sociology and anthropology

SOCIOLOGY & ANTHROPOLOGY
HAPPENINGS

The Sociology and Anthropology Department would like to welcome our new faculty members for the 2009/2010 Academic Year:

Todd French - Assistant Professor of Anthropology

We also welcome our Preparing Future Faculty Fellows from Indiana University:

Doug Kinkaid
Jennifer Puentes

Tom Hall

Thomas D. Hall, Edward Myers Dolan Professor of Anthropology and professor of sociology and anthropology, received the Edwin L. Minar Jr. Scholarship Award. Established in 1981, the Minar Award is presented in recognition of exceptional scholarly achievement and is named in honor of its first recipient, a former professor in the department of classical studies.

Darrell LaLone
-named Professor of Evolutionary Studies and Coordinator of the Evolution Studies (EvoS) Program 2009-2014

Rebecca Upton
-named the Edward Myers Dolan Professorship
in Anthropology 2009-2014

-received the U.S. Fulbright Scholar Award in Botswana for AY 2009-2010. She will be conducting research in Maun and working with the HIV/AIDS Centre at the University of Botswana in Gaborone.

Marie Hopwood and Lindi Conover
2009 Faculty Development Student/Faculty Summer Research Award recipients
"Knowledge Creation: Archaeology, Memory and Narrative Through the Conover-Cochran Collection"

New Sociology Textbook by Prof. David Newman is Published

Sociology: Exploring the Architecture of Everyday Life (Brief Edition), by David M. Newman, professor of sociology at DePauw University, has been published by Pine Forge Press. The textbook "provides introductory sociology students an inviting, accessible introduction to the fascinating world of sociology and the sociological imagination," according to the publisher. "Compelling personal and current examples will engage students and help them to understand how sociology affects them in a personal and day-to-day way."

The books features include "David Newman's signature compelling writing style as well as his personal chapter-opening anecdotes -- attributes that have already helped thousands of students learn to think sociologically while being intellectually challenged."

Dr. Newman is also the author of Families: A Sociological Perspective; Sociology: Exploring the Architecture of Everyday Life; and Identities & Inequalities: Exploring the Intersections of Race, Class, Gender, and Sexuality.

"Indigenous Peoples and Globalization: Resistance and Revitalization" by Professor of Sociology and Anthropology Thomas D. Hall and James V. Fenelon, Foreword by Duane Champagne, (Paradigm Press, 2009)

The issues native peoples face intensify with globalization. Through case studies from around the world, Hall and Fenelon demonstrate how indigenous peoples movements can only be understood by linking highly localized processes with larger global and historical forces. The authors show that indigenous peoples have been resisting and adapting to encounters with states for millennia. Unlike other antiglobalization activists, indigenous peoples primarily seek autonomy and the right to determine their own processes of adaptation and change, especially in relationship to their origin lands and community. The authors link their analyses to current understandings of the evolution of globalization.

Thomas D. Hall is also the Edward Myers Dolan Professor of Anthropology at DePauw University and coauthor, with Christopher Chase-Dunn, of "Rise and Demise: Comparing World Systems."

Profs. Barbara Steinson and Matthew Oware Receive 2008-09 Exemplary Teaching Award

This recognition is supported by the George and Virginia Crane Distinguished Teaching Award Fund.

"These are two inspirational teachers who exemplify what it is to be dedicated to student learning and to enriching our academic community," noted Neal B. Abraham, executive vice president of DePauw, in announcing the selections. Dr. Abraham also serves as vice president for academic affairs and dean of the faculty. "It continues to be one of the most rewarding aspects of my responsibilities to review the nominations and the records of accomplishment of the nominees. We have a talented faculty and many, many colleagues deserving of this recognition."

Matthew Oware came to DePauw as a faculty fellow in 2000-01 while he was still a graduate student participant in the Preparing Future Faculty program in sociology at Indiana University. He was next appointed as a pre-doctoral scholar for 2001-02 and then as a full-time faculty member beginning in 2002-03. He was granted tenure and promoted to associate professor effective with the 2008-09 academic year. He earned his B.A. in 1995 from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign in 1995 and his M.A. (1999) and Ph.D. (2002) from Indiana University.

Dr. Oware's effectiveness in the classroom is well documented by students and colleagues, ranging over such courses as Race and Ethnic Relations in the U.S., Individual and Society, Sociology and Popular Culture, and Sociology and Hip Hop. He has twice led Winter Term study projects to Botswana. Students report that he is a dedicated and inspiring teacher, a mentor who is able to raise difficult topics in class while making the discussions safe for what might otherwise be awkward or threatening. He holds students to rigorous standards of critical reading, analytical discussions, and thoughtful speaking, challenging them at many levels. His colleagues attest to how his conversations with them about teaching have been insightful and inspiring, particularly in how he succeeds in drawing student into addressing issues of race in the classroom without alienating others. He is known among his colleagues as an effective speaker, an engaging lecturer, and a skillful discussion leader. In short, his classes exemplify the best of liberal arts college teaching.

Oware's scholarship includes studies of self-identification in different settings of children of mixed racial heritage. His recent articles include: "Code of the Street" and "Hip Hop" in the Encyclopedia of Race, Ethnicity and Society; and "Status Maximization Theory, Hypodescent Theory, or Social Identity Theory?: A Theoretical Approach to Understanding the Racial Identification of Multiracial Adolescents" scheduled to appear in the edited book Biculturalism. His latest article "A ‘Man’s Woman’?: Contradictory Messages in the Songs of Female Rappers, 1992-2000" will appear shortly in the Journal of Black Studies. Last year, the professor joined the editorial board of Teaching Sociology, the flagship teaching journal in the field. He was recently awarded a three-year faculty fellowship (2009-2012) for "A Sociological Analysis of Rap, Race and Politics."

Professor Oware's service outside of the classroom, which forms a key part of his exemplary teaching, includes work with the Black Studies Steering Committee, the Publications Board, the Black Caucus (which he has served as co-convenor), the Campus Climate Task Force and the First-Year Seminar Committee. He also served for three years as faculty adviser to the Association of African American Students and has served as the advisor to Kappa Alpha Psi fraternity.

S&A Majors Travel to Ghana
Sociology and Anthropology majors Jamie Resseguie, Elizabeth Ratchford, Sarah Sadowski and Becky Murphy with sociology professor Nancy Davis at the Kakum Rainforest near Cape Coast, Ghana; part of a January 2008 study trip of Ghanaian historty, culture and society.

American Sociological Association Honors
Prof. Nancy Davis

In the article, published in the American Sociological Review in 2006 (Vol. 71, pages 167-190), the authors "test two theories linking religion and economic beliefs in predominantly Muslim nations using data from national surveys of Algeria, Bangladesh, Egypt, Indonesia, Jordan, Pakistan and Saudi Arabia," notes a synopsis of the work. "Moral Cosmology theory posits that because the religiously orthodox are theologically communitarian in viewing individuals as subsumed by a larger community of believers subject to timeless laws and God's greater plan, they are disposed toward economic communitarianism, whereby the state should provide for the poor, reduce inequality and meet community needs via economic intervention. Modernists are theologically individualistic in seeing individuals as having to make moral decisions in a temporal context and as responsible for their own destinies. As such, modernists are inclined to economic individualism, whereby the poor are responsible for their fates, wider income differences promote individual initiative, and government should not interfere in the economy."

It continues, "An alternate hypothesis, based on Islamic scripture's discussion of economic matters, limits the effects of orthodoxy versus modernism to the one clear economic directive of Islam: the state's responsibility to care for the poor."

It is the finding of Davis and Robinson "that Islamic orthodoxy -- measured as the desire to implement Islamic law (the shari'a) -- is associated in every country with support for such economic reforms as increasing the responsibility of government for the poor, reducing income inequality, and increasing government ownership of businesses and industries."

Access the complete text by clicking here.

The work by Professors Davis and Robinson on the subject of shari'a received international attention last year. Access a citation in the Toronto Star