Anthropology Theses and Dissertations

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Demographic Investigation of a Piscataway Creek Ossuary
(1974) Ashmore, Rebecca Anne Huss; Kerley, Ellis R.; Anthropology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md)
Skeletal material from an ossuary on Piscataway Creek was analyzed to determine the minimum number of individuals present, and their sex, stature, developmental life stage and age at death. Cultural debris indicated a date of about 1400-1500 A.D. for the burial. At least 281 individuals were recovered, based on a count of right femoral and temporal petrous portions. Although no sex determination was possible for the 68 juveniles, age at death for this group ranged from 7 foetal months to 18 years. For the 213 adults, sex was evenly divided for the population, and mean stature was fixed at 172.86 cm. for males and 160.61 cm. for females. 107 adults died during young adulthood; 81 died during middle age; and 16 died during old age. A sample of each life stage was tested microscopically to determine age at death. Young adults averaged 56.19 years; and old adults averaged 65.71 years. Average age at death for the entire population was 39.33 years.
Discourse and Dissent in the Diaspora: Civic and Political Lives of Iranian Americans
(2013) Zarpour, Mari Tina; Freidenberg, Judith N; Anthropology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
This study examines the political agency of Iranian immigrants. Through the rhetorical device of "political talk" which encompasses politically- and civically- oriented discourse, action and ideology, this research follows political talk as it presents itself in two locations within the public sphere: in the life course of Iranian Americans, and through online discourse. Methods used included a combination of conventional ethnography (participant observation, informal interviews, life history interviews), and virtual ethnography to develop a typology of political and civic action. Life history interviews provided an understanding of the meanings informants assigned to political and civic action within the larger trajectory of their lives, especially within the context of migration experiences. Virtual ethnography involved the analysis of three different Iranian digital diaspora communities. First, this research found that the civic and political spheres of engagement are linked, and that Iranian immigrants use organizations to learn participatory democracy. It illustrates how ethnic organizations, online and offline, act as both vehicles and activators for immigrant political participation and further civic engagement in the U.S. Additionally, this research uncovers how factors (age at migration, length of time in U.S., particular migration experience) impact notions of belonging and solidarity. It unpacks immigrant political agency to demonstrate the range of behaviors and activities which constitute political and civic participation. It contributes to understanding modes of citizenship and belonging by relating individual, historical, and situational variables in order to understand the relationship between homeland events, immigrant politicization and political behavior. Analysis of the three digital communities evidenced the multiple ways that digital diasporas can be a forum for engaging politically and in creating political community by allowing for a diversity of voices. Finally, merging conventional and virtual ethnography highlighted the dominant discourses about participation in larger society, and demonstrated the formation of a distinctly Iranian-American civil society.
BROUGHT UP CAREFULLY: THE ARCHAEOLOGY OF WOMEN, RACE RELATIONS, DOMESTICITY, AND MODERNIZATION IN ANNAPOLIS, MARYLAND, 1865-1930
(2013) Knauf, Jocelyn; Leone, Mark P.; Anthropology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
This dissertation explores the ways in which gender identity played an important role in shaping social and economic systems in post-Civil War Annapolis, Maryland. Focusing on the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, this study examines the definition, negotiation, and contestation of normative ideas about gender and acceptable social relationships during this time period of numerous social, political, and economic changes. Emergent gender ideologies were closely connected to citywide and national priorities, and normalized identity configurations were used to determine who would be considered eligible for civil rights and the protections of citizenship, and to individualize inequalities. Utilizing historical and archaeological evidence from two streets in the historic district of Annapolis, this dissertation focuses on the ways in which negotiations of gender norms can be seen through archaeologically recovered material culture - namely historic features, ceramics, glass, and fauna. This dissertation argues that the "public" project of governance in Annapolis was accomplished partially through negotiations about "domestic" spaces and responsibilities, which are closely tied to gender and race. During the post-Civil War period, developing gender norms - including ideas about what made a man worthy of citizenship or a woman worthy of protection - played an important part in reformulated expressions of white supremacy, initiatives to modernize cities, and the organization of domestic spaces and priorities. A variety of tactics were used to negotiate gendered identities in Annapolis, and variations in the ways that gender ideologies were expressed reflect active mediations of dominant ideologies.
Chincoteague in Transition: Vernacular Art and Adaptation in Community Heritage
(2014) Sullivan, Kristin Marie; Chambers, Erve; Anthropology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
In addition to serving aesthetic or representational purposes, art can express values related to heritage and identity politics. This dissertation discusses the ways in which the vernacular arts of hunting decoy and decorative wildfowl carving in Chincoteague, Virginia, as well as the closely related tradition of wildfowl hunting, express understandings of various forms of heritage in touristic and community exchange, representing and helping tell the story of the ways in which this locale's rural population has adapted to, resisted, and at times encouraged changes related to tourism development and environmental regulation. In the process this project considers how embodied cultural knowledge is presented through carving and closely related practices such as hunting, how environmental and community values relate to carving and carving-related traditions, and the ways in which community members negotiate identity and maintain the integrity of their communities through the production and appreciation of localized artistic expression. Research supporting this dissertation consists primarily of systematic participant observation and key informant interviewing with hunting decoy and decorative wildfowl carvers. It was conducted over the course of nearly two years living on Chincoteague Island, developing close relationships with wildfowl carvers and others associated with this tradition, for example shop owners, arts organizations, local historians, hunters, and museum specialists.
`Fried chicken belongs to all of us': The Zooarchaeology of Enslaved Foodways on the Long Green, Wye House (18TA314), Talbot County, Maryland
(2014) Tang, Amanda; Leone, Mark P; Anthropology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
This project analyzes the zooarchaeological remains excavated from three slave quarters, located on the Long Green of the Wye House Plantation (18TA314). The zooarchaeological data used dates from about 1650 until 1865. The dissertation focuses on how the late 18th century - archaeologically c. 1770 - was a period of immense change at Wye House and this caused coinciding changes in food consumption. Faunal data is combined with historical and archaeological information to assess the validity of utilizing African-American food patterns. The dissertation interrogates the role of archaeologists in reifying racism and in the reproduction of inferior histories for African-Americans based on dominant narratives. The research incorporates the consideration of other social, political, historical, and economic variables to assess the development of local and regional cuisines. This dissertation evaluates why designations of Soul Food and African-American foodways emerged, how this cuisine compares to Southern Cooking, and the ideologies behind keeping the two cuisines separate.
The Empowerment Paradox: Hope and Helplessness in a Tanzanian Community-Based Cultural Tourism Initiative
(2014) Stevens, Melissa Aileene; Chambers, Erve; Anthropology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
Community-based tourism (CBT) has been conceived by its supporters as a pro-poor community development and empowerment strategy. One such initiative is the Longido Cultural Tourism Enterprise, which was established by a Dutch NGO to promote socio-economic development in a Maasai community in northern Tanzania. The enterprise has created opportunities for local participants to build economic and social capital, especially women who do not have many options to earn or control income outside of tourism. However, the promises of tourism are limited by the "tourism gatekeepers" who control access to tourists and the opportunities that they represent. This research explores the paradox of empowerment by investigating the ways that tourism engagement encourages both independence and dependence in Longido, and how conflicting ideas concerning definitions of CBT and its goals affect the residents whose livelihoods have come to depend on tourism. Ethnographic research was conducted in Longido over a period of nine months, and involved participant observation, semi-structured interviews with key informants and Longido residents, a tourist questionnaire, and comparative site visits to other cultural tourism enterprises in Tanzania. This research found that the potential that the Longido enterprise has for transforming relationships of power, particularly between women and men, is limited by the very nature of the community-based tourism (CBT) model employed to achieve this goal. CBT enterprises such as the one in Longido cannot achieve transformative change that leads to the self-determination of its participants when the tourism industry necessitates continued dependence on foreign markets and intermediaries and local people lack market access and knowledge. Attempting to accomplish both development and business goals when they are in direct conflict with one another has led to a failure to fully achieve either. This dissertation concludes that if the Longido enterprise has transformative development as its goal, the CBT model might be the wrong tool. Most significantly, the approach taken in developing and conducting tourism in Longido must consider the diverse priorities and motivations of participants, as well as the touristic relationships of power which limit the agency of local participants in achieving the realization of their own goals in tourism engagement.
LABORING IN STONE: THE URBANIZATION OF CAPITAL IN THE QUARRY TOWN OF TEXAS, MARYLAND, AND ITS EFFECTS, 1840 TO 1940
(2014) Fracchia, Adam; Brighton, Stephen A; Anthropology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
Capitalism is founded on the unequal relationship between capital and labor, a relationship that along with the expansion and accumulation of capital and labor power has come to influence everyday life and values. The quarry town of Texas, in Baltimore County, Maryland, offers an opportunity to explore this important relationship between labor and capital. Established in the mid-nineteenth century to quarry and burn limestone at a time of expanding industry and an expanding nation. The town was created to house the workers, primarily Irish immigrants and later African Americans hired to toil in this hazardous industry, and a community was formed and eventually destroyed. This study examines the logic and process of capitalism, drawing on David Harvey's theoretization of the urbanization of capital to understand how life at Texas was influenced by capitalism. The role of and changes to the quarry industry's operations are studied along with their impact on life in Texas and how industry aligned social relations in town to facilitate capitalism through the manipulation of material culture and space. Through an analysis of the built landscape and artifacts of everyday life, such as ceramic tableware and smoking pipes, in their social context, daily interactions can be studied within a wider framework and scale. Studying Texas in this manner demonstrates the utility and necessity of using a totalizing approach, as suggested by Harvey, to examine capitalism in historical archaeology.
MAKING SENSE OF THE FORT; CIVICALLY-ENGAGED SENSORY ARCHAEOLOGY AT FORT WARD AND DEFENSES OF WASHINGTON
(2015) Minkoff, Mary Furlong; Shackel, Paul A; Anthropology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
In this dissertation, I ask the question, what is the best way to understand the history and archaeology of The Fort and other African American communities associated with the Defenses of Washington? The Fort is an African American community that settled on the grounds of Fort Ward in Alexandria, Virginia from the 1860s through the early 1960s. To answer this question, I adopted a civically-engaged, sensory approach to archaeology and established three project goals. First, I use sensory archaeology, historical research, and community memories to explore the origins of The Fort community, its relationship to Fort Ward, and the land surrounding it. Second, I incorporate the archaeology, memory, and history of The Fort community into a broader narrative of the local and national past through shared sensory experiences. Third, I conclude by describing how a sensory approach could be used to understand the experiences of African Americans at other Civil War Defenses of Washington sites. These goals have been developed with the consideration and input from The Fort Ward/Seminary African American Descendant Society (Descendant Society) and the National Park Service (NPS).
Clinical Practice in Prenatal Care: Perspectives of Latina Mothers, Healthcare Providers, and Scientists on Male Circumcision
(2015) Colon-Cabrera, David; Freidenberg, Judith N; Anthropology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
This study examines how the interplay between biomedical and ethnomedical perspectives impacts on reproductive health services and consumer decision to circumcise among Latinos in Prince Georges County, Maryland. International research influenced circumcision decision-making during prenatal care: little is known about how neonatal male circumcision (MC) is understood at local clinics; about what patients and providers know regarding circumcision benefits; and the reasoning behind the choices made regarding MC among Latinos. What are the beliefs, practices, and policies regarding MC at community clinics and the international research that influences these policies? Ethnographic research was conducted in three clinics in the state of Maryland including participant observation in the clinics, and interviews with healthcare providers, Latina women who sought services, and scientists and policy makers currently active in MC research. The study explored the interplay between biomedical and ethnomedical knowledge of prenatal care services. Interviews were also conducted with six scientists and policy makers currently active in MC research. The study found that as a reproductive health procedure MC illustrated a complex interplay between biomedical and consumer knowledge. Specifically, healthcare providers did not talk about MC to patients mainly because: 1) They thought that the majority of the Latina women seeking services did not want the procedure; 2) The clinics are constrained for resources and circumcision is not a priority when compared to other prenatal care topics deemed more important in the short prenatal visits. In addition, the policy makers and scientists made assumptions referring to the discussion of circumcision by reproductive and sexual health services clinics when providing prenatal care to clients. Their knowledge relied exclusively on the results of clinical trial data, and how this data could inform policy and clinical guidelines. This dissertation contributes to understanding how services impact MC decision-making and increase the pool of data in regards to the feasibility of overarching MC policies aimed at infants. In addition, this research recommends to critically examine MC as a biomedical practice that is now being rationalized as an HIV prevention strategy.
Double "Double Consciousness": An Archaeology of African American Class and Identity in Annapolis, Maryland, 1850 to 1930
(2015) Deeley, Kathryn Hubsch; Leone, Mark P; Anthropology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
This dissertation explores the intersections of race and class within African American communities of the 19th and early 20th centuries in order to expand our understanding of the diversity within this group. By examining materials recovered from archaeological sites in Annapolis, Maryland, this dissertation uses choices in material culture to demonstrate that there were at least two classes present within the African American community in Annapolis between 1850 and 1930. These choices also show how different classes within this community applied the strategies advocated by prominent African American scholars, including Booker T. Washington, W.E.B. Du Bois, Anna Julia Cooper, and Nannie Helen Burroughs, as ways to negotiate the racism they encountered in daily lives. One class, the "inclusionist" class, within the community embraced the idea of presenting themselves as industrious, moral, clean, and prosperous to their White neighbors, a strategy promoted by scholars such as Booker T. Washington and Nannie Helen Burroughs. However, another group within the community, the "autonomist" class, wanted to maintain a distinct African American identity that reflected the independent worth of their community with an emphasis on a uniquely African American aesthetic, as scholars such as W.E.B. Du Bois suggested. The implementation of different strategies for racial uplift in daily life is both indicative of the presence of multiple classes and an indication that these different classes negotiated racism in different ways. This dissertation explores the strategies of inclusion and exclusion African American scholars advocated; how African Americans in Annapolis, Maryland implemented these strategies in daily life during the 19th and early 20th centuries; and how debates over implementing these strategies are still occurring today.
Reordering the Landscape: Science, Nature, and Spirituality at Wye House
(2015) Pruitt, Elizabeth; Leone, Mark P; Anthropology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
This dissertation draws on literature and theoretical frameworks of gardening and social ordering that examine early Euro-American and African-American material culture as they came together on the plantation landscape at Wye House. Located on the Eastern Shore of Maryland, the plantation was home to the Welsh Lloyd family and hundreds of enslaved Africans and African-Americans. Using archaeological and archeobotanical remains of garden related buildings and slave dwellings, this project acknowledges the different possible interactions and understandings of nature at Wye House and how this gave shape to a dynamic, culturally-based, and entangled landscape of imposed and hidden meanings, colonization and resistance.
Hunter-Gatherers, Archaeogenomics, and the Evolutionary History of the Foxes of California's Channel Islands
(2015) Hofman, Courtney; Shackel, Paul; Anthropology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
Understanding human-animal relationships is a fundamental area of archaeological research. Throughout human history, animals have been sources of food, raw materials, labor, and companionship. Humans have also had an important influence on animal populations, including extinction, domestication, and translocation. Recently, archaeological research on the interactions between humans and animals has also helped us understand the contemporary status of animal populations, providing important insights for conservation biology and establishing a new research agenda, conservation archaeogenomics. In this dissertation, I define the field of conservation of archaeogenomics and develop a case study of how archaeological, genomic, and isotope data can be integrated to inform the conservation of an endangered carnivore. The endemic island fox (Urocyon littoralis) of California's Channel Islands is a federally listed endangered species and has been the subject of considerable conservation research, including a captive breeding program. Despite decades of research, significant questions remain about when foxes colonized the Channel Islands and the role that Native Americans may have played in their introduction and dispersal to six islands. Using mitochondrial genomes of 185 extant island and gray fox samples, I demonstrate that island and mainland lineages diverge ~9200-7100 cal BP and were quickly dispersed to the other Channel Islands, likely by humans. I also explore the possibility of a deliberate introduction by Native Americans using isotope data. I did not detect evidence of human resource provisioning of island foxes from early archaeological contexts as might be expected if they were introduced by ancient peoples. However, I did detect evidence of human resource provisioning on San Nicolas Island in the late Holocene and developed a long-term dataset documenting ~7300 years of foraging ecology in the endangered island fox. Archaeological investigations of human-animal relationships through time can help document the influence of Native Americans on species distribution, abundance, and ecology. Understanding how species and humans adapted to and influenced changing environments in the past will inform decisions about protecting, preserving, and restoring biodiversity in the future. This dissertation demonstrates the importance of integrating archaeology and genomics for understanding ancient and modern human environmental relationships and modern conservation biology.
The Cultural Ecology of Youth and Gender-Based Violence in Northern UgandaGANDA
(2015) Lundgren, Rebecka Inga; Whitehead, Tony; Anthropology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
Twenty years of conflict in northern Uganda has resulted in high rates of gender-based violence, unintended pregnancy and a generation exposed to a lifetime of violence. Understanding gender socialization is critical because gender role differentiation intensifies during adolescence, and hierarchies of power in intimate relationships are established. Life histories with 40 adolescents in transitional life stages; puberty, older adolescents, newly married and new parents give voice to gendered experiences of puberty, sexuality, reproduction and violence. 35 in-depth interviews were conducted with individuals nominated by youth as significant in their lives. The Cultural Systems Paradigm (CSP) offers an organizing framework to understand the intersectionality of the components of cultural systems within which youth develop. Social settings, systems and processes shape the acquisition of gender identities. Adolescents depend on others for care and resources, and their networks play influential roles manifesting idea systems and imposing or mediating historical and economic context. Boys and girls recognize that social norms are gendered and identify mechanisms for "learning" gender. Less evident enculturation processes include gendered time and space, experiences of violence, kinship systems and political and historical influences. Social sanctions maintain gender norms/roles, making it difficult for youth to forge new ways of interacting. Study results elucidate the ways masculine and feminine identities are shaped by observation and experience of intimate partner violence and harsh physical punishment. The experience of internal displacement solidified inequitable gender norms, fostering masculinities rooted in violence. Results also suggest that gender is stamped on the bodies of developing boys and girls during puberty. This stage also marks the beginning of vigilant enforcement of increasingly rigid gender roles by family, peers and community. Recognition of the power of hidden influences and social sanctions for gender role transgressions informed an intervention which encourages youth to reflect critically on the examples in their lives and amplifies the voices of gender equitable role models. Building on pathways of resistance to hegemonic gender identities identified during the research, a life course approach was developed to provide differentiated, yet complementary, interventions at key transition points.
CAREER TRAJECTORIES AND INCORPORATION STRATEGIES IN THE LIFE HISTORIES OF FOREIGN-BORN FACULTY IN THE U.S.
(2015) Carattini, Amy Marie; Freidenberg, Judith N; Anthropology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
The primary aim of this study is to understand the factors that influence and affect high-skilled immigrant social practices and adjustment within an occupational unit located in the U.S. The secondary aim is to contribute to the body of knowledge in the process of transforming public perceptions from that of classifying immigrants almost exclusively in low skilled sectors to acknowledging the diversity of skill among the foreign-born. Through research with foreign-born faculty, located at a research university, this study focuses on career trajectories with special attention to domains of connection. Research findings indicate that their visibility as foreign-born is complex. Foreign-born faculty are no longer counted in university data when they have naturalized; however, many are recognized and counted as adding to minority quotas (such as Black, Latin@, and Asian). Foreign-born faculty who participated in this study, referred to as study collaborators for their engagement in the research process, often described who they were and what they did in relation to their occupation rather than their countries of birth and/or settlement--expressing a range of social connection(s) and incorporation strategies. The guiding question for this research is: "What variables influence domains of connection for foreign-born faculty?" In order to answer this question, 48 life history interviews were used to understand how foreign-born faculty constructed their career paths from early educational experiences to selecting teaching and/or research positions in their chosen field--both of which are connected to their subsequent/on-going immigration decisions. Research findings indicate two major career trajectories as they intersect with immigration, 1) being trained and professionally developed in the U.S. or 2) securing employment in the U.S. after being trained and professionally developed abroad. Three domains of connection are identified: political, lifestyle, and professional. This study contributes to anthropology of immigration and recent trends in scholarship by following skilled immigrant incorporation into the labor market to understand their social practices and concludes with suggestions for applied and policy contributions.
MIGRATION, MODERNITY AND MEMORY: THE ARCHAEOLOGY OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY IN A NORTHEAST PENNSYLVANIA COAL COMPANY TOWN, 1897-2014
(2015) Roller, Michael Peter; Shackel, Paul A; Anthropology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
The Lattimer Massacre occurred in September of 1897 in the anthracite coal region of Pennsylvania. It has been described as the bloodiest massacre of the nineteenth century. In this event, a company-sponsored sheriff and a posse of local businessmen shot into a crowd of striking Eastern European mine laborers, resulting in the deaths of at least nineteen. However, the great significance of the event is not in the body count but the material contexts of its occurrence as well as its pre- and post- histories. Moreover, while the event can be securely consigned to history, the capitalist processes punctuated by this instance of violence are present throughout the century since its occurrence. In the region, coal company towns materialized carefully maintained racialized labor hierarchies in which new immigrants were confined to shanty towns at the periphery. The dissertation operates on an archaeological scale stretched across the longue durée of the twentieth century, documenting the transformation of a shanty town into an American suburb over the course of a century. The archaeological evidence hails from three excavations including a survey of the site of the Massacre and excavations of lots in the shanty enclave. This dissertation examines the trajectory of these settlements across the entire span of the twentieth century. With its primary evidence derived from waste, ruins, surpluses and redundancies accumulated over time, archaeological tellings of history recognize these aspects not simply for their contingency, but their centrality within capitalist social life across the passage of time. In this dissertation, I propose that a critical historical archaeology can contribute substantially to a nuanced understanding of the ironic developments of late twentieth century political economy. Contradiction, sovereignty, governmentality, states of exception, surplus enjoyment, cycles of creative destruction and reterritorialization, renewal, and subjectivation are explored by juxtaposing, grafting and merging archaeological evidence with social theory, textual evidence, ethnographic data and interdisciplinary scholarship to present an archaeological history greater than the sum of its parts. The result is both a history of the community and a schematic for an archaeological history of the twentieth century.
Resilience to Climate Change: An Ethnographic Approach
(2016) Johnson, Katherine Joanne; Paolisso, Michael J; Anthropology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
Global projections for climate change impacts produce a startling picture of the future for low-lying coastal communities. The United States’ Chesapeake Bay region and especially marginalized and rural communities will be severely impacted by sea level rise and other changes over the next one hundred years. The concept of resilience has been theorized as a measure of social-ecological system health and as a unifying framework under which people can work together towards climate change adaptation. But it has also been critiqued for the way in which it does not adequately take into account local perspective and experiences, bringing into question the value of this concept as a tool for local communities. We must be sure that the concerns, weaknesses, and strengths of particular local communities are part of the climate change adaptation, decision-making, and planning process in which communities participate. An example of this type of planning process is the Deal Island Marsh and Community Project (DIMCP), a grant funded initiative to build resilience within marsh ecosystems and communities of the Deal Island Peninsula area of Maryland (USA) to environmental and social impacts from climate change. I argue it is important to have well-developed understandings of vulnerabilities and resiliencies identified by local residents and others to accomplish this type of work. This dissertation explores vulnerability and resilience to climate change using an engaged and ethnographic anthropological perspective. Utilizing participant observation, semi-structured and structured interviews, text analysis, and cultural domain analysis I produce an in-depth perspective of what vulnerability and resilience means to the DIMCP stakeholder network. Findings highlight significant vulnerabilities and resiliencies inherent in the local area and how these interface with additional vulnerabilities and resiliencies seen from a nonlocal perspective. I conclude that vulnerability and resilience are highly dynamic and context-specific for the local community. Vulnerabilities relate to climate change and other social and environmental changes. Resilience is a long-standing way of life, not a new concept related specifically to climate change. This ethnographic insight into vulnerability and resilience provides a basis for stronger engagement in collaboration and planning for the future.
Integrating Environmental Justice and Social-Ecological Resilience for Successful Adaptation to Climate Change: Lessons from African American Communities on the Eastern Shore of the Chesapeake Bay
(2016) Hesed, Christine Danielle Miller; Paolisso, Michael; Anthropology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
This research concerns the conceptual and empirical relationship between environmental justice and social-ecological resilience as it relates to climate change vulnerability and adaptation. Two primary questions guided this work. First, what is the level of resilience and adaptive capacity for social-ecological systems that are characterized by environmental injustice in the face of climate change? And second, what is the role of an environmental justice approach in developing adaptation policies that will promote social-ecological resilience? These questions were investigated in three African American communities that are particularly vulnerable to flooding from sea-level rise on the Eastern Shore of the Chesapeake Bay. Using qualitative and quantitative methods, I found that in all three communities, religious faith and the church, rootedness in the landscape, and race relations were highly salient to community experience. The degree to which these common aspects of the communities have imparted adaptive capacity has changed over time. Importantly, a given social-ecological factor does not have the same effect on vulnerability in all communities; however, in all communities political isolation decreases adaptive capacity and increases vulnerability. This political isolation is at least partly due to procedural injustice, which occurs for a number of interrelated reasons. This research further revealed that while all stakeholders (policymakers, environmentalists, and African American community members) generally agree that justice needs to be increased on the Eastern Shore, stakeholder groups disagree about what a justice approach to adaptation would look like. When brought together at a workshop, however, these stakeholders were able to identify numerous challenges and opportunities for increasing justice. Resilience was assessed by the presence of four resilience factors: living with uncertainty, nurturing diversity, combining different types of knowledge, and creating opportunities for self-organization. Overall, these communities seem to have low resilience; however, there is potential for resilience to increase. Finally, I argue that the use of resilience theory for environmental justice communities is limited by the great breadth and depth of knowledge required to evaluate the state of the social-ecological system, the complexities of simultaneously promoting resilience at both the regional and local scale, and the lack of attention to issues of justice.
Violence against Women Policy and Practice in Uganda - Promoting Justice within the Context of Patriarchy
(2016) Gardsbane, Diane; Freidenberg, Judith N.; Anthropology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
The goal of this study was to understand how and whether policy and practice relating to violence against women in Uganda, especially Uganda’s Domestic Violence Act of 2010, have had an effect on women’s beliefs and practices, as well as on support and justice for women who experience abuse by their male partners. Research used multi-sited ethnography at transnational, national, and local levels to understand the context that affects what policies are developed, how they are implemented, and how, and whether, women benefit from these. Ethnography within a local community situated global and national dynamics within the lives of women. Women who experience VAW within their intimate partnerships in Uganda confront a political economy that undermines their access to justice, even as a women’s rights agenda is working to develop and implement laws, policies, and interventions that promote gender equality and women’s empowerment. This dissertation provides insights into the daily struggles of women who try to utilize policy that challenges duty bearers, in part because it is a new law, but also because it conflicts with the structural patriarchy that is engrained in Ugandan society. Two explanatory models were developed. One explains factors relating to a woman’s decision to seek support or to report domestic violence. The second explains why women do and do not report DV. Among the findings is that a woman is most likely to report abuse under the following circumstances: 1) her own, or her children’s survival (physical or economic) is severely threatened; 2) she experiences severe physical abuse; or, 3) she needs financial support for her children. Research highlights three supportive factors for women who persist in reporting DV. These are: 1) the presence of an “advocate” or support 2) belief that reporting will be helpful; and, 3) lack of interest in returning to the relationship. This dissertation speaks to the role that anthropologists can play in a multi-disciplinary approach to a complex issue. This role is understanding – deeply and holistically; and, articulating knowledge generated locally that provides connections between what happens at global, national and local levels.
An Environmental Anthropology of Modeling and Management on the Chesapeake Bay Watershed
(2017) Trombley, Jeremy M.; Paolisso, Michael; Anthropology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
In the last few decades, computational models have become an essential component of our understanding of complex environmental processes. In addition, they are increasingly used as tools for the management of large-scale environmental problems like climate change. As a result, understanding the role that these models play in the socioecological process of environmental management is an important area of inquiry for an environmental anthropology concerned with understanding human-environment interactions. In this dissertation, I examine these roles through an ethnographic study of computational environmental modeling in the Chesapeake Bay watershed. The Chesapeake Bay region is an excellent place to investigate modeling and management because, for over thirty years, it has been the site of a watershed-scale effort to reduce nutrient pollution (nitrogen, phosphorous, and sediment) to the Chesapeake Bay. In order to carry out this management process, the Chesapeake Bay Program (CBP) was created as a partnership between the federal government and seven watershed jurisdictions. In addition, modelers at the CBP have been developing a complex computational model of the watershed known as the Chesapeake Bay Modeling System (CBMS) in order to identify and track the sources and effects of nutrient pollution on the estuary. In this dissertation, I explore the role of the CBMS and other models in our understanding and management of nutrient pollution in the region through three articles written for publication in peer-reviewed journals, each of which addresses the question in a different way. The first discusses the ways that the process of building and implementing a computational model is affected by its inclusion in a management institution. The second describes the ways that the computational models themselves are affected by the management contexts in which they are developed and deployed. The third examines the various roles that they play in building and maintaining the relationships that underlie the management process. Together, these articles shed light on the ways that computational models mediate human-environment interactions by way of environmental management, and will help to plan more inclusive and effective modeling and management approaches in the future.
JOINT CULTURE IN THE U.S. MILITARY: ACCOMPLISHING THE MISSION BY ADAPTING TO ORGANIZATOINAL DIVERSITY
(2017) Krizan, Martin; Paolisso, Michael; Anthropology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)
This dissertation develops the concept of joint culture by analyzing the experiences of military service personnel who served in joint assignments through the perspectives of organizational and cognitive anthropology and the application of participant observation, semi-structured interviews and schema analysis grounded in interviewee narratives. This dissertation uses a logical framework to organize and conduct interviews and guide the analysis of interviewee narratives. Concepts and themes from interviews are systematically examined following the logical framework to posit a set of cognitive structures associated with joint culture. At least two joint cultural schemas are present in the accounts of joint service that interrelate to form a cultural model of jointness that prepares personnel to function in a joint cultural environment. First, a schema of joint culture, the tacit cognitive structures focused on the priority of mission accomplishment that motivates personnel to work through the inter-organizational differences encountered in the joint environment. Second, a schema for joint culture, the more procedural or process focused explicit cognitive structure that informs how service personnel figure out the steps before, during and after a joint assignment. These schemas dynamically interrelate and are intersubjectively shared in adaptive ways as service personnel navigate their joint assignments. This dissertation finds that while military service personnel may not understand formal joint concepts or benefit from formal joint credit for each of their joint assignments, they believe joint service is valuable as an opportunity to learn from the other services and because of the organizational diversity that brings complimentary capabilities together to accomplish the mission. This dissertation adds to the growing body of literature that deals with anthropology of the military and may represent the first cognitive anthropological research into an important cultural context for many military personnel and illustrates how anthropological methods can be applied to military cultural contexts.

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