anthropologists on the Public Stage: A Training Program” to offer web-based, modular training to learn how to work successfully in media and public policy circles
Jeffrey CohenI am a cultural anthropologist and my research focuses on Migration and Refugees; Economics and Development; Nutrition and Research Methodology with work in the USA, Mexico, Turkey and China.
Since the early 1990s I have studied migration from communities in Oaxaca, Mexico to the US with support from the National Science Foundation. In collaboration with Ibrahim Sirkeci (Regent's University, London) we have developed a model of insecurity and migration. I also conduct comparative research on global migration patterns.
My work on entomophagy (eating insects) in Mexico was supported by the National Geographic Society.
I have served as an expert witness on several criminal and immigration/refugee cases, consulted on marketing and cultural issues with Fortune 500 companies and the World Bank.
In my latest book, EATING SOUP WITHOUT A SPOON: ANTHROPOLOGICAL THEORY AND METHOD IN THE REAL WORLD, I explore how to conduct research. You can learn more at: http://utpress.utexas.edu/index.php/books/cohen-eating-soup-without-a-spoon
My most recent work is with the Bhutanese Community of Central Ohio - Bridging the Divide: A Collaborative Exploration of the Bhutanese Community Response to COVID-19, https://research.osu.edu/first-round-awardees-for-the-seed-fund-for-racial-justice-announced/
Dmitry BondarenkoI graduated with the M.A. degree cum laude in 1990 from the Moscow State University, Department of Ethnography, School of History. I completed my Ph.D. in 1993 and D.Sc. in 2000 at the Russian Academy of Sciences. At present, I am Vice-Director for Research of the Institute for African Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Director of the Inrternational Center of Anthropology of the National Research University Higher School of Economics, and Full Professor with the Center of Social Anthropology of the Russian State University for the Humanities. In the past, I was a visiting scholar with the Program of African Studies of Northwestern University (Evanston, USA), Institut fuer Geschichte (Goettingen, Germany), and Maison des sciences de l'homme (Paris, France). I have lectured at universities of Russia, the USA, Egypt, Tanzania, Slovenia, and Angola. I have conducted field research in a number of African countries (Tanzania, Nigeria, Benin, Rwanda, Zambia, Uganda) and among Black people in Russia and the USA.
Linda HallLinda Jean Hall, a retired Information Technology Engineer, now is an engaged anthropologist dedicated to serving the tangible educational needs of future generations. The first steps towards a new future were taken in 2005 when she traveled to visit friends in Ecuador and began taking classes that led to the completion of a bachelor’s degree in Spanish at UCSB. Concurrently, she collaborated with Savannah Brogdan, a childhood friend, to self-publish a memoir of their life- experiences from 1948-1966 entitled Three Rivers Crossed. In order to achieve the goal to become a professor, Linda completed a Ph.D. in Cultural Anthropology at UCR, two MAs at UCSB; one degree in Latin American and Iberian Studies (2010) and another Master’s in Anthropology (2014). Currently, Linda is a lecturer at UCLA in Chicana/o Studies and a part-time researcher. She specializes in bringing to the forefront the lived experiences of Afro and Latino diasporic and previously ignored groups. Her area of specialization is the immigration of US Ecuadorian migrants of all ethnicities to the U.S.
Judith WilliamsJudith Williams is a Ph.D. Candidate in sociocultural anthropology. A former chef and caterer, her research interests involve food labor, racial hierarchy, colorism, and the negotiation of racial inequalities. Her dissertation will explore the practices, traditions and socio-cultural beliefs, that reproduce and justify continued anti-black discrimination, within Miami’s restaurant industry, as well as the ways in which this discrimination is resisted and contested. Judith is a McKnight doctoral fellow and holds a master’s degree in Hospitality Management. Prior to pursuing her PhD, she was a Chef instructor at FIU’s Chaplin School of Hospitality Management.
Chingchai MethaphatI am a medical anthropologist, with the background in nursing and public health.
