Association of Black Anthropologists

ABA is a section of the American Anthropological Association

ABA STATEMENT AGAINST POLICE VIOLENCE AND ANTI-BLACK RACISM

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On June 6, 2020

In Uncategorized

June 6, 2020

Almost six years ago the Association of Black Anthropologists staged a memorable die-in and issued a statement in protest against anti-Black racism in the U.S. Today, the U.S. is in flames again because of the escalating domestic terrorism of white vigilantes and police officers who, in a span of months, killed unarmed Ahmaud Aubrey while jogging in a South Georgia neighborhood, unarmed Breonna Taylor in her apartment in Louisville, KY, unarmed George Floyd with a cop’s knee on his neck in Minneapolis, MN, and unarmed Black trans man Tony McDade in Tallahassee, FL. In March 2020, police and paramedics watched as Monika Diamond, a Black trans woman, was shot to death in Charlotte, NC as paramedics were treating her in an ambulance. These murders are in addition to the continuing weaponizing of whiteness – as the country witnessed a white woman threaten to call the police on Black man Christian Cooper who was bird watching in Central Park, New York. 

This pandemic of anti-black racism also finds equal expression in the disproportionate impacts of the novel coronavirus pandemic on the Black population. Though representing only 13 percent of the population, Black Americans account for almost one-third of infections nationwide, and Black Americans are dying of COVID-19 at three times the rate of white people. This health disparity and inequity is the result of Black Americans not only comprising a majority of “essential” jobs that put them at increased risk for COVID-19 infection; it is also the result of centuries of marginalization, disenfranchisement, and stress that translates into poorer health outcomes (co-morbidities or underlying conditions especially) that, again, put Black Americans at increased risk for infection.

As it pertains to the ongoing atrocities of the criminal policing system and the accumulated health effects of racism in this country, we charge genocide as we did in 2014. 

White supremacist violence is at the heart of the founding of the United States. While the extreme manifestations of this genocidal violence take many forms, and ebbs and flows, the structures remain in place. For Black people, this has meant incalculable racial terror and a continuous struggle against numerous systems of oppression – the policing and carceral apparatus, the inequitable health care system, the education apparatus, social and economic hierarchies, and neoliberal policies among others. Our resolve and determination against these systems of tyranny cannot be understated. But we are aware that there is no way forward if this foundational anti-Blackness is not acknowledged and reckoned with, in this country.

It is for this reason that we firmly assert the nearly-universal claim that “Black Lives Matter,” from allies and supporters, need to be followed up with both introspection and clear and concrete measures for redress and restitution. This action is especially crucial for the discipline of anthropology. 

We urge our non-Black anthropology colleagues, especially our White colleagues who tend to reproduce the toxic effects of whiteness in anthropology departments, think tanks, research groups, and other spaces where anthropology is practiced across the nation, to move beyond the soul searching, despondency, and white guilt that this moment (and similar other moments) has engendered. Instead, we want members of the discipline to start at “home,” to accept the ways that anthropology has been and continues to be implicated in the project of white supremacy (both in its implicit and explicit manifestations) and to lay out a clear path for moving forward. We want members of the discipline of anthropology to see the ways that white supremacy is manifest in their curricula, syllabi, graduate student recruitment and mentoring, hiring, and promotion practices. We want them to see and correct their refusal or inability to teach race, racism, the pathology of whiteness, and the banality of white supremacy; their marginalization of Black scholars and their scholarship. We also challenge them to evaluate their commitment to being, paraphrasing the words of Black anthropologist, William S. Willis, “a discipline of the subjugated races.” This call to recognition and action is only the first step in the discipline’s long journey towards decolonization. 

As Black anthropologists, we have consistently demonstrated that there is much more to Black life than the need for affirmation from the very people abiding in systems that oppress us. Our global Black communities have always worked to destroy those systems. This moment is no different. We fully support the protests of rage and affirmation that have exploded throughout the country and throughout the world. And we condemn the current violent police repression at city, state, and national levels, including the call by the President of the United States and U.S. Senator Tom Cotton (R-Arkansas) to deploy U.S. military troops to disband the protest movements that have spread around the country. Not only are militaries ill-prepared and untrained for peacekeeping in civilian contexts, these irresponsible and inflammatory calls also court the deeper involvement of pro-Trump militias, many of whom are heavily armed, subscribe to white nationalist ideologies, and may react to what they perceive as an official call to violence in support of their leader. The use of the military will only further escalate violence, lead to loss of innocent life, violate core civil and human rights, and continue to polarize our citizenry and undermine democracy. 

We demand a justice system that begins with the premise that policing is and always has been a form of white supremacy. We demand that local, city, and state governments engage in meaningful dialogue, which involves humbly listening to the protesters and taking their demands seriously. 

We also encourage all anthropologists to donate to bail funds to free protesters, to continue to circulate information rooted in decolonized ethical research, to support movements for reparations for Black folks globally, and the ABA encourages Black people to protect their health (emotional, mental, physical, and spiritual) as we continue in this struggle.

Introducing the 2020 ABA Program Committee

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On February 29, 2020

In ABA @ 50

We are pleased to introduce ourselves as the 2020 ABA Program Committee. We are: karen g. williams, Mieka Brand Polanco, Holly Okonkwo, and Tiffany Marquise. We look forward to putting together a solid and stimulating program and poised to work with you as we prepare for the 2020 meetings in Saint Louis, Missouri. We also proudly note that our own Bianca Williams is serving as this year’s Executive Program Chair for the AAA conference.

You might already know that 2020 is a special year for the ABA, as it marks our section’s 50th anniversary. We look forward to celebrating this momentous milestone in Saint Louis. The Executive Board has been ginning up some rich events, and we hope you will contribute too by putting together a thought-provoking, boundary-breaking, celebratory roster of panels, papers, posters, and events. Here are some notes to keep in mind as you plan your own conference participation:

  • Truth and Responsibility: The overall theme for the 2020 AAA meetings is Truth and Responsibility. The Call For Papers for this theme opens with the following provocation:

“Truth and Responsibility” is a call to reimagine anthropology to meet the demands of the present moment. The imperative to bear witness, take action, and be held accountable to the truths we write and circulate invites us to reflect on our responsibility in reckoning with disciplinary histories, harms, and possibilities. To whom are we giving evidence and toward what ends? For whom are we writing? To whom are we accountable, and in what ways?

You can read the full Call for Papers here. There are abundant ways our collective research comes to bear on these questions. For submissions for ABA review, you may want to interrogate topics that address what gets counted as “truth” – and who gets to decide; who becomes accountable for wrongdoings – and to whom do they bear responsibility; Who gets left out of the accountability ecosystem, etc. We look forward to seeing your submissions. The deadline for abstract proposal submissions is April 8 at 3 pm.

  • 3 PM?? Just wanted to underscore that deadline time. It is not the end of the day. Not even 5 pm. It is smack in the middle of the afternoon: 3 PM, people. Don’t miss it.

  • 50th Anniversary: The Association of Black Anthropologists turns 50! We hope you use this opportunity to propose panels and events that commemorate ABA’s past, celebrate what it is now, or imagine its future, as well as panels that reflect the breadth and depth of past and present members, and their impact on the discipline.

  • Invited Panels: Note that we are able to host only a very limited number of invited panels. If you think your panel ought to be considered for “invited” status, please (1) reach out to us at ABAProgramCommittee@gmail.comto give us a head’s up and discuss; (2) Let us know whether your panel might potentially be co-sponsored with another section, as this will increase the number of panels we are able to invite.

  • Waived Registration Fee: You can find information about Financial Assistance and Support for the AAA Annual Meeting here. Please note that the deadline for Waived Registration Fee applications is March 18, 2020.

  • We’re here for you: Reach out with any questions as you prepare your abstracts and panels. We’ll do our best to answer – or direct you to someone who can. Our email is ABAProgramCommittee@gmail.com .

Book Signing with Kia L. Caldwell and Alvaro Jarrin: Dec 2, 2017

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On November 20, 2017

In ABA @ AAA

2017 ABA – Sponsored Sessions (and Other Sessions of Interest)

By

On October 28, 2017

In ABA @ AAA

Not-to-miss

ABA General Body Meeting – Thursday, November 30, 2:30 p.m. Join us as we discuss association business and make plans for the upcoming year.

ABA Legacy Awards Program and Reception – Friday, November 20, 7:45 p.m. Come mingle with your fellow ABA members as we enjoy one another’s company and honor the accomplishments of members of our community, including Dr. Johnetta B. Cole, this year’s Legacy Scholar. ABA-AFA-AFAA-ALLA-AQA-SANA-SAW Joint Section reception to follow!

AAA Opening Keynote: Bending the Arc of Change – A Conversation with Paul Farmer and Jim Yong Kim – Wednesday, November 29, 6:30 p.m.

AAA Annual Business Meeting – Friday, December 1, 6:15 p.m.

Presidential Address Delivered by Dr. Alisse Waterston “Four Stories, a Lament, and an Affirmation” – Saturday, December 2, 6:15 p.m.

Sponsored Sessions

Thursday, November 30

10:15 a.m.–12:00 p.m. – (3-0425) 21st Century Resistance, Protest, and Ethnography in the African Diaspora (Co-sponsored by the American Ethnological Society)

4:15–6:00 p.m. – (3-1080) Race, Religion, and the State: Afro-Diasporic Imaginaries and the Politics of Black Self-Making (Co-sponsored by the Society for the Anthropology of Religion)

Friday, December 1

4:15–6:00 p.m. – (4-1265) Anthropology Beyond the African Burial Ground Project: Epistemologies, Ethics, and Interpreting the African Diasporic and Native American Pasts (Co-sponsored by the Association of Indigenous Anthropologists)

Saturday, December 2

2:00–3:45 p.m. – (5-0850) Between Visibilities and Invisibilities: Forms of Racism and Anti-Racism in the Twenty-first Century (Co-sponsored by the American Ethnological Society)

Other Sessions

Wednesday, November 29

12:00–1:45 p.m. – (2-0105) Identity politics versus naive workerism? Revisiting race, class and gender in the era of Trump and Brexit

Thursday, November 30

10:15 a.m.–12:00 p.m. – (3-0440) Anthropology and the Matter of Whiteness

2:00–3:45 p.m. – (3-0845) Centering Prisons: Reframing Analysis of the State, Relations of Power and Resistance

4:15–6:00 p.m. – Invited Session (3-1115) Sounds of Vacations: The Political Economy of Caribbean Tourism

4:15–6:00 p.m. – Late Breaking Session (3-1088) Until We All Get Free: Black Feminist Leadership and Organizing within The Movement for Black Lives

Friday, December 1

8:00–9:45 a.m. – (4-0115) Centering Black Women: Examining Stigma, Belonging, and Transgressive Practices

8:00–9:45 a.m. – (4-0195) Racialized Terror, Persistence and the Otherwise: Histories and Horizons of Struggle and Surveillance

10:15 a.m–12:00 p.m. – Invited Session (4-0295) Black Food Matters: Race, Food Consumption, and Resistance in the Age of “Food Justice” (Sponsored by the Society for the Anthropology of Food and Nutrition)

10:15 a.m.–12:00p.m. – (4-0495) Race and White Privilege: Explorations of Racial Conjunctures in Latin America and the Caribbean

2:00–3:45 p.m. – (4-0850) There’s Levels to This: Protest, Disruption, Resistance

2:00–3:45 p.m. – Invited Session (4-0980) Toward a Transdisciplinary Coalition in Sociocultural Linguistics: A Collaborative Analysis of Presidential Discourse in Trump’s Black History Month Listening Session (Sponsored by the Society for Linguistic Anthropology)

2:00–3:45 p.m.– AAA Executive Session (4-0900) Beyond the African Burial Ground: Anthropological and trans-disciplinary innovations in theory, methods, and technologies

4:15–6:00 p.m. – (4-1145) In Medias Race: Black Embodiments Present and Future

4:15–6:00 p.m. – (4-1175) Spaces of Racialization, Spaces of Resistance: Race, language, and education

4:15–6:00 p.m. – Late Breaking Session (4-1173) From the Streets of #Charlottesville: Activism, Academia, and Anthropology

Saturday, December 2

8:00–9:45 a.m. – (5-0100) Blackness, Politics, and Performance: Essential Contestations in the Crisis of Nostalgic Nationalism

10:15 a.m.–12:00 p.m. – (5-0397) ‘Blackened Knowledge’ in Anthropocene

4:15–6:00 p.m. – (5-1085) Anthropology Matters: Understanding and Presenting Ancient Egypt in Its African Context

Sunday, December 3

8:00–9:45 p.m. – (6-0070) Language, Race, and Digital Space10:15AM-12:00PM – (6-0195) Engaging Contradictions, Negotiating Memory: Reimaging Tourism, Blackness and Entrepreneurship in Contested Spaces

10:15 a.m.–12:00 p.m. – (6-0210) The Space(s) Between: Matters of Kinship, Belonging, and Crossovers

10:15 a.m.–12:00 p.m. – (6-0275) Citizenship on the Periphery: Race, Class and the Struggle for Full Citizenship

10:15 a.m.–12:00 p.m. – (6-0260) Lives Spaces, Globalized Economies, and Consumption in African Contexts

12:15–2:00 p.m. – (6-0515) The Whitelash is Real: The New Politics of Exclusion

12:15–2:00 p.m. – (6-0470) Race and Indigeneity

Roundtables

Thursday, November 30

10:15 a.m.–12:00 p.m. – Late Breaking Session (3-0373) In whose honor? On monuments, public spaces, historical narratives, and memory

4:15–6:00 p.m. – AAA Executive Session (3-1225) Do Black and Brown Lives Matter to Anthropology? Race, Bodies, and Context

4:15–6:00 p.m. – (3-1150) #NoBanNoWallsNoJailsNoDAPL: An Anthropology of Accomplices

Friday, December 1

4:15–6:00 p.m. – (4-1145) In Medias Race: Black Embodiments Present and Future

4:15–6:00 p.m. – (4-1095) Anthropology Matters – Fighting Essentialist Ideas about Poverty, Race, and Intelligence in the Trump Era (Co-sponsored by the Biological Anthropology Section and General Anthropology Division)

Saturday, December 2

8:00–9:45 a.m. – (5-0155) Racialization, Incarceration, and Struggle in Settler Colonial Societies: Israel and the United States

10:15 a.m.–12:00 p.m. – (5-0475) Making Anthropology Matter – Teaching Race as an Act of Resistance

2:00–3:45 p.m. – (5-0940) From Margin to Center: Teaching Race in Times of Trump

4:15–6:00 p.m. – (5-1120) I am Not Your Negro: Rethinking Race Relations and Becoming Ethical Subjects

Sunday, December 3

8:00–9:45 a.m. – (6-0050) Anthropology and/as African Diasporic Intellectual History

Workshops, Installations, and Films

Wednesday, November 29

5:05–6:05 p.m. – (2-0680) Changa Revisited (Film)

Thursday, November 30

9:00–11:30 a.m. – (3-0225) Participatory Ethnographic Theater of the Contemporary: State of the Nation

4:15–4:39 p.m. – (3-0990) Who is your grandfather? (Film)

Friday, December 1

12:20–1:44 p.m. – (4-0720) The Return (Film)

1:00–3:45 p.m. – Annual ABA Mentoring Session. This is a great opportunity for students and early career members to connect with potential mentors. For more information contact Dr. Riché Barnes.

4:30–4:35 p.m. – (4-1290) Make it Rail (Film)

Saturday, December 2

8:15 a.m.–12:00 p.m. – (5-0275) From the Classroom to the White House: How Anthropologists, Educators and Activists Can Influence Education Policy (Co-sponsored by the Council on Anthropology and Education)

3:06–4:14 p.m. – (5-0950) We Must Be Dreaming (Film)

ABA Stages Protest and Issues Statement Condemning Police Violence and Anti-Black Practices

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On December 8, 2014

In Member News

ABA Stages a “Die In” at AAA 2014

 

ABA Statement Against Police Violence and Anti-Black Practices

The Association of Black Anthropologists condemns, in no uncertain terms, the ongoing terrorism waged against Black U.S. communities by the state, police, and White vigilantes. We condemn the executions of our boys and girls, women and men by the police in Ferguson, Staten Island, Saratoga Springs, Los Angeles, and throughout the country. We also recognize that these forms of state violence are perpetrated against Black people globally. We are enraged by the fact that no police officer has been indicted in the recent murders of Aiyanna Jones, Michael Brown and Eric Garner; and we are outraged that in the hundred days since the murder of Michael Brown, police have also murdered unarmed Ezell Ford, unarmed Tanisha Anderson, unarmed Roshad McIntosh, unarmed Akai Gurley, unarmed Dante Parker and unarmed Kajieme Powell. These are state-sponsored massacres of our people, massacres enabled by a long history of national and global anti-Blackness.

As it pertains to the ongoing atrocities of the criminal justice system in this country – alongside those who spoke before the United Nations in November, we charge genocide.[1]

As members of the academic discipline with the distinctive history of establishing the language and “science” of race to justify settler colonialism and slavery, we recognize full well that the root of today’s anti-Black state-sponsored violence in the U.S. is white supremacy. We know that our discipline played a significant role in developing the trope of a particular Black subject – the “urban” Black – that has been deployed by society at large to dehumanize Black people.  At the same time, we also realize that our discipline has been tepid in fruitfully acknowledging and addressing its own white supremacist foundation. We therefore call on our colleagues in the American Anthropological Association to join us in not only condemning this history but also in affirming that Black Lives Matter – beyond the role of ethnographic subjects and cultural vessels. We call on our colleagues in anthropology to stand against the U.S. state’s terrorism against Black and Brown peoples. We call on our colleagues to join us in demanding redress and restitution, with expediency.

As anthropologist Zora Neale Hurston is known to have said, “If you are silent about your pain, they will kill you and say you enjoyed it.” We will not be silent. For members of the American Anthropological Association to be silent at this time given our discipline’s historic complicity in establishing the current order, and when we have the means to make a difference, is criminal.

To this end

  1. We call on the Executive Board of the American Anthropological Association to issue a formal statement that condemns the heinousness of these crimes and calls on our academic guild to more forcefully tackle the problems brought on by racism and racial profiling. We ask that the Executive Board make every effort to make this statement accessible to the general public through mainstream media outlets so the discipline’s stance and investment in these efforts can be widely known.
  2. We call on our colleagues to join the ABA in challenging the power positions from which we produce anthropology.
  3. We join with other anthropologists, and stand in solidarity with people from around the country, in calling on the U.S. Department of Justice to review the use of force by police and to make a commitment to working for the eradication of racism and racialized state violence.

[1] http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2014/11/we-charge-genocide-movement-chicago-un/382843/

ABA at the 2014 AAA Annual Meeting in Washington, D.C.

By

On April 13, 2014

In Conferences

For more information on the 113th Annual Meeting of the American Association of Anthropologists to be held in Washington, D.C., visit the AAA general information page. Specific ABA conference events will be posted soon.

ABA Statement on The Dominican Republic

By

On January 27, 2014

In Member News

The Association of Black Anthropologists (ABA) condemns the recent ruling by the Dominican Republic’s Constitutional Court on September 23, 2013 (Ruling 0168-13), which has created a volatile human rights crisis in the Dominican Republic. As other outraged organizations like Amnesty International, CARICOM (Caribbean Community), the Haitian Studies Association, the National Bar Association, and the governments of Guyana, Trinidad & Tobago and St. Vincent and the Grenadines have observed, the court ruling does the following:

  • It strips citizenship from the offspring of non-resident Haitians born in the Dominican Republic where nationality is conferred by place of birth;
  • It denies Dominican children of Haitian descent the right to an identity and nationality;
  • It overlooks the due process of law; and
  • It disregards the binding character of decisions made by the Inter-American Court of Human Rights in favor of Haitian-descended Dominicans.

As a result of the ruling, people of Haitian descent are being stripped of their rights and deported.

The ABA stands in solidarity with the people of Haitian descent in the Dominican Republic and calls on the Dominican Parliament to pass a law countermanding the Constitutional Court’s ruling that renders people of Haitian descent stateless. We also call on the President of the Dominican Republic, Danilo Medina, to sign said legislation into law.

In the spirit of the Haitian Revolution, where people of African descent fought for the right to live dignified lives, we call for an end to the current violence perpetrated against Haitian-descended Dominicans, an end to the deportation of people of Haitian descent, and a prompt resolution of this serious matter. Let us all stand together and act in the interests of humanity and human rights and allow people of Haitian descent in the Dominican Republic to lead safe and dignified lives.

The ABA seeks to ensure that people studied by anthropologists are not only objects of study but active makers and/or participants in their own history. In a larger sense, we intend to highlight situations of exploitation, oppression and discrimination.

More on the Dominican Republic, the Dominican Court Ruling, and Haitians in the Dominican Republic (as of January 22, 2014):

Myriam Chancy
Apartheid in the Americas: Are you Dominican or Haitian?

Dominicans Dispossessed: Fit for Exploitation, Not Citizenship.

Kiran Jayaram
State, Market, Xenophobia: Making Haitian Educational Migrants in the Dominican Republic
Kimberly Simmons
Reconstructing Racial Identity and the African Past in the Dominican Republic
Jemima Pierre
The Dominican Republic Hates Black People
Dr. Jemima Pierre discusses Racial Hatred in the Dominican Republic on Black Agenda Radio

Focus on Haiti

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On January 26, 2014

In Member News

It has been four years since a 7.0 earthquake devastated parts of Haiti. At present, this disaster claimed over 200,000 lives and has left over 150,000. Additionally, Haitians continue to suffer from a cholera outbreak that has claimed thousands of lives.

Woman standing in front of ruins. Haitian woman carrying supplies amid the destruction from the January 2010 Haiti earthquake. (U.S. Geological Survey/photo by Anthony Crone.)

In 2014, the Association of Black Anthropologists (ABA) continues to focus on Haiti by standing in support and solidarity with Haiti, the first black republic in the world, by disseminating Haiti-related information and providing anthropological analysis of recent news from Haiti and issues affecting the Haitian diaspora.

To facilitate an informed dialogue about the past, present and future of Haiti, we ask that peers and colleagues continue to submit relevant Haiti-related information to the ABA focus on Haiti website to Bertin M. Louis, Jr. at: abahaiti@gmail.com. Please send:

  • Articles and Essays by anthropologists about Haiti and Haitian Earthquake Recovery-related topics,
  • Links of anthropologists in the media discussing Haiti and Haitian Earthquake Recovery-related topics,
  • Websites about Haiti, Haitian Culture and History, and
  • Annotated bibliographic information.
Michel-Rolph Trouillot (1949-2012)
American Anthropological Association: Remembering Michel-Rolph Trouillot
Remembering Trouillot (Colin Dayan)
Anthropology Report: Michel-Rolph Trouillot, Bibliography
Cholera and Earthquake Relief (courtesy of potomitan.net)
Partners in Health
Digital Library of the Caribbean’s Protecting Haitian Patrimony Initiative
Dwa Fanm
Fonkoze
FANM
Haiti Reborn
Lambifund
Madre
Recent Books about Haiti and Haitians
Mark Schuller. 2012. Killing with Kindness: Haiti, International Aid, and NGOs
Books about the Haiti Earthquake by Anthropologists
Haiti After The Earthquake by Paul Farmer
Tectonic Shifts: Haiti Since the Earthquake. Edited by Mark Schuller and Pablo Morales
Anthropologists Discussing Haiti in the Media: Recent Commentary (as of January 24, 2014)

Pooja Bhatia
Help for Haiti (Douze Janvyè [January 12])
Jacob Kushner
Four years after the Haiti earthquake, what have billions in U.S. aid bought?
Bertin M. Louis, Jr.
#ShamelesslyHaitian on Haiti’s Independence Day (Also available in French here)
Anthropologists Discussing Post-Earthquake Haiti in the Media (Alphabetical Order)
Greg Beckett
Moving Beyond Disaster to Build a Durable Future in Haiti
Is the United States Doing Enough for Haiti?
Elizabeth Chin
Anthropology Now Haiti Watch
Why Adopting Haitian Children is a Terrible Idea
Alex Dupuy
Foreign Help Actually Hurting Haiti
Paul Farmer
How to Stop Cholera in Haiti
Haitian Government Needs More Aid NECN.com
PBS News Hour
The New York Times
Jeffrey Kahn
Cut the Red Tape: Why Haitians Need Humanitarian Parole Now
Helping Haiti Help Itself
Relax the Caps for Haitian Visa Applicants
Jim Yong Kim
Dartmouth’s President, a Global Health Leader, Offers Perspectives on Helping Haiti Chronicle of Higher Education
Jonna Knappenberger
Cholera Cases and Questions in the North
Violence in Cap Haitien update
Milot’s Forgotten “Tent City”
Bertin M. Louis, Jr.
Studying Voodoo isn’t a Judgement USA Today article referencing essays.
Haiti’s Pact with the Devil? Some Haitians Believe This Too
The Hubert Smith Radio Show
WATE-6 News (Knoxville, TN)
Tennessee This Week (Knoxville, TN)
The Hubert Smith Radio Show/Haiti: One Year After the Earthquake
Elizabeth McAlister
Voodoo’s View of the Quake in Haiti
Devil’s Logic: Behind Pat Robertson’s Blame Game
Haiti’s Musical Traditions, Past and Present
Elizabeth McAlister on Hope and Tragedy
Voodoo Brings Solace to Haitians
Why Does Haiti Suffer So Much?
Sidney Mintz
Whitewashing Haiti’s History
Jemima Pierre
Bill Clinton Loves Haiti
The Dominican Republic Hates Black People
Don’t Blame Repbulicans for Obama’s Actions in Haiti
How to Help Haiti
Our Failure On Haiti
The Politics of Rebuilding Haiti CounterSpin interview
The Puppet, the Dictator, and the President: Haiti Today and Tomorrow
Karen Richman
Mass Graves May Have Lasting Spiritual Impact in Haiti
Run From the Earthquake, Fall Into The Abyss: A Léogane Paradox
Nina Glick Schiller and Georges Fouron
Killing Me Softly: Violence, Globalization, and the Apparent State
Bill Quigley and Amber Ramanauskas
Where the Relief Money Did and Did Not Go: Haiti After the Quake
Mark Schuller
“Chaos and Cholera: Haiti’s Message to the Tea Party (and the Rest of Us)”
Clearing the Rubble, Including the Old Plan for Haiti
Did you Drink Soup? Strains on Solidarity in Haiti
Falling Through the Cracks, Or Unstable Foundations?
Fault Lines: Haiti’s Earthquake and Reconstruction, Through the Eyes of Many
Haiti One Year Later
Haiti’s Resurrection: Promoting Human Rights
Haiti’s Second Goudougoudou: The Global Food Crisis
Haiti’s Unnatural Disasters
Interview with Mark Schuller on Democracy Now!
Passing The Riot Test
Rained Out? Opportunities in Haiti Washing Away
Sowing Seeds of Hope or Seeds of Dependence?
Starfish and Seawalls: Responding to Haiti’s Earthquake, Now and Long-Term Commondreams.org
Tectonic Shifts? The upcoming donors conference for Haiti
“Too Soon for the Carnival des Fleurs: Sweeping Haiti’s Poor Back under the Rug”
Uncertain Ground
Unstable Foundations: Human Rights of Haiti’s 1.5 Million IDPs
What Wyclef Lays Bare for Monday’s Foreign Policy Debate
Gina Athena Ulysse
Amid Rubble And Ruin, Our Duty To Haiti Remains National Public Radio
Defending Vodou in Haiti
Goudougoudou: Earthquake Memories from Haiti
Haiti’s Earthquake’s Name and Some Women’s Trauma
Haiti’s Electionaval
Haiti’s Fouled-up Elections
Haiti’s Future: A Requiem for the Dying
Haiti’s Future: Repeating Disasters
Haiti’s Solidarity with Angels
Haitian Feminist Yolette Jeanty Honored With Other Global Women’s Activists
The Haiti Story You Won’t Read
Haiti’s Vodou Religion Ulysse and Sibylle Fischer discuss how Vodou (please note spelling) has been demonized to become “voodoo”
Haiti Will Never Be The Same Ulysse discusses Haiti’s past and why it must set a different course in the future
The Legacy of Haitian FeministPaulette Poujol-Oriol
New Narratives for Haiti MP3; an interview on Feminist Magazine on KPFK
Rape a Part of Daily Life for Haitian Women in Relief Camps
The Way We See Haiti Here on Earth
Why Context Matters: Journalists and Haiti
Why I am Marching for “Ayiti Cherie” (Beloved Haiti)
Why Representations of Haiti Matter Now more than Ever
Landon Yarrington
More Updates from Cap Haitien
Updates from Cap Haitien
Violence in Cap Haitien
A Day at the Beach
Port-au-Prince or Port-au-President?
Can Wyclef Tap Haiti’s Youth Movement?
How Haiti Can Reclaim Sovereignty
The Logic of Triage in Humanitarian Action
Haiti Facts and History

Haiti Lives: Contributions of Haitian Anthropologist Antenor Firmin by Deneia Fairweather
C.I.A. World Factbook – Haiti
Bob Corbett’s Haitian History Page
Haiti and the U.S.A.: Neighbors Linked by History and Community. The Trinity College Haiti Program.
Annotated Haiti Bibliography

Farmer, Paul. 1994.The Uses of Haiti. Monroe: Common Courage Press.
The Uses of Haiti uses the quest for human dignity of the majority of Haitian society (the Haitian poor) as a critical lens to analyze Haitian history. By reviewing the actions of nations such as France and the United States and particular actors in Haitian history such as Toussaint Louverture, the Haitian upper class, the Haitian military, François and Jean-Claude Duvalier, Farmer’s goal is to reveal the structural issues (structural adjustment programs, an indemnity the Boyer administration paid France in the 19th century so that France would not invade Haiti and the Duvalier kleptocracy) to provide answers as to why poverty and underdevelopment are persistent in Haiti. (Visit Amazon’s Paul Farmer page.)
Glick Schiller, Nina and Georges Fouron. 2001. Georges Woke Up Laughing: Long-Distance Nationalism and the Search for Home. Durham: Duke University Press.
Georges Woke Up Laughing is a superb ethnography which uses research in the United States and research in Haiti to demonstrate the continued ties between Haitians living in the United States and Haiti. Using the experiences and family history of Dr. Georges Fouron, a professor of education and Africana Studies at Stony Brook University who is of Haitian descent, the text takes readers from the United States to Haiti to analyze the current crisis in Haiti, gender, nationalism and the relationship between later generations of Haitian Americans and Haiti. (View more on Amazon.)
Pamphile, Leon. 2001. Haitians and African Americans: A Heritage of Tragedy and Hope. Gainesville: University of Florida Press.
Haitians and African Americansis an informative text which demonstrates the long historical relationship between Haitians and African Americans. This book deals with the shared heritage of slavery for both groups and how the paths of African Americans and Haitians have crossed repeatedly in their dual quest for freedom from human bondage and equality. For example, this book recognizes some of important contributions that Haitians made to American society by Haitians like the founding of Chicago by a Haitian named Jean Baptiste Point du Sable. In addition, the text notes the African American political support of Haiti and Haitians especially during the Haitian boat crisis of the late 20th century. (View more on Amazon.)
Zéphir, Flore. 2004. The Haitian Americans. Westport: Greenwood Press.
The Haitian Americans is an excellent resource about the Haitian presence in the United States. The author provides a detailed history of Haiti, a history of Haitians in the United States, statistics about Haitian migration to the United States, information about established and growing Haitian communities across the United States and short biographies about prominent Haitian Americans who contribute to the fabric of American society. (View more on Amazon.)

ABA at the AAA Annual Meeting in Chicago 2013

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On April 7, 2013

In Conferences

Future Publics, Current Engagements

The 2013 annual meeting theme Future Publics, Current Engagements invites discussions about how anthropological theory and method can provide insight into the human past and emerging future. Read More.

A list of submission types and requirements are listed on the AAA website at: Proposal Submission Types.

Check back soon for more updates!

View last year’s ABA Conference lineup.

ABA at the AAA Annual Meeting in San Francisco 2012

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On November 7, 2012

In Uncategorized

You can download a PDF with all this info listed below from this link: ABA Sessions for AAA 2012

3-0315 Imagining Anthropology without Borders

Thursday, November 15, 2012: 10:15 AM-12:00 PM

The theme, Borders and Crossings, challenges us to consider the ways in which anthropology is influenced and reshaped as borders are crossed. This roundtable will imagine anthropology without borders. Within such a context, we will consider the implications of the varied crossing with other disciplines and the consequences for not setting boundaries within the discipline. In order to accomplish this, we will address the following questions: Does a borderless discipline limit anthropology’s ability to contribute to a better understood and more just world? For instance, has the AAA lost its center? Does the growing number of sub-sections render the AAA an increasingly diluted and fragmented organization—especially as concerns major cultural and social issues? Have anthropologists ceased raising the big and fundamental questions because of the increasing specialization within the field? When and where do the varied anthropologies and anthropologists intersect and truly speak to one another? Or, perhaps anthropology is not doing enough to protect its borders. Should anthropology be more concerned about how other disciplines borrow our theories and methodologies? Should we be more insistent that those disciplines acknowledge their anthropological heritage? Finally, are we taking the best advantage of the places where borders are crossed? Specifically, should we be more creative and flexible about existing, new and possible borders to cross in order to encourage racial and ethnic diversity within anthropology?

Organizers:
Andrea Carol Abrams (Centre College)

Chairs:
Johnnetta Betsch Cole (National Museum of African Art)

Roundtable Presenters:
Brackette F Williams (University of Arizona), Yolanda T Moses (University of California Riverside), Robert Paynter (University of Massachusetts ), Gwendolyn Mikell (Georgetown University) and Kamela S Heyward-Rotimi (University of Massachusetts)

Crossing Borders: The On-going Work and Legacy of Johnnetta Betsch Cole

Thursday, November 15, 2012: 1:45 PM–5:30 PM

1:45 PM
Introduction Faye Harrison
2:00 PM
“Nothing Is Too Good for the People” Michael L Blakey (College of William and Mary)
2:15 PM
A Tribute to Sister President: HBCUs and Their Anthropological Legacies Marla Frederick (Harvard University)
2:30 PM
We Are All Sisters: Building a Language for Theorizing Black Non-Feminist/Anti-Feminist Anthropology Riche Daniel Barnes (Smith College)
2:45 PM
Women of Color and Might:  A Consideration of Anthropology, Art, Race, Gender and Border Crossing Andrea Carol Abrams (Centre College)
3:00 PM
The Poetics and Politics of Reclaiming: Indigenous Peoples & Anthropology Robin RR Gray (University of Massachusetts, Amherst)
3:15 PM
Discussant Johnnetta Betsch Cole (National Museum of African Art)
4:00 PM
Introduction A. Lynn Bolles
4:15 PM
Connecting Through Art: Johnnetta Cole’s Encore Career Mary Catherine Bateson (Professor Emerita, George Mason University)
4:30 PM
The Curatorial Life Corinne A Kratz (Emory Univ)
4:45 PM
Educational Issues: The Anglophone Caribbean and the US Arthur K Spears (City University of New York – Graduate Center)
5:00 PM
Mentoring As Legacy: The Influence of Johnnetta Betsch Cole On Self and Anthropology Irma McClaurin (McClaurin Solutions)
This session would be of particular interest to:
Those involved in mentoring activities, Students, Practicing and Applied Anthropologists
Organizers:
Riche Daniel Barnes (Smith College)
Chairs:
Faye V Harrison (University of Florida) and A Lynn Bolles PhD (University Of Maryland College Park)
Discussants:
Johnnetta Betsch Cole (National Museum of African Art)

4-0090 The Politics of Party Music: Bay Area Beats, Rhymes and Dance

Friday, November 16, 2012: 8:00 AM–9:45 AM

8:00 AM
Speaking Back and Liberating Minds: Spoken Word Among Bay Area Youth of Color Ashley D. Aaron (San Francisco State University)
8:15 AM
“So After All My Logic and My Theory”: Youth Participatory Action Research Through Hiphop Christopher Roberts (San Francisco State University and San Francisco State University)
8:30 AM
The Funk Behind Street Dance Alan Mar David (San Francisco State University)
8:45 AM
“Sound of Da Police”: Bay Area Hiphop Politics, Policy and Police
9:00 AM
Discussion
9:15 AM
Discussion
9:30 AM
Discussion
This session would be of particular interest to:
Students, Teachers of Anthropology in Community Colleges, Practicing and Applied Anthropologists
Organizers:
Dawn-Elissa Fischer (San Francisco State University)
Chairs:
Dawn-Elissa Fischer (San Francisco State University)

4-0220 Haitian Protestantism Across National Borders

Friday, November 16, 2012: 8:00 AM-11:45 AM

8:00 AM
The Army of Heaven: Strength and Ambiguity In Haitian Pentecostalism Frederick J Conway (San Diego State University)
8:15 AM
Notes Toward a Discussion of Protestantism, Creolization, and Self In 19th-Century Haiti Landon Yarrington (The University of Arizona)
8:30 AM
Salomon Sevère Joseph (1891-1973) and the Mission From God: The Founder and Internationalization of Indigenous Haitian Christianity Terry Rey (Temple University)
8:45 AM
Geographies of Faith In the Popular Neighborhoods of Port-Au-Prince: Protestant, Catholic, and Vodouist Coexistance, Solidarity, and Conflict Lynn Selby (The University of Texas at Austin)
9:00 AM
“If Any Man Be In Christ, He Is a New Creature”: Evangelicalism Among Haitian Agricultural Workers In the Dominican Republic David S Simmons (The University of South Carolina)
9:15 AM
Haiti’s Pact with the Devil: Bwa Kayiman, Haitian Protestant Views of Vodou, and the Future of Post-Earthquake Haiti Bertin M Louis Jr (The University of Tennessee)
9:30 AM
Shifting Boundaries of the Land of God and Shrines to the Anti-Christ Tekla Nicholas (Florida International University)
9:45 AM
Break
10:00 AM
Migrant Theology: Haitian Pastors and the Church of the Nazarene In Miami, FL Jemima Pierre (Vanderbilt University)
10:15 AM
Protestants Sans Frontieres: Humanitarian Thinking within the Haitian Protestant Diaspora Leonard J Lowe (The University of North Carolina)
10:30 AM
Discussant Karen E Richman (University of Notre Dame)
10:45 AM
Discussant Leslie Gerald Desmangles (Trinity College)
11:00 AM
Discussion
11:15 AM
Discussion
11:30 AM
Discussion
This session would be of particular interest to:
Teachers of Anthropology in Community Colleges, Students
Organizers:
Bertin M Louis Jr (The University of Tennessee)
Chairs:
Bertin M Louis Jr (The University of Tennessee)
Discussants:
Leslie Gerald Desmangles (Trinity College) and Karen E Richman (University of Notre Dame)

4-0380 Mapping Diasporic Engagements/Mapping Blackness(es)

Friday, November 16, 2012: 10:15 AM-12:00 PM

10:15 AM
Geo-Corporeal Acrobats: Interrogating Nutritional Praxis, Theology, and the African Diaspora Among Hebrew Israelites Diana A. Burnett (University of Pennsylvania)
10:30 AM
Fighting Monkeys and Situating Selves: Mapping Shiny New Blacknesses Via Dirty Old Logics In Contemporary Black Diaspora Krystal A Smalls (University of Pennsylvania Museum)
10:45 AM
We All Niggas: Blackness As Analog In Gentrifying San Francisco Savannah Shange (University of Pennsylvania)
11:00 AM
Diasporic Imagery and Cultural Practice Brittany L Webb (Temple University)
11:15 AM
Discussant Bayo Holsey (Duke University)
11:30 AM
Discussion
11:45 AM
Discussion
This session would be of particular interest to:
Students, Practicing and Applied Anthropologists
Organizers:
Brittany L Webb (Temple University) and Savannah Shange (University of Pennsylvania)
Chairs:
Brittany L Webb (Temple University)
Discussants:
Bayo Holsey (Duke University)

4-0435 Association of Black Anthropologists Board Meeting

Friday, November 16, 2012: 12:00 PM-2:00 PM
Seacliff (Hilton San Francisco)

This meeting is for the executive board of ABA

Organizer:
Raymond G Codrington (The Aspen Institute)

4-0580 Transforming Anthropology Board Meeting

Friday, November 16, 2012: 12:15 PM-1:30 PM
Bay View (Hotel Nikko)

Editorial Board Meeting for Transforming Anthropology to discuss progress/issues of Transforming Anthropology

Organizer:
Dana-Ain Davis (Queens College, CUNY)

4-1065 Association of Black Anthropologists Awards Ceremony Reception I

Friday, November 16, 2012: 6:15 PM-7:30 PM
Yosemite A (Hilton San Francisco)

Awards will be presented at the ceremony and a reception will follow.

This session would be of particular interest to:
Those involved in mentoring activities, Students, Teachers of Anthropology in Community Colleges, Practicing and Applied Anthropologists
Organizers:
Kimberly E Simmons (University of South Carolina), Raymond G Codrington (The Aspen Institute), Aimee M Cox (Fordham University) and Melanie E L Bush (Adelphi University)
Chairs:
Kimberly E Simmons (University of South Carolina) and Raymond G Codrington (The Aspen Institute)

4-1165 Association of Black Anthropologists Awards Ceremony Reception II

Friday, November 16, 2012: 7:30 PM-9:00 PM
Yosemite A (Hilton San Francisco)

The reception will immediately follow the ABA Awards Ceremony.

This session would be of particular interest to:
Those involved in mentoring activities, Students, Teachers of Anthropology in Community Colleges, Practicing and Applied Anthropologists
Organizers:
Kimberly E Simmons (University of South Carolina), Raymond G Codrington (The Aspen Institute), Aimee M Cox (Fordham University) and Melanie E L Bush (Adelphi University)
Chairs:
Kimberly E Simmons (University of South Carolina) and Raymond G Codrington (The Aspen Institute)

AAA Sections Joint Reception

Friday, November 16, 2012: 8:00 PM-10:00 PM
Continental 4 (Hilton San Francisco)

Sponsored by: Association for Feminist Anthropology

Joint reception of Association for Feminist Anthropology, Association for Queer Anthropology, Association of Black Anthropologists, Association of Latina and Latino Anthropologists, Society for Latin American and Caribbean Anthropology, Society for the Anthropology of North America, Society for the Anthropology of Work

This session would be of particular interest to:
Students
Organizer:
Jane Henrici PhD (Institute for Women’s Policy Research)

5-0360 Punishment and the State: Imprisonment, Transgressions, Scapegoats and the Contributions of Anthropology

Saturday, November 17, 2012: 10:15 AM-12:00 PM

In 2003, in her seminal book on prison abolition, Angela Davis wrote, “The prison has become a key ingredient of our common sense. It is there, all around us. We do not question whether it should exist. It has become so much a part of our lives that it requires a great feat of the imagination to envision life beyond the prison” (Davis, Are Prisons Obsolete? 2003:18-19). More recently, Michelle Alexander concretized the explicitly racialized character of mass incarceration in the United States with a variety of statistics, including that “there are more African Americans under correctional control today – in prison or jail, on probation or parole – than were enslaved in 1850, a decade before the Civil War began” (Alexander, Huff Post Online, posted February 8, 2010). It is at the juncture of these challenging statements — the hegemonic “common-sense-ness” of the carceral state, and the hyper-racial nature of state-meted punishment — that this roundtable discussion begins. The scholars participating in this conversation offer a variety of empirical standpoints, but share a research focus on the U.S. — a nation-state that incarcerates more people than any other country in the world. It is with this deep empirical, experiential and theoretical engagement with state-meted punishment and imprisonment that we hope to develop an anthropologically-informed theoretical framework for studying (and writing about) the peculiar contours of punishment in context of the state. Such a framework, we contend, holds value for research far beyond these particular state boundaries. While the outrageous statistics on the American carceral state and powerful writing on prison reform inspire our work, the participants in this session feel that anthropology’s sustained attention to “the common sense” helps to reveal additional forms of state-meted punishment — and it also contributes a unique and often overlooked set of tools for advancing scholarship and activism on punishment and imprisonment. We note the seminal work of anthropologists already writing about prisons and punishment — Ruth Wilson Gilmore, Lorna Rhodes, Loïc Wacquant, and Tony Whitehead, to name some — and honor their contributions by calling for a recognized (and recognizable) disciplinary space for scholarship on this topic. For example, we would like to see some concepts that are endemic to our work (e.g., punishment, imprisonment, and the state) show up as keywords in the AAA proposal forms. As it stands, while scholarship on punishment and imprisonment has been emerging both within and outside of academia, anthropologists play a relatively small part in this movement. And yet, who better to consider the culturally situated contexts in which punishment and imprisonment exist? Who better to problematize the “common sense-ness” of mass incarceration — or of other more invisible (but equally racialized) forms of punishment perpetuated daily by the state? The session is intended as a first stab at building a vocabulary for an anthropological oeuvre on punishment and imprisonment in the context of the state.

Organizers:
Mieka B Polanco (James Madison University)
Introductions:
Brackette F Williams (University of Arizona)
Chairs:
Mieka B Polanco (James Madison University)
Roundtable Presenters:
Tony Whitehead (University of Maryland), Mahri Irvine (American University), Anjana M Mebane-Cruz (State University of New York), Margaret E Dorsey (The University of Texas – Pan American) and Pem D Buck (Elizabethtown Community and Technical College)

5-0550 Business Meeting Association of Black Anthropologists

Saturday, November 17, 2012: 12:15 PM-1:30 PM
Continental 5 (Hilton San Francisco)

This meeting is for the general membership of the ABA

Organizer:
Raymond G Codrington (The Aspen Institute)

5-0770 Race, Place and the Politics of Borders: Black Community Research in the 21st Century South

Saturday, November 17, 2012: 1:45 PM-3:30 PM

The socio-spatial histories of southern communities reveal the embeddedness of racialized policies and practices that have endured over time. In historical and contemporary contexts, race is a critical marker on both cultural and geographic landscapes. In Black communities, Jim Crow policies, urban renewal, slum clearance and interstate highways are among the many social and political forces that have influenced mobility and challenged African Americans’ relationships to space and place. Often founded along the borders of city limits or in isolated geographic pockets, southern Black communities and neighborhoods were not only places of refuge but also places of agency, initiative, rejuvenation and reinvention of self. While these legacies of resiliency and resistance can be found today, many residents of these communities also feel victimized by vicious forms of social and economic abandonment. Community research methodologies can reveal the social and historical significance of race, place and borders to African Americans in their struggles for self-definition and selfdetermination. Guided by the legacies of DuBois, Davis, Drake, and other community researchers, this roundtable will interrogate the relationship between race and landscape in southern black communities. We will discuss the construction of Blackness in the southern communities we study and the roles of Black identities in social, economic and health issues. We will discuss the meaning of historical and cultural landscapes to residents of Black neighborhoods and communities. We will also consider the ways that our collaborative efforts (with residents) can contribute to the revaluing of communities and inscribe new meaning to marginalized places.

Organizers:
Cheryl R Rodriguez (University of South Florida)
Chairs:
Cheryl R Rodriguez (University of South Florida)
Roundtable Presenters:
Antoinette T Jackson PhD (University of South Florida), Evelyn Newman Phillips PhD (Central Connecticut State University), Corliss D. Heath (University of South Florida) and Beverly G Ward (BGW Associates, LLC)

5-0815 Negotiated Blackness: The Politics of Genes, Gender, Beauty and Multi-Racial Identity

Saturday, November 17, 2012: 1:45 PM-3:30 PM

1:45 PM
Size Matters: Sustaining Female Inequality In a Post-Democratic World Signithia Fordham (University of Rochester and University of Rochester)
2:00 PM
Redrawing Borders of Belonging In a Narrow Nation: Challenges and Consequences of Afro-Ariqueño Activism In Chile Sara B Busdiecker
2:15 PM
Fit for Citizenship? Race, Respectability and the Politics of “Obesity” In Washington, DC Amanda O Gilliam (Columbia University)
2:30 PM
From Straight to Curly: The Natural Hair Movement In the Dominican Republic Kimberly E Simmons (University of South Carolina and University of South Carolina)
2:45 PM
“Mixed,” “Multiracial,” “Other,” “Jamaican:” Contesting, Crossing, and Re-Drawing Racial Borders Sharon E Placide (Florida Atlantic University, Florida Atlantic University and Florida International University)
3:00 PM
Africanicity and Admixture: Tracing Ancestry, Ascribing Status James Battle (University of California, Berkeley/University of California, San Francisco)
This session would be of particular interest to:
Students

Chair:
Kimberly E Simmons (University of South Carolina)

5-1030 Acting Out: Youth Performance in the African Diaspora

Saturday, November 17, 2012: 4:00 PM-5:45 PM

This roundtable engages the forms and functions of performance among African Diasporic youth. Anthropological and cultural studies examinations of youth have long focused on the salience of performance in the social construction of expressive youth culture. Employing frameworks offered by interdisciplinary visionaries such as Stuart Hall, Audre Lorde, and Katherine Dunham, we understand Black youth culture as determined both by its African heritage and by contested diasporic conditions, and as uniquely characterized by emphases on style, music and the use of the body (Hall 1993). Following Hall, we set our sights on performativity in African Diasporic youth cultures, on “linguistic innovations in rhetorical stylization of the body, forms of occupying an alien social space, heightened expressions, hairstyles, ways of walking, standing, and talking, and a means of constituting and sustaining camaraderie and community” (Hall 1993). In the United States, Black youth culture has been linked to “corrupt” self-fashionings such as expensive sneakers, prison-inspired and hip hop-aligned baggie jeans, and most recently, the hooded sweatshirt, as markers of criminality. Black youth have deployed these self-fashionings to contest, affirm, and creatively refashion racialized, sexualized, gendered, and age-based identities, and to protest racial and economic injustice. Globally, African Diasporic youth have also “acted out” in the forms of dance and hip hop music to individually and collectively place black bodies in public spaces in which they have often been policed or rendered invisible. These examples frame the presentations which include an analysis relating gendered performance in the works of author Jamaica Kincaid and hip hop emcee Nicki Minaj to West Indian girls’ feminine identity constructions; an exploration of racialized representations of youth in the 2011 London riots; and an examination of Caribbean immigrant drag parodies on the Internet. We conceptualize “performance” broadly to consider the youthful construction of African Diasporic identities at the intersections of race, sexuality and gender. Following the 2012 AAA meeting theme of “borders and crossings across time, space, embodied differences, language and culture,” the panel addresses performance as a theoretical tool, a mode of expression, and as a vehicle for activism and global dialogue among black youth in disparate locations, exploring the mutable borders between overlapping renditions of youthful African Diasporic identities.

Organizers:
Oneka LaBennett (Fordham University)
Introductions:
Elizabeth J Chin (Art Center College of Design)
Chairs:
Oneka LaBennett (Fordham University) and Aimee M Cox (Fordham University)
Roundtable Presenters:
Raymond G Codrington (The Aspen Institute), O Hugo Benavides (Fordham University) and Nicholas Andrew Boston (City University of New York – Lehman College)

5-1090 Telling the Truth: Pioneer, Archeology, and Emancipation Projects Then and Now

Saturday, November 17, 2012: 4:00 PM-5:45 PM

4:00 PM
Engaged, Evocative Ethnography to Document Unacknowledged Black Pioneers of Immokalee, Florida Brie McLemore (New College of Florida) and Amanda D Concha-Holmes (University of Florida, New College: the Honor’s College of Florida and aMandala.org)
4:15 PM
Incorporating Archaeological Findings and the African American Experience In the Architectural Design of the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture Ayana Aisha Flewellen (University of Texas at Austin)
4:30 PM
Democratizing the Canon: Institutionalizing a Decolonized Anthropology Justin Hosbey (University of Florida) and Justin Dunnavant (University of Florida)
4:45 PM
Freedom Sound: Emancipation Day Musicking In Rural Jamaica Edward B Sammons (The Graduate Center, CUNY)
5:00 PM
“I Live Here, Too/I Want Freedom/Just As You.”: Migration, Mortality, and Belonging In Emancipation Era Washington, DC Justin Dunnavant (University of Florida)
5:15 PM
Tensions In the American Dream: Racial Nationalism and the Multiple Crises of U.S. Hegemony, Historical Capitalism, and White World Supremacy Roderick Bush (St. John’s University)
This session would be of particular interest to:
Teachers of Anthropology in Community Colleges, Students
Organizers:
Edward B Sammons (The Graduate Center, CUNY)
Chairs:
Edward B Sammons (The Graduate Center, CUNY)

5-1165 Works in progress session

Saturday, November 17, 2012: 6:15 PM-8:15 PM
Golden Gate 6 (Hilton San Francisco)

This session pairs tenured scholars (associate/professor) with graduate students/post-docs/assistant professors, to discuss papers, applications, or chapters. This program is designed to meet the needs of students and junior faculty of color who may seek the advice of senior scholars on works in progress and career and professional developmen

This session would be of particular interest to:
Those involved in mentoring activities, Students, Teachers of Anthropology in Community Colleges, Practicing and Applied Anthropologists
Organizer:
Riche Daniel Barnes (Smith College)

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