DDHR-News Archives - Anthropology

Dr. Raja Swamy featured on the “Pretty Heady Stuff” podcast show

Dr. Raja Swamy was featured on”Pretty Heady Stuff,” a podcast show that features interviews with a variety of theorists, artists and activists from across the globe. It is guided by the search for radical solutions to crises that are inherent to colonial capitalism.

Dr. Swamy engages in an extended discussion on his recent book, Building Back Better in India: Development, NGOs, and Artisanal Fishers after the 2004 Tsunami. He discusses what is meant in the wake of the 2004 tsunami for states and multinational companies to see it as an opportunity to rebuild in a manner that prioritized profit and alignment with global financial regimes, rather than in a way that put the needs of already existing grass root networks and forms of collective labour first.

Access the podcast episode here.

Dr. Narges Bajoghli: Unsilenced: Women’s Protests in Iran

The streets of Iran have been filled with chants of “Women! Life! Freedom!” as the nation experiences a vast social uprising against its political leadership led by women and girls.

Sparked by the September 16th killing of a 22-year-old woman, Mahsa Jina Amini, while in the custody of Iran’s “morality police” for failing to comply with Islamic dress codes, the movement has at its heart an insistence that there is no such thing as political freedom without bodily autonomy. It has spread throughout Iran—prompting a government crackdown that has killed hundreds—and given rise to new visions for political futures both in Iran and globally.

Dr. Narges Bajoghli, an award-winning political anthropologist, writer, and professor whose past research on Iran has given her unprecedented access to those in power as well as to the social movements struggling against the state, shares her insights into what these uprisings mean for Iran and the rest of the world.

Dr. Bajoghli discusses the women and girls at the forefront of this movement, their refusal to comply with laws and systems that oppress them, and the prospects of these struggles to bring about substantive change despite government efforts to squelch dissent.

Dr. Narges Bajoghli is a political anthropologist, media anthropologist, and documentary filmmaker, whose research lies at the intersections of media, power, and resistance in Iran and the United States. nargesbajoghli.com

A lecture by Dr. Narges Bajoghli, Assistant Professor of Middle East Studies at Johns Hopkins University’s School of Advanced International Studies, co-director of the school’s Rethinking Iran Initiative, and author of Iran Reframed: Anxieties of Power in the Islamic Republic.

DDHR Webinar Series

On April 14, 2023, Narges Bajoghli, anthropologist and award-winning author of the book Iran Re-framed: Anxieties of Power in the Islamic Republic, will present “Women, media and ideology in post-revolutionary Iran.” Her talk will be the latest offering in our DDHR webinar series that began two years ago.

In fall 2022, Alemaheyu Jorgo, Tamar Shirinian and Raja Swamy hosted the Burkinabe-French anthropologist Dominique Somda in a discussion titled “Women, race, identity and memory in contemporary African societies.” She examined the complex legacies of slavery and its memorialization in Madagascar, Benin, and South Africa, as well as the representational politics around the depiction of women’s agency, slavery and colonialism in films, such as The Woman King, and Black Panther. Since 2021, DDHR’s webinars have brought scholars and public intellectuals of international repute to UT. Speakers and participants have included award-winning Tamil film-maker Leena Manimekalai, as well as anthropologists, sociologists, and political scientists such as Nayanika Mookherjee, Balamurli Natrajan, Aparna Sundar, Zhandarka Kurti, Asli Zengin, Ather Zia, Frances Hasso, Michelle Brown, and others. The webinars focus on contemporary social crises impinging upon the physical, social, and economic well-being of populations across the world. The aim of the series is to spur conversation and critical dialogue around specific themes linking the study of disasters, displacement, and human rights to inquiry into social inequalities and structural violence. They also create a space for popular critique and resistance that can shape changing social landscapes across the world. Details and video recordings of webinars are available at https://anthropology.utk.edu/ddhr-webinar-series/.

Swamy Investigates Complex Catastrophic Events in New Book

Raja Swamy is currently studying the temporal dimensions of natural and technological hazards on the one hand, and social and physical vulnerability on the other. This research is directed towards his new book tentatively titled A Critical Disaster Studies Manifesto, which aims to provide a comprehensive framework for investigating complex catastrophic events and processes.

Extending the conceptual limits of the term “disaster” and drawing upon research conducted in Houston and South India, he places everyday life at the center of analysis, by examining how rhythms of the everyday facilitate or impinge upon the capacities of human beings to secure and maintain physical and social well-being, especially when contending with systemic economic, social and political inequalities and injustices. Focusing on the everyday enables a reckoning with the myriad processes that produce catastrophic events, as hazardous threats proliferate in the era of climate change. These threats may include various anthropogenic systems and processes such as extractive capitalism.

While bringing attention to the insidious undergirding of disaster vulnerability in everyday processes and relations, Raja will also use his book to make a strong case for considering the transformative possibilities of collective social change as beleaguered and marginalized populations sometimes fight back for a better economic and ecological future, especially when catastrophic situations throw into doubt long-held assumptions about the everyday.

Season of Changes

Message from the Department Head

It has been another busy, productive, and successful year in the department. I’m excited to share with you in this issue of Anthropos the stories of my colleagues and highlight the experiences of some of the wonderful students who make the department such a great place to do and teach anthropology.

This academic year kicked off with the first faculty retreat we’ve had in nearly 20 years. We spent a day together in the beautiful setting of the University of Tennessee Arboretum discussing how university changes in budgeting, enrollment, and organization will affect the department and how best to respond and plan for them. We also strategized about future growth and curricular changes. Most importantly, the retreat was a chance to engage with each other, brainstorm, and share experiences in a setting outside of the daily demands of life in Strong Hall. I hope to make retreats a part of our annual cycle going forward.

Our program continues to thrive, with another year of increasing undergraduate enrollment. Because the interests and needs of our students and the department continue to change, we have been busy adjusting our curriculum and welcoming new colleagues.

Last May, Micah Swimmer of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians led the university’s first-ever course that centered Cherokee language instruction within a broader discussion of contemporary Cherokee culture. The course, housed in anthropology, included students from across the university and was a great success. We will offer it again this year as part of May mini-term. We also put into place a new undergraduate concentration in archaeology, which will start in the fall. The concentration provides a more structured pathway for students interested in focusing their studies on archaeology and will include requirements for field and laboratory work in addition to coursework in archaeological method and theory. We’re also working to build partnerships with local archaeological firms to provide our students with internship and employment opportunities.

In August we welcomed biological anthropologist Steven Lautzenheiser to the department as a new tenure-line faculty member. Steven specializes in biomechanics of the foot and ankle in modern humans and teaches courses in human anatomy, paleontology, evolutionary biology, and primate evolution.

Four new lecturers – Karim Alizadeh, Alemayehu Jorgo, Ehsan Lor Afshar, and Amanda Williams – have also joined the faculty this year. Their courses are providing our students with opportunities to learn about new areas of scholarship, including anthropological perspectives on money, pastoralism in East Africa, ancient borderlands in Iran, and the treatment of the dead.

I am happy to announce that Raja Swamy earned tenure and promotion to associate professor, and Ben Auerbach was promoted to professor. We are pleased to welcome Terrie Yeatts to the department as our new accounting coordinator, and Sarah Taylor from the College of Arts and Sciences as our new undergraduate academic advisor.

We have begun collaborations with the McClung Museum’s new environmental archaeologist Alison Damick, and with Zachary Garrett, the new NAGPRA coordinator, in the Office of the Provost.

We are also at a time of transitions. In the spring, faculty gathered for a farewell dinner to celebrate the career of Distinguished Professor of Science Jan Simek, who retired after 38 years at the university. An expert in the archaeology of Paleolithic Europe and cave archaeology, most recently in the Southeast, he served as department head from 1992 to 2000 and again from 2014 to 2017. He also was chancellor of the university from 2008 to 2009 and president from 2009 to 2010. Jan continues his affiliation with the department as professor emeritus.

Lee Meadows Jantz, associate director of the Forensic Anthropology Center and distinguished lecturer, plans to retire from teaching at the end of the spring semester. Lee joined the department in 2000 and is an expert in skeletal biology, forensic anthropology, and human growth and development. She is responsible for the body donation program and curates the William M. Bass Donated and Forensic skeletal collections.

After a nearly 22-year career at the university, Professor David Anderson, a leading scholar of southeastern archaeology, former associate head, and current director of graduate studies, will retire in July. Staff member Kathy Berry will retire next month after five years with the department, during which time she has been the public face of the department for students in Strong Hall. We are grateful for all of their contributions over the years and wish them all the best.

I hope you enjoy this issue of the newsletter. Please reach out if you’d like to learn more about the department or share your memories and ideas with us.

-Barbara Heath
Professor and Head

Bentley Part of Team Studying Russian Disinformation Campaigns

Social media is one of the main outlets where you can find people from all over the world discussing politics and sharing information. Sometimes, the information that is spread is not always accurate and can be used to sway the public’s opinion. A new study on social media content in Belarus outlines a general strategy of disinformation that appears to have occurred before and after Belarus’s presidential election in August 2020.

Alex Bentley, professor of anthropology at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, is part of a team who closely followed Russian-language Twitter content and disinformation campaigns from Belarus.

“The details of our results are beginning to outline the general strategy of disinformation campaigns that may play out over many months, opportunistically incorporating the inevitable events that occur along the way,” said Bentley.

This research is one of the first studies regarding Russian-language social media. The republic of Belarus was formerly part of the Soviet Union. In the past, the government in the Soviet Republic held complete control over mass media and their citizens were closely censored. Disinformation campaigns are propaganda used in political events that purposely spreads false information in order to deceive the public.

This research contributes to the team’s field of study by utilizing different research methods. The team performs several novel analyses, combining computational social science and in-depth qualitative analysis methods. The results from this study have already begun to identify the general outline of disinformation campaigns.

The article, “Event-driven Dynamics of Social Media: A case study in Belarus,” was published March 1, 2022, in Springer Nature Social Sciences.

“This project was made possible by a unique, interdisciplinary collaboration under a MINERVA grant, led by Catherine Luther, professor and head of the UT School of Journalism and Electronic Media, and a half dozen UT co-authors across colleges” Bentley said.

Co-authors include Natalie M. Rice, Benjamin D. Horne, Catherine A. Luther, Joshua Borycz, Suzie L. Allard, Damian J. Ruck, Michael Fitzgerald, Oleg Manaev, Brandon C. Prins, and Alexander Bentley (University of Tennessee, Knoxville).

Also included from other universities are Joshua Borycz (Vanderbilt University), Damian Ruck (Adavai, Ltd., UK), and Maureen Taylor (U. of Technology Sydney, Australia).

—Story by Sarah Berry

DDHR Program Working Papers Series

The Disasters, Displacement, and Human Rights (DDHR) Program is now accepting submissions to a new working papers series. Envisioned primarily as a vehicle for UT graduate students and faculty to share their academic work as it is being prepared for final publication, the series is the brainchild of Raja Swamy, assistant professor of anthropology. It will provide an opportunity for authors to receive feedback on their work and to disseminate it widely to an audience of scholars interested in themes relating to disasters, displacement, structural violence, human rights, and social justice.

When pandemic travel and gathering restrictions are lifted, the series will become an important part of the biennial DDHR conference, enabling conference attendees to develop papers for formal publication.

Visit the Submissions Portal

DDHR Graduate Hera Jay Brown Is Named Rhodes Scholar

The faculty of the Disasters, Displacement and Human Rights Program (DDHR) would like to honor and celebrate our remarkable student, Hera Jay Brown, who was named a 2020 Rhodes Scholar on November 23, 2019. She is the first transgender woman to be named a Rhodes Scholar and the ninth graduate in the history of the University of Tennessee to win this prestigious honor to study at Oxford University.

Hera was drawn to the DDHR program in Anthropology to focus her interdisciplinary major in sociocultural anthropology and forced migration studies, where she was carefully mentored by DDHR director Dr. Tricia Hepner and further guided by Dr. Rebecca Klenk and Dr. Raja Swamy. At Oxford, Hera Jay plans to work at the intersections of sociocultural anthropology, forced migration, law and public policy, and the critical study of humanitarianism.

Hera Jay’s scholarly interest in refugees, and her commitments to social justice and human rights, motivated her work at home and abroad. At UT, she served on the executive board of a campus sexual empowerment and awareness group (SEAT) and as the LGBTQ+ Policy Intern at the Biden Foundation in Washington DC. During two years of study abroad in Amman, Jordan, she carried out original fieldwork in the King Hussein bin Talal Development Area, a special work zone established for refugees from Syria. In Berlin, Germany, she was a volunteer translator and cultural advisor for a community organization serving Syrian refugees and asylum seekers, and became an intern with the Middle East Collective (founded and directed by UT alumna Whitney Buchanan). Following graduation she took a fellowship at American University in Cairo as a Presidential Associate, and then returned to the US to work in Nashville, Tennessee as a refugee youth coordinator. She is currently a Fulbright-Schuman Research Fellow in the European Union, where she is studying the EU’s “golden passport” and citizenship-by-investment schemes within the broader context of EU refugee and migration policy. Her project includes research sites in Malta, Belgium, Bulgaria, Cyprus and Lithuania.

With respect to her training at UT, Hera writes, “As an undergraduate, finding the right mixture of support and opportunity in a program is vital; I could not have made a better choice than the DDHR program. It led to my fieldwork experiences with refugee communities in Berlin, Amman, and Cairo. Now, as a Fulbright-Schuman researcher in the EU, I find myself continuing to draw from these deep, instilled wells of knowledge, support, and experience provided by the DDHR program and its faculty.”