Annals: Departmental reports and staff listings

University of Kent

The Marlowe Building, Canterbury, Kent CT2 7NR
T. 01227 827928 F: 01227 827289 E: anthro-office(AT)kent.ac.uk
W: http://www.kent.ac.uk/anthropology

Degrees offered in anthropology

Undergraduate:

Single honours: BA Social Anthropology, BSc Anthropology, BSc Biological Anthropology, BSc Medical Anthropology

Combined honours in Social Anthropology and Archaeology, Accounting and Finance, Cultural Studies, Economics, History, Law, Philosophy, Politics, Psychology, Social Policy and Sociology or with a European language

Graduate:

(Taught) MA in Social Anthropology; Social Anthropology and Computing; Ethnicity, Nationalism and Identity; Visual Anthropology. MA and MSc in Environmental Anthropology. MSc in Ethnobotany

(Research) MA, MSc, MPhil, PhD

Social programmes

Four-year BA degree in social anthropology with a language, including a year’s anthropological study abroad: in Finland, The Netherlands and Japan, the language of instruction is English; in France, Spain, Italy and Germany it is the language of the country.

Report

The Anthropology department continues to expand. The new(ish) BSc programmes have attracted considerable interest. First year recruitment is now double what it was in 2004. This expansion reflects an increasing interest in anthropology among school-leavers fuelled by a strong recruitment programme in the south-east region in which open days and visits to local schools have played a major part. At the postgraduate level numbers fluctuate, often depending on the current strength of the pound. The specialist MSc programmes in Ethnobotany and Environmental anthropology, especially the former, recruit well, and the MA in Visual anthropology is now properly established with a professional practical component that appeals strongly to students.

We have attracted post-doctoral students through Leverhulme awards and through the Marie-Curie fellowship scheme and the Urgent Anthropology Research Fellowship, which we continue to host. Thanks largely to quota awards and a very successful CASE award strategy, as well as internal awards, we have healthy postgraduate research numbers. Our vigorous research culture manifests itself in the regular Tuesday seminar research seminar with guest speakers, the annual Paul Stirling lecture – in December 2007 given by Professor Michael Gilsenan – and in the encouragement of staff and students to present papers at and attend international conferences.

There are some staff changes to report. John Corbin retired in 2007, though Marie and he continue to be associated with the department. Scott Legge has accepted a post in Macalster, Minnesota, and will be leaving in July 2008. David Zeilyn has reduced his commitment from full-time to a quarter-time to allow more scope for research and consultancy. As a result of these changes we have advertised for two new posts in biological anthropology and will soon be advertising for one in social anthropology. Bill Watson steps down as head of department from July 2008, and the new head of department will be Dr Douglas Macmillan from the DICE side of the department. The representative head on the anthropology side has yet to be confirmed.

Professor Ellen was elected as the new President of the Royal Anthropological Institute in 2007.

The RAE no longer plagues us, but references to the new REF and its potential bibliometric implications alarm us, as does the insistent pressure to concede that research quality can be measured by the volume of research grant income.

Staff list

Glenn Bowman: Palestine; Yugoslavia; nationalism and ethnicity; tourism; visual anthropology (photography); religion.

Melissa Demian, (PhD Cambridge): Papua New Guinea; Kinship and exchange, gender, property theory, legality and legal pluralisms, aesthetics, temporality; Melanesian ethnography

Christine Eagle: IT technical advisor and lecturer in statistics

Professor Roy Ellen, FBA, (PhD LSE): South-East Asia, Eastern Indonesia, Ethnobiology, cognitive anthropology, classifications, ecology and environmental anthropology.

Professor Michael Fischer,  (PhD Texas): South Asia, Pakistan, the South Pacific, the Cook islands. Anthropology and computing; computer modelling.

Sarah Johns, (PhD Bristol): Hominin evolution and behaviour; history of evolutionary theory; evolutionary psychology; human sexual behaviour.

Roger Just (PhD Oxford): Greece, north Mediterranean; Ethnicity and Nationalism; kinship; fishing communities, anthropological theory; philosophy.

Scott Legge, (until July 2008) (PhD, University of Alaska Fairbanks): Human biology and adaptation; osteology; paleopathology; growth and development; bioarchaeology; nutrition and disease.

Nicholas Newton-Fisher (PhD Bristol): Primates, especially chimpanzees, behavioural ecology and the evolution of social systems.

Peter Parkes, (DPhil, Oxford): Pakistan (Hindu Kush); Turkmenistan social structure; ritual; oral literature and performance; visual anthropology; agro-pastoral production; adoption and fostering.

Daniela Peluso, (PhD Columbia University): Amazonia. Kinship, gender, development, environmental anthropology.

Raj Puri, (PhD University of Hawaii): South-east Asia, Indonesia, Vietnam, Europe. Environmental anthropology, ethnobiology, historical ecology, methods, conservation, development, water, climate change.

Anna Waldstein, (PhD University of Georgia): Mexico, British Isles. Medical anthropology, ethnopharmacology, medical ecology, nutrition and health and traditional medical systems.

Professor Bill Watson, (Ph D Cambridge) (Head of department 2005- 2008):  Indonesia; Malaysia; Philippines; history and anthropology; anthropology of Islam; communities in Britain; anthropology and literature, autobiography, gender.

David Zeitlyn (PhD Cambridge): Cameroon and Nigeria; West Africa. Religion; anthropological linguistics; biography and autobiography; kinship and population history; photography; research methods; computing applications.

Part-time Teaching Staff

Cameron Adams (PhD Georgia) Central America, medical anthropology, biological anthropology

Mary Adams (PhD Kent) Southern Africa; Townships, health and illness, religion, gender, family livelihood strategies

Professor Patricia Howard (PhD Wisconsin) Central America; ethnobotany, political ecology, food commodity systems

Piers Locke (PhD Kent) Nepal, Hinduism; political anthropology, ritual and religion, anthropology of human-animal interaction

Gary Martin, (PhD Berkeley) Mexico; Sabah; Morocco. Ethnobotany; Applied ethnobiology in relation to integrated development and wildlife conservation.

Mr Rob Veltman, (MA Lancaster) Linguistics.

Research Staff

Janet Bagg (PhD Kent)(Research Fellow):  History and anthropology, computing applications; Britain (Weald of Kent), Corsica.

Robert Mayer (PhD SOAS, PhD Leiden): Ritual and religious organisation, refugee communities; Buddhism, North India, Tibet.

Yoshitaka Ota (PhD UCL) Research Assistant

Novellino, Dario (PhD Kent)  Urgent Anthropology Research Fellow: Southeast Asia; Ethnobotany; environmental anthropology.

Simon Platten (PhD University of Kent): Indonesia and the British Isles. Small-scale cultivation and socio-cultural change.  Ethnobotany of food crops.  Environmental anthropology; Eden Project link person.

Staff in other Departments

Axel Klein (PhD SOAS) Kent Institute of Medicine and Health Sciences: Africa, Caribbean. drug dependence, substance abuse, addiction

Honorary Members:

Akhtar, Dr Ehsan (PhD Wales) Agricultural development, Pakistan.

M. Alexiades, (PhD CUNY): Amazonian medicinal plants and non-timber forest products, community development and the broad range of issues related to environmental struggles and environmental identities in tropical forests.

Cantwell, Dr Cathy (PhD Kent) Ritual and religious organisation; refugee communities; Buddhism, North India, Tibet.

Colclough, Dr Nevill (PhD LSE) History and anthropology, political systems; Italy.

Connell, Dr Bruce (PhD Edinburgh) Linguistics; Africa: Nigeria, Cameroon.

Delibas, Dr Kayhan (PhD Kent) Islam; Middle East politics; globalisation; modernisation.

Eades, Professor Jerry (PhD Cambridge) Urban anthropology, development; West Africa, Japan, China.

Hann, Professor Chris (PhD Cambridge) Economic and political anthropology, ethnicity; Eastern Europe, Turkey, China especially Central Asia.

Heinrich, Prof Michael, School of Pharmacy, London.

Henfrey, Dr Tom (PhD Kent) Environmental anthropology, Guyana.

Kesby, John (DPhil Oxford) Cultural regions, ritual and belief systems; East Africa (Tanzania).

Kocher-Schmid, Dr Christin (PhD Basel) Ethnobiology, cognitive anthropology, constructions of identity, arts and aesthetics; Papua New Guinea.

Lyon, Dr Wenonah (PhD Texas) Cognitive anthropology, gender, development, medical anthropology; Pakistan.

Nesbitt, Dr Mark (PhD Reading, Centre for Economic Botany, Kew) Ethnobotany; archaeobotany; economic botany.

Prato, Dr Giuliana (PhD London) Political anthropology, popular culture, migration. Italy, Balkans.

Pardo, Dr Italo (PhD London; Honorary Reader) Political anthropology, urbanism, elites, legitimacy; Italy.

Renshaw, Dr Jonathan (PhD LSE) Rural development; Latin America, S. Asia.

Veltman, Mr Rob (MA Lancaster) Linguistics.

Executive Officer: Susan Simpson

Anthropology Secretaries: Jan Horn (undergraduate), Nicola Kerry-Yoxall (postgraduate), Sheila Dutnell (postgraduate/admissions), Shelley Malekia (on maternity leave 2008) (postgraduate/admissions)

Requirements for taught MA: Six written pieces of coursework, 10,000-word dissertation

Requirements for PhD: Three years’ registration, 80,000-word dissertation 

Academic year system: Two 12-week terms and one 6-week term

Special resources and facilities

Durrell Institute of Conservation and Ecology (DICE); Ethnobiology laboratory; links with Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew; Biological Anthropology laboratory; links with Powell-Cotton Museum, Birchington; Centre for Social Anthropology and Computing; four Sun servers maintained by the department, and undergraduate microcomputer laboratory and graduate research room with Macintosh IBM-compatible machines; laser printing and optical reading/scanning capability.

Departmental series:

CSAC Monograph Series

Ethnographics Gallery. http://lucy.kent.ac.uk/

Experience Rich Anthropology: http://lucy.kent.ac.uk/

For prospectus write to:

Undergraduate: Admissions Office, Registry, University of Kent, Canterbury, CT2 7NZ.

Graduate:  Graduate Office, Registry, University of Kent, Canterbury, CT2 7NS.

For further information, write to: Anthropology Secretary, Marlowe Building, University of Kent, Canterbury, Kent, CT2 7NR.