Anthro News Briefs, Winter 2012
News Briefs from the Department of Anthropology at Wayne State University
From the guy in the red hat (interim chair), Thomas W. Killion
My first year (beginning January of 2012) as Interim has been one of increasingly rapid change here at Wayne State. The department and the university face continuing budgetary challenges that have required tough adjustments and change at all levels.
The rhetoric of "cuts and belt-tightening" seems, at times, to overwhelm our collective academic enterprise. But within the borders of Wayne State's rebellious Republic of Anthropology, the energy is high and our determination to advance research and teaching remains strong. New grant proposals, innovative teaching and courses and exciting training initiatives outside of the classroom dominate the horizon as we enter 2013.
At the top of the news, we have a new dean! Wayne Raskind (formerly director of the School of Mathematical and Statistical Sciences at Arizona State and Dean of Faculty at the University of Southern California) met with anthropology faculty in October for an in-depth and very upbeat discussion of the department's past accomplishments and future challenges. We wound up his visit in the Great Exhibit Hall of the Gordon L. Grosscup Museum of Anthropology with an open meeting attended by faculty, students and friends.
A lively and wide-ranging discussion of urban anthropology ensued (some of you may remember the legendary "School of Detroit Anthropology") that focused on ongoing fieldwork and exciting new research proposals for medical anthropology, food and politics, linguistic anthropology and historical archaeology. Our new dean begins his tenure at Wayne State's College of Liberal Arts and Sciences with a special promise to advance social sciences at the university, a promise that certainly is sweet music to the ears of all in anthropology. His mandate: double external research over the next three years in the college and hire new faculty to strengthen promising departments with strong research and publication histories (that's us by the way).
This mandate bodes well for a positive new period of growth and advancement in anthropology and I hope to be announcing plans for both chair and faculty searches in the months to come. In the meantime, I'm providing "News Briefs," a preliminary draft of the early 2013 Anthropology Newsletter to you now.
to access a sample of articles from our upcoming newsletter that will be mailed to students, faculty, alums and doners very soon. We hope this electronic preview will give you a taste of some of the exciting activities that have been ongoing in the department over the last several months. We are looking forward to great teaching and research in Detroit and beyond in 2013!
We hope we can continue to rely on your support as we forge ahead. If you would like to make a donation to the department (it's all deductible!) for student activities (including travel, research, publication and more) online, please visit go.wayne.edu/give-anthro.
Your contribution will be greatly appreciated by our students!