2004-07 Alfred P. Sloan Foundation Center for Working Families,
Ann Arbor, MI
Education
UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN - Ann Arbor, MI
2002 Ph.D. in
Anthropology
Dissertation: "Changing Places: Life-style Migration,
Refuge, and the Quest for Potential Selves in the Midwest’s
Post-industrial Middle Class."
Committee: Thomas E. Fricke (Chair); Janet L. Finn;
Conrad P. Kottak; Lawrence Root (Cognate)
1996 M.A. in Anthropology
COLLEGE OF THE ATLANTIC, Bar Harbor, ME
1990 B.A. in Human
Ecology
Senior Thesis: A Conceptual Framework of Human Ecology for use in Science Education. Etta Kralovec, Ph.D., Project Director
Teacher Education Program major with research and
coursework on personality and social development,
educational philosophy and curriculum design, environmental
studies, and community planning.
2007
“'From Sweet Potatoes to God Almighty': Roy Rappaport on
Being a Hedgehog" [with Tom Fricke], American Ethnologist,
Vol. 34(3), Aug [View
PDF]
2006 “Grey Suit or
Brown Carhartt: Narrative Transition, Relocation and
Reorientation in the Lives of Corporate Refugees” Journal
of Anthropological Research, Vol. 62(3), Fall
[View
PDF]
2006
“Striving for Unity: A Conversation with Roy Rappaport"
[with Tom Fricke], Michigan Discussions in Anthropology,
Vol. 16, April [Archived
with DeepBlue]
2005
“From Pi to Pie: Moral Narratives of Non-economic Migration
and Starting Over in the Post-industrial Midwest.”
Journal of Contemporary Ethnography, Vol. 34(5), Oct
[View
PDF]
2003 “Nationalism in
Indonesia: Building Imagined Community and Intentional
Communities through Transmigration,” Ethnology, Vol.
42(2), Spring [View
PDF]
2002 “Integrating
Work in Academe and Advocacy.” Sloan Research Network, Vol.
4(2), Summer
Book
Chapters
2008 “American
Dreaming: Refugees from Corporate Work Seek the Good Life”
in Culture, Work, and Family Values: An Ethnographic Reader,
Elizabeth Rudd & Lara Descartes, eds. Lanham, MD:
Lexington Books
2007 “Therapeutic Uses of
Place in the Intentional Space of Purposive Community” in
Therapeutic Landscapes: Advances and Applications, Allison
Williams, ed. Hampshire, England: Ashgate [View
PDF]
Research Reports & Working Papers
2002 “Life-style
Migration in the Post-Industrial Middle-class as Strategy
for Feeling Greater Personal Control, Balance, and
Integration in Work, Family, and Personal Life,” Working
Paper #034-02 for the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation Center for
the Ethnography of Everyday Life, University of Michigan
1998
“Community Building among Indonesian Transmigrants: The
Challenges of Ecological Sustainability and Social Harmony,”
Research Report #98/18-03/AS, Indonesian Institute of
Sciences, Jakarta, Indonesia
Under
Review & In Preparation
“Pursuing
the Good Life in an Age of Uncertainty: American Narratives
of Travel and a Search for Refuge” (in preparation)
“Personhood in Place: Personal and Local Character for
Sustainable Narrative of Self” (in preparation)
Opting for Elsewhere: Relocation and the Remaking of Self in
the Post-Industrial Middle Class (book in preparation)
Non-Peer Reviewed
2007
"Arrivals and Departures" The Bear River Review,
Vol. 3(1), April
2006 "Remember the Fish?"
The Bear River Review, Vol.
1(1), April
Building on previous experience a recent project considers
forms of ‘New Work,’ alternative arrangements of work and
family life, explored by so-called free-agents of the
post-industrial economy. This project reveals how some
individuals and groups explore a kind of frontier of social
and economic arrangements and thus help redefine the
meaning, purpose and place of work in personal and community
life. In Indonesia, I have maintained contacts in the field
and continue to observe the changing landscape of identity
politics in the wake of the end of the New Order government
and how its end has impacted expressions of ethnicity and
community in the transmigration settlements of Northern
Sulawesi. I am also developing a project that builds on my
longstanding interest in the anthropology of space and
place. I connect this interest directly to emerging areas of
inquiry in the fields of public health and health geography.
This project entails examining how different community
design reform movements from the 19th century “moral
treatment” approach in asylum care to today’s new urbanism
attempt to use the spatial order as foundation for a new
moral order. From built form to landscape, I look at the
therapeutic use of place not only for planned treatment of
individual disease/disorder, as in moral treatment, but also
the intent to offer remedies for perceived ills of the
collective through alternative spatial and social
arrangements within purposive community.
Field, Research & Professional Experience
[to top]
New Work Frontiers: Free-Agents in the
‘Flexible’ New Economy (2004-2006)
Alfred P. Sloan
Foundation Center for the Study of Working Families,
Sponsor
Southeastern Michigan, USA
This project considers forms of ‘New Work,’ alternative
arrangements of work and family life, explored by
so-called free-agents of the New Economy based on
flexibility. Through documentary ethnography, this
project will reveal how certain individuals and groups
are exploring, tentatively at first perhaps, unfamiliar
landscapes of New Work as a kind of frontier of social
and economic arrangements thus helping to redefine the
meaning, purpose and place of work in personal and
communal life. As pioneers of an emerging
post-industrial world, how are some of today’s
free-agents engaged in a kind of “frontiering” as they
seek to find or create good work that has intrinsic value and allows them
to experience a sense of dignity, self-respect and purpose? At
the same time, how are they also challenging the presumptions of
the frontier mind that characterized the cultural history of
America in their effort to redefine the relationships between
work, family, community and self?
Changing
Places: Life-style Migration, Refuge, and the Quest for
Potential Selves in the Midwest’s Post-industrial Middle
Class
(2000-2001)
Center for the
Ethnography of Everyday Life, Sponsor
Northwestern
Lower Michigan, USA
Through in-depth
interviews, participant-observation, and analysis of
archival and contemporary media, this research explores
present-day social and structural transitions in
American family and community life through the case of
life-style migration. The relocation of middle-class
working families away from metropolitan areas to growing
ex-urban communities high in natural amenities is a
means of negotiating building tension between personal
experience with material demands in pursuit of a
livelihood within the flexible, contingent new economy
and cultural conventions for the good family and
community life as the basis for defining individual
character. Accounts of life-style migrants are part of a
larger moral story of what constitutes the good life at
a time when basic social categories and cultural
meanings are shifting. These accounts are related to
both narratives of travel and conversion where
downshifting and displaced corporate workers pass
through a period of critical liminality as they attempt
to redefine themselves through relocation to a place
believed to provide necessary refuge and inspiration for
the discovery of an inner, authentic self.
Community Building Among Indonesian Transmigrants: The
Challenges of Social and Ecological Sustainability
(1998)
American-Indonesian
Exchange Foundation, Sponsor
Bolaang-Mongondow Regency, Northern Sulawesi, Republic
of Indonesia
Fulbright Scholar to the Republic of Indonesia
Through a multi-site project consisting of
social-surveys, in-depth interviews,
participant-observation and analysis of archival and
contemporary sources, this research examines the
Indonesian government’s population resettlement program
to explore different ways of looking at the idea of
community and community building. Transmigration
settlements are both planned and intentional
communities. They are planned in accordance to
government priorities, which intend them to serve in the
building of an imagined community – a unified nation.
They are also places where settlers struggle, following
their own intent, to build their own personal, everyday
vision of community as a place where they feel that they
belong. Cultural editing taking place at the local and
national levels are found to be closely related in both
means and ends.
Center for South and Southeast Asian
Studies (1994-1997)
University of
Michigan, Ann Arbor
Research Associate -
conducted library research and translation of texts in
Indonesian
Mischa Titiev Library of Anthropology
(1994-1996)
University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
Library Manager
- Instituted new cataloging system and
conducted complete reorganization of the books and
journals collection, responsible for assigning work to
three employees, processed charitable donations of books
from several sources; Met with faculty and donors
regularly to determine library policies and goals
I believe in providing
students with ways of integrating practical subjects with
those areas of study that enrich the mind and spirit. For
students destined for fields both in and outside academia, I
help students to find fulfilling ways of contributing to the
need for skilled analysts and researchers with sharp
critical thinking skills who have learned to manage,
evaluate, and interpret large volumes of different kinds of
data on human social and cultural life. I am prepared to
teach a variety of courses including introductory (cultural
and four-field) anthropology, advanced anthropological and
social theory, ethnographic methods and data analysis, and
contemporary culture in the context of globalization. In
addition to regional ethnography focusing on North America,
I can also teach classes or incorporate perspectives from my
fieldwork in Indonesia which addresses the role of
development programs in the politics of culture and ethnic
identity. Courses offering cross-cultural perspectives on
important social, cultural, and environmental issues are a
natural expression of my experience and interests.
Teaching and Educational Program Experience
[to top]
Associate
Professor -
Design, prepare, and teach a variety of courses
using discussion, small group, and lecture formats;
supervise student fieldwork, presentations, and term
projects; provide detailed feedback, evaluation, and
grading of student work; advise students in frequent
conferences; attend regular faculty and other meetings.
FALL 2008
Anthropology
201 - Cultural Anthropology
- [Introductory]
Anthropology 280 - Special Topics: Medical
Anthropology
- [Introductory/Intermediate]
SPRING 2008
Anthropology
201 - Cultural Anthropology
- [Introductory]
Anthropology 280 - Special Topics: U.S. Culture and the Changing
Family
- [Introductory]
Anthropology 480/580 - Special Topics: Anthropology of Global Problems
-
[Advanced]
FALL 2007
Anthropology
201 - Cultural Anthropology
- [Introductory]
Anthropology 343 -
Anthropological Research Methods
-
[Intermediate/Advanced]
Maritime Heritage Alliance,
Traverse City, MI (2000-2004)
Interpreter & Mate - Serve as interpreter and crew
member (most recently as Mate) in the mission of non-profit organization to
research, preserve, and educate public on the maritime
cultural and natural history of the Great Lakes aboard
the Official Tallship of the State of Michigan – the 92
ft. replica 1845 Great Lakes schooner Madeline.
College of the Atlantic,
Bar Harbor, ME (2003 - now Faculty Associate)
Visiting Professor
- Fully designed, prepared, and taught original courses
using discussion, small group, and lecture formats;
supervised student fieldwork, presentations, and term
projects; provided detailed feedback, evaluation, and
grading of student work; advised students in frequent
conferences; attended regular faculty meetings.
Environmental Justice and Social Welfare -
[Intermediate]
Anthropology of Human Ecological Problems:
The Politics of Culture - [Advanced]
Introduction to Cultural Anthropology:
Comparative Study of Culture - [Introductory]
American Dreams - The Anthropology of Capitalism and Working
Families -
[Intermediate/Advanced]
Department of Anthropology, University of
Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI (1999)
Graduate Student Instructor
- Responsible for three sections of twenty-five students
each; designed and graded all section-based student work
including three writing assignments and a final paper;
advised students in regular conferences.
Introduction to Anthropology
- [Introductory]
Summer Field Studies by the Sea,
Bar Harbor, ME (1989-1990)
Program Coordinator - Assisted
Program Director to plan, coordinate, and implement a
wide variety of summer programs including professional
development of teachers of secondary school science and
outdoor leadership for high-school students through
field studies based on campus, research vessels and
Acadia National Park.
Biological Sciences
Curriculum Study (BSCS),
Colorado Springs,
CO (1990)
Curriculum Development Assistant
- Worked with team of curriculum development experts to
design a secondary school biology textbook using an
organizing conceptual framework of human ecology.
Dorr Natural History Museum,
Bar Harbor, ME
(1987-1988)
Naturalist
- Worked with team of students and professionals to plan
and develop traveling outreach programs on cetacean
biology, ichthyology, and coastal ecology. Traveled to
island and in-land rural schools as a naturalist
presenting successful programs that continue to be used
today.
2007
“Character as Commodity: Persons and Places on the Market.”
Paper presentation to the American Anthropological
Association, 106th Annual Meeting, Washington, DC
2006 “Therapeutic Uses of Place in the Intentional Space
of Purposive Community.” Paper presentation to the American
Anthropological Association, 105th Annual Meeting, San Jose,
CA
2005 "New Frontiers of Work and Family: Making
Work Meaningful in the ‘Flexible’ New Economy." Paper
presentation to the American Anthropological Association,
104th Annual Meeting, Washington, DC
2005 “Intending Community: An Asylum's Journey from
Mental Hospital to New-Urbanist Sanctuary.” Paper
presentation to the Communal Studies Association, Harmony,
PA
2004 “The Enduring Magic of Frontier Myth in America:
Relocation as Utopian Family Project.” Paper presentation to
the American Anthropological Association, 103rd Annual
Meeting, Atlanta, GA
2004 “Defining the Good: Middle-class Life-style
Choices, Relocation, and the Consumption of Place.” Paper
presentation to the 5th International Crossroads in Cultural
Studies, Urbana-Champaign, IL
2004 “Picking Places: Non-economic Migration as
Negotiation between the Material and Moral.,” Paper
presentation to the Midwest Sociological Society, 2004
Annual Meeting, Kansas City, MO
2003 “Life-Style Migration as a Personal Quest for
Refuge.” Paper presentation to the American Anthropological
Association, 102nd Annual Meeting, Chicago, IL
2002 “Transmigration: Imagined and Intentional
Community in Indonesia’s New Order.” Paper presentation at
the conference “Invoking History: Perspectives on Culture,
Politics, and Identity in Southeast Asia,” International
Institute, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI
2002 “Changing Places: Starting Over through Life-style
Migration.” Paper presentation at the conference “Families
that Work,” Center for Myth and Ritual in American Life,
Emory University, Atlanta, GA
2001 “Transmigration in Indonesia: Building Imagined
Community and Intentional Communities in Post-Colonial
Nationalism.” Paper presentation to the Communal Studies
Association, New Harmony, IN
2000 “Life-style Migration in the Midwest: Changes in
the Culture of Family and Work in American Post-industrial
Middle Class.” Paper presentation to the American
Anthropological Association, 99th Annual Meeting, San
Francisco, CA
2007 Chair/Organizer of conference
session “Difference, (In)equality and Justice: Locating
Personhood and Place in the Commodity Landscape,” American
Anthropological Assoc., 106th Annual Mtg., Washington, DC [Session
Information]
2006 Organizer of book section titled
"Transcending Geography: Applications in the Anthropology of
Health" for the edited volume Therapeutic Landscapes:
Advances and Applications, Allison M. Williams, ed.
2006 Chair/Organizer of conference
session “Therapeutic Environments: Putting Human Health in
Place,” Society for Medical Anthropology, American
Anthropological Assoc., 105th Annual Mtg., San Jose, CA, 16
Nov [Abstract]
[Archived
with DeepBlue]
2006 Guest Presenter, "Faculty
Showcase: The Scholarship of Teaching and Learning," Eastern
Michigan University, Ypsilanti, MI, 06 April
2005 Chair/Organizer of conference
session "Families that we live with, Families that we live
by: Current U.S. Research on Middle-class Working Families,"
Society for the Anthropology of North America, American Anthropological Assoc., 104th Annual Mtg.,
Washington, DC, 01 Dec [Abstract]
[Archived
with DeepBlue]
2005 Chair of conference session
"Generating Persons in Practice" Imagining Kin, U. Michigan,
Ann Arbor, MI
Reviewer for Journal of Contemporary Ethnography
Reviewer for Qualitative Sociology
Mentor for the National Association for Student
Anthropologists (NASA) of the American Anthropological
Assoc.
Foreign Language: Bahasa
Indonesia (fluent); Malay (fluent); French (proficiency)
International Travel/Cross-Cultural
Expertise: Two and a half years combined
experience in Southeast and Northeast Asia as well as New
Zealand and Europe
Computer Experience and Program Use:
Data Analysis Software (Atlas.ti;AnSWR;Nvivo);
Word Processing & Database (Word;Wordperfect;Access;Filemaker;Endnote;Procite);
Graphical Presentation (Powerpoint); Web Design & Publishing
(Frontpage, Dreamweaver, CGI, SFTP); Scanning & Image
Processing (Photoshop).
Broadcasting: On-Air
Broadcaster & Programmer. America’s oldest continuously
operating community public radio, WNMC-FM, Traverse City,
MI, 2001-2004.
Sailing: Served since
2000 as a volunteer on Michigan's Official Tallship, the
Schooner Madeline - most recently as Mate.
Printable CV
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