Anthropology graduate students win University-Wide SIGS awards.
Allan Day has been selected by the Scholarship and Awards Committee of the Graduate Council to receive the Alice Eaves Barns Award in recognition of his displayed tenacity in the face of adversity, while attaining excellence in both the classroom and outside endeavors.
In 2016 I received a Bachelor’s degree in English from IU-Southeast. I decided to take the writing skills I had developed and explore the social sciences. My interest in the machinations of culture led me to the University of Louisville Anthropology department, where I focused my Master’s work on issues of sustainability and the environment. I wanted to understand how various cultures conceive of the human relationship to the environment, why so many societies function unsustainably, and what impact sustainability efforts might have upon socio-cultural systems.
During my time here, I became involved in two pertinent research projects. The first was to explore cooperative grocery stores from a social sciences perspective to contribute to efforts to start such an operation in Louisville. The second was a follow-up on a project from a political ecology class exploring students’ changing conceptions of nature and the environment.
I was interested, too, in taking active part in sustainability work beyond the academics. I had previously performed some volunteer work through the WWOOF program, connecting volunteers to organic farms. My university studies in sustainability led me to the Citizen Forester program at Louisville Grows, a nonprofit organization supporting urban agriculture, urban forestry, and environmental education. Citizen Foresters are specially trained to lead teams of volunteers for tree planting events. I concluded my academic career with an internship at Louisville Grows, helping with their various operations and programs.
The internship transitioned into a full-time fund development position at Louisville Grows through the Americorps Vista program. This position ends in June 2019 after which I intend to continue work pertaining to sustainability and environmentalism. The ideal is to take a position conceived by Louisville Grows in conjunction with Limbwalker Tree Service as an urban arborist apprentice. This opportunity largely depends on pending grant applications, so its feasibility remains to be seen. Meanwhile, while the completion of this position is a little ways off, I keep my eyes open for potential future opportunities.
Anthropology Graduate Student, Meagan Taylor, receives University-wide honor, the Virginia “Jenny” Madden Award in recognition of her leadership through service to her program, college, discipline, the University as a whole, and/or the community.
Meagan Taylor entered the Anthropology MA Program in the Spring of 2017 to pursue refugee and immigrant studies as a cultural anthropologist. During her graduate career, she took classes such as Refugees and Mobility, and Volunteerism that further shaped her interests and her understanding of their applications to real world experiences. Alongside classes, Meagan took an active role on campus and within the community. In her first semester of graduate school, she became the Graduate Network of Arts and Sciences (GNAS) Representative as well as the Secretary of the Anthropology Graduate Student Association (AGSA) where she served as a liaison between the organizations and the graduate students. To complement her academic focus, she volunteered at Americana World Community Center in the after-school program assisting teachers in art and creative writing classes. In the Spring of 2018, she became the President of AGSA and shortly after that, she started in a new intern role at Kentucky Refugee Ministries (KRM) in Louisville, supporting the Family and Youth Services programs with summer camp and school registration. Within that intern role, she participates in the “In-Project” at Kenwood Elementary where the teachers combine anti-bullying awareness with promoting culture and ethnic diversities among the students. As her time in the program is coming to an end, Meagan is looking into future careers that aid in refugee resettlement and post-resettlement programs and teaching English. She hopes to continue her work in non-profits, providing the holistic and open-minded perspectives she has acquired and developed though her educational career as a cultural anthropologist.