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MSU Anthropology professor receives Fulbright Scholarship for linguistic anthropology research in France
Dr. Chantal Tetreault, MSU Department of Anthropology associate professor, received a Fulbright Scholarship to research Arabic language education and policy in Paris, France, for six months. Dr. Tetreault’s academic background is linguistic and cultural anthropology, and her research focuses on the connection between language change and cultural change. In past research, she has focused on youth in France of Algerian or North African descent. “Some of the basic kinds of principles that I work with regarding language practices have to do with social identity, notions about belonging, social exclusion, and particularly as they relate to gender and ethnicity,” she said. …
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MSU Campus Archaeology Program assists with replacement of a WWI veteran’s plaque on campus
MSU recognizes former student, WWI veteran ahead of Memorial Day University corrects name on plaque, hosts private rededication ceremony As the nation honors the sacrifices of the veterans who have fought for its freedoms and made the ultimate sacrifice, Michigan State University is honoring the legacy of one Spartan veteran in particular for his lasting impact on campus. World War I veteran Cosmer Magnus Leveaux served in the U.S. Army as Corporal, Battery A, 1st Battalion, 119th Field Artillery, 32nd Division. Leveaux was a student in forestry and part of the class of 1918. He enlisted in the Army on…
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Announcing the Retirement of Joan Reid, Department of Anthropology Academic Program Coordinator
Joan Reid is retiring from Michigan State University after 32 years, having served in three other campus roles before becoming the Academic Program Coordinator for the Department of Anthropology in 2015. Reid plays an invaluable role in helping Anthropology graduate students matriculate through the program, assisting them from their prospective student visits all the way until graduation. In her role as Academic Program Coordinator, Reid keeps graduate students informed of important deadlines and program requirements, assists with paperwork and department procedures, compiles reports, maintains academic and personnel files for graduate students, and provides key support to the department chair, graduate…
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Ph.D. Students Emily Milton and Jeff Burnett Awarded Department Funding for Research in Archaeology
We are happy to announce the award recipients for the Department of Anthropology Archaeology Fellowships. Ph.D. student Emily Milton received funding from the William A. Lovis Research Fund in Environmental Archaeology, the Lynne Goldstein Fellowship, and the Alumni and Friends Expendable Fund for Archaeology; and Ph.D. student Jeff Burnett received funding from the Lynne Goldstein Fellowship. Each of the funds support archaeology students in the Department of Anthropology at MSU: for the Alumni and Friends Expendable Fund for Archaeology, the fund is intended to encourage archaeology students who have demonstrated the capacity to achieve educational and professional goals, the motivation…
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MSU Anthropology professor and undergraduate participate in Smithsonian global oyster study
Dr. Sanchez, MSU Department of Anthropology assistant professor, and his colleague Dr. Michael Grone, California Department of Parks and Recreation, contributed to the global study of Indigenous oyster fisheries, which synthesized over a century of archaeological findings from the San Francisco Bay Area. The synthesis of these data was supported by MSU Anthropology major Emily Westfall. “I participated in the research to contribute to reimagining Indigenous-environmental relationships, specifically Indigenous fisheries, within archaeological, biological, and ecological literature,” Dr. Sanchez said. “So often, Indigenous relationships with culturally important species, such as oysters, are often minimized. I believe it is critical to center…
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MSU alum named Executive Director of the Hispanic Latino Commission of Michigan
In September 2021, the Hispanic/Latino Commission of Michigan (HLCOM) named MSU alumna Dr. Isabel Montemayor-Vazquez the executive director, and she began her role that same month. Dr. Montemayor-Vazquez received both her master’s and doctorate’s degrees from the MSU Department of Anthropology. “I was interested in this position because it marries my political science background and applied activist driven anthropology background perfectly,” Dr. Montemayor-Vazquez said. “In this position, I can advocate for the needs of the community, work with non-profit organizations serving the Latinx community, train different state agencies on structural and systemic inequities, and most importantly, contribute to policy change.”…
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Dr. Heather Howard publishes in Syndemic Magazine
Department of Anthropology associate professor Dr. Heather Howard recently published an article in Syndemic Magazine. The article is titled “First Nations, Contagion, and Canada: The Lineages of Pandemic Colonialism the Americas.” In examining the pandemic’s ties to colonialism, the article states: “If the overall “trick” of settler colonialism is to convince settlers they are natives of the lands they subjugate, in the pandemic a further trick consists of treating colonialism’s consequences as so many particular cases of “disparities,” “susceptibilities,” or “local emergencies.” What might be called a syndemic clustering of settler colonialism, systemic racism and gender discrimination has been systematically…
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Professor Emeritus Lovis Conferred Michigan Archaeological Society Merit Award
The Michigan Archaeological Society, the oldest and largest avocational archaeological organization for citizen scholars in the state of Michigan, has conferred its highest award on Professor Emeritus William A. Lovis. The MAS Merit Award honors individuals “for sustained, outstanding, and significant contributions to Michigan archaeology”. This award recognizes Dr. Lovis’ half century of research into Michigan’s past, with scholarship resulting in numerous books, monographs and journal articles, as well as his long-standing association with and support for Michigan’s avocational archaeological community. Congratulations Dr. Lovis!
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Team of Anthropologists organizes international ‘Teaching the City’ workshop
On April 8th, 2022, over 220 international scholars and professors came together online to engage with pedagogical questions and practical case studies for a day-long virtual workshop on “Teaching the City”. The workshop designed around two core questions: “How do we teach about the city? What sits at the core of our educational and pedagogical explorations of urban spaces and socialities within Anthropology and its sibling disciplines? The organizing team was composed of MSU Department of Anthropology assistant professor, Dr. Lucero Radonic, Dr. Suzanne Scheld from California State University Northridge, Dr. Angela Storey from University of Louisville, Dr. Megan Sheehan…
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Ph.D. student Kelly Kamnikar and Dr. Joe Hefner publish a chapter in Avances en Antropología Forense.
Department of Anthropology Ph.D. student Kelly Kamnikar and assistant professor Dr. Joe Hefner recently published a chapter in Avances en Antropología Forense. This chapter reviews population affinity estimation using macromorphoscopic trait analysis. The authors focus on the application of this method to Latin American groups and discuss refining broad categories used in population affinity estimation, like Hispanic. They aim to provide a starting point for investigation into biological distance and population affinity for practitioners working with Latin American populations to improve methodology used in identification of migrant remains at the Mexico-US border, and victims of violence that may occur in transit from…