The Peteet Award for Excellence in Anthropological Scholarship

Dr. Peteet with 2021 departmental award winners (L-R): Mekenzie Davis (Peteet Award), Briana Lee (Merit Award), and Henrietta Ransdell (Peteet Award). Not pictured, Kaylee Bryan (Merit Award).

This award honors the career of Anthropology faculty member and former department chair Julie Peteet, who helped build and shape the department from 1991 to 2021. Professor Peteet’s dedication to impactful research can be seen in her many publications and academic honors, her commitment to supporting scholarship about Palestinian experiences, and her long-term work to grow the Department of Anthropology and the Middle East and Islamic Studies Program at the University of Louisville. Peteet is the recipient of many major academic grants, including from the National Endowment for the Humanities, Social Science Research Council, Fulbright program, Wenner-Gren Foundation, and Mellon Foundation. She is also author of the much-lauded books Space and Mobility in Palestine (Indiana University Press 2017), Landscape of Hope and Despair: Palestinian Refugee Camps (University of Pennsylvania Press 2009), and Gender in Crisis: Women and the Palestinian Resistant Movement (Columbia University Press 1991).

Initiated in 2021, this annual award recognizes the research and scholarship activities of exceptional undergraduate Anthropology majors. The award is given based upon evidence of primary research participation and/or future research promise within any of the sub-disciplines of Anthropology. Evidence of research participation may include participation in fieldwork or primary data collection within a faculty-led project; creation of independent research for a course, thesis, or otherwise; presentation of findings at an academic conference; participation in the writing of academic research articles; or other related scholarly activities.

2021 Peteet Awards

  • Mekenzie Davis
  • Henrietta Ransdell

2022 Peteet Award 

  • Maria Cora
  • Elizabeth Hagan