1970s

Bruce Bradtmiller (B.A. 1975, M.A./Ph.D. Northwestern U). At the end of 2020, Bruce and Carol Cottom (B.A. 1971; M.A. U. Missouri) sold their business, Anthrotech, where he now works as a consultant while the new owner gets up to speed. One of the few applied physical anthropology businesses out there (maybe the only one?), Bruce sees himself as fortunate to have run this business for over 28 years (although the organization itself has been around since 1950), collecting and analyzing anthropometric data and helping clients apply the results to make better-fitting and safer workspaces, protective equipment, medical devices, clothing and wearable technology. Bruce writes, “What I learned at IU Anthro was instrumental in setting me off on what's turned out to be a great career!” Thanks for your many years of service to the profession, Bruce and Carol!

Patrick Rogers (B.A. 1970) shares a story that he characterizes as “vaguely related” to 2020 pandemic. As an undergrad in 1970, he enrolled in IU Foreign Studies year abroad program at San Marcos University in Lima, Perú. While there he learned Spanish, saw South America, and studied Cultural and Physical Anthropology. He writes “There were serious setbacks for our undaunted group of 13 students, including a 6.9 earthquake and many other misfortunes. However, as in the last year with the public health crisis, we found a way to persevere and survive. It took inner strength and lots of support from our program and program director in Lima, Dr. Tom Wright. Each of us grew and developed out of necessity. I believe we can endure this pandemic, given the trials by fire we were exposed to as foreign students. Go Big Red! Go Hoosiers!” Good to hear from you Pat!

Kim Shoup (B.A. ‘74) writes: “I took a major in anthropology because I had to pick a major.  I flopped around the college curriculum and took many science, literature, and various odd classes – none with a view to a career, but not a bad liberal arts education. Turns out my anthropology education fundamentally changed my worldview: almost every situation I  scrutinize, from personal to national, I apply an anthropological (evolutionary) analysis. I have been a small town (my home town) lawyer for 41 years, and my anthropology education has served me well. My last semester was  fall of 1974 and I have never known whether I graduated in 1974 or 1975 – kind of a metaphor for my unguided college experience.” It’s wonderful to hear from you and how anthropology continues to affect your life Kim!

1980s

Dr. Jeffrey Cohen’s journey at IU (B.A. 1984, Ph.D. 1994) began with undergraduate study with Dr. Anya Royce and her husband Dr. Ronald R. Royce. Zapotec language classes with the Royces inspired him to pursue doctoral study. He earned his M.A. from the University of New Mexico, and upon return to the IU anthropology graduate program, became interested in cultural identity in a globalizing system. He travelled to Oaxaca and fell instantaneously in love with the place, realizing right away that this was where he wanted to work. Migration theory became the focus of his career. Now a Professor of Anthropology at Ohio State University, Cohen shares that while this pandemic was certainly unexpected and brutal, he has found ways to keep busy. “Given my focus on migration, there is always something interesting and important to do.” In August he wrote for The Conversation about how indigenous Mexicans were barricading their villages and growing their own food to survive COVID-19. He continues to work on migration issues and recently received a social justice grant to work with a Bhutanese refugee community in Columbus, OH, while continuing to research the effects of COVID-19 and the pandemic on people’s lives in Mexico.

Don Jordan (Ph.D. 1980) writes “Although I never taught or had more contact with anthropology again after leaving IU, I will always remember it as the most intellectually stimulating period of my life. I have put my experience from those years to work many times in newspaper and magazine articles over the years, and most recently on the radio, WFHB, back here in Bloomington. I "retired" here after 25 years in Florida. That is where the 2020 part of this note arrives. My radio show (Inside Outdoors, same as the title of my newspaper outdoors column for 47 years) switched from live in-studio to Zoom when the pandemic shutdown arrived. While this has cut us off from two-way communication with the public (no phone calls), our podcast is reaching people all over North America and probably farther than that. I often bring in anthropology, or various anthropologists I have known or worked with over the years, to contexts involving our work as sources of news and information. At age 76, I see this as a great victory and a story of adaptation to the environment. Ought to be a lot of PhD material being generated out of 2020, something for every sub-discipline. Great to have you back among us Don!

Laura Joss (1982) has been with the National Park Service for over 30 years, and has worked in 9 parks and three regions across the country. She is currently the Superintendent for Golden Gate National Recreation Area, which includes Fort Point National Historic Site, the Muir Woods National Monument, and Alcatraz Island. During 2020 Golden Gate remained open, but Muir Woods, Fort Point and Alcatraz had to periodically close to follow local COVID-19 health orders. As the most visited National Park unit in the system, Golden Gate usually welcomes over 17 million visitors. In 2020, that number dropped to 14 million due to COVID-related closures. However, there was a great increase in visitation to beaches and trails. Laura writes, “It is wonderful to see people getting out of their residences during Shelter in Place to be in nature and get exercise. I am proud that our parks have played a positive role in providing opportunities for respite and healthy activities to the residents of Northern California.” Thank you for the work you do Laura!

1990s

Doug Naylor (B.A. '93) studied Physical Anthropology in Bloomington, and primatology and archaeological field school the summer of his senior year. Surprisingly, it was his love of food that led him into an unexpected career. He worked for several chain restaurants following graduation, supervised an organic farm for three years, and ever since food has been his business. He is currently Chef Manager at the Nashville Zoo at Grassmere. Doug writes, “my Arts and Science degree has served my well in management and forming relationships. Proud to be a Hoosier.” Thanks for this update Doug!

Susan Kirkpatrick Smith (Ph.D. 1998) is an Associate Professor of Archeology at Kennesaw State University, GA. After spending 8 years as department chair, 2020 started off well. She had a semester-long sabbatical and headed to Athens (Athens Greece, not Athens GA!) to work with a colleague at the American School of Classical Studies on a paper accepted for publication. Then on to Crete, to finalize plans for her annual undergraduate osteology field school at the INSTAP Study Center for East Crete. Of course that field school, like all the others in the world, was cancelled. Grateful not to have to migrate to online teaching in the middle of the semester, Susan instead enjoyed some uninterrupted thinking and writing time for the remainder of 2020. Glad you are well and thriving Susan!

L. Kate Wiltz (B.A. 1993) is a Research Associate and Project Manager at the Eppley Institute for Parks and Public Land. Her update focuses on the things that buoyed her in 2020, writing:  “Nearly 30 years after my studies at IU, I find myself in a unique position of service to my community. I was elected to the County Council in Monroe County, IN in 2018. As our community was beset with the pandemic and the accompanying fear, uncertainty, and isolation, our local government scrambled to find the “best” ways to support those most impacted. My county colleagues and I apportioned hundreds of thousands of dollars from our rainy day fund to aid those on the front lines of relief. Money was sent directly to the local food bank, the United Way Covid relief fund, and to the Townships that make up Monroe County so as to provide direct relief to those needing assistance on rent or utilities. Another way Monroe County government pivoted to support our community was through direct grants to local businesses. During the budget cycle last year, I championed a living wage for all county employees, including those working part-time. The Council unanimously passed this change to our salary ordinance, assuring that working for Monroe County meant earning a more equitable paycheck. Finally, as last summer dealt repeated tragic blows to the BIPOC community, the Monroe County Council coordinated a public meeting on concerns on racial inequity, and committed to diversity and inclusion training over the coming years for all of our staff and elected officials. Many colleagues in positions of influence are actively seeking the knowledge, wisdom, and awareness to change ourselves and the systems in which we operate for the greater good of all marginalized people and groups; doing such work personally, and alongside them, is a source of hope and solace for me. I have always looked at anthropology as compassionate science, using data as a basis for understanding humanity. From understanding comes compassion and empathy, and thus the possibility for justice and equity. While I may not make my living as an anthropologist, the lens I use in my work is one I acquired as an anthro student and have been expanding for many years since.” Thank you for this and all you do Kate!

2000s

Loni Coleman (B.A. 2004) is the Director of Annual Giving for UCLA Health in Los Angeles. The COVID-19 pandemic shifted her focus toward helping provide funding relief to front line healthcare workers, supporting infectious disease research and vaccine development, and advancing innovative care for patients (things like virtual art, animal therapies, and AI robots in our children's hospital).  In her spare time she enjoys birding, visiting museums, and traveling. She has a 7-year-old daughter, and is newly engaged -- Congratulations Loni!

Jay VanderVeen (M.A. ’05, Ph.D. ’06). Just before all IU campuses pivoted to online instruction, Jay was named the Assistant Director of the University Center for Excellence in Teaching at IU South Bend, where he has taught in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology since 2006. His main tasks are consulting with faculty on matters of teaching and learning, designing and implementing mentoring workshops and career advising, and assisting with course design and other instructional considerations. Good to hear from you Dr. VanderVeen!

2010s

Dr. Leigh Bush (Ph.D. 2018, with a concentration in Food Anthropology) is in the news and coping creatively with the job market by creating digital courses that take place over Zoom through EventBrite. These virtual sessions are small, seminar style courses that, over the course of six weeks, “explore how food takes on and makes meaning in our lives”. For more information on the course, click here.

Kristin Grandolfo (B.A. 2014, minor Central Eurasian Studies) writes: I am going onto my fourth year of being an assistant English teacher with the JET (Japan Exchange and Teaching) Programme. I am placed in Hokkaido, in a small rural town much like the dairy farmlands of Indiana. I've had classes online since May/June last year and the kids have really helped keep my spirits up. Many of our fun festivals have been canceled, but the town has tried to help by displaying 2 firework shows. The east side of Hokkaido is not well-known, but it's become home for my husband and me. There's so much natural beauty here, as well as a world heritage site, an Ainu culture/ village, so many foxes that I can't keep up with them, and amazing, welcoming people. To keep myself busy I have been practicing wearing kimono with my teacher and trying to improve my Japanese. Our local friends here are bound and determined to get me to stay longer and open an English Cafe / Bakery, where the community would be able to come and learn about different parts of the world, English, how to study abroad, and of course, eat tasty "American/Foreign" sweets. So we have begun talking business about this recently. It's not much, but it has helped getting by this past year. We wish you all the best Kristin!

Kellie Hogue (Ph.D. 2012 Anth & American Studies)  works as a Senior Policy Analyst at the California Research Bureau. The Bureau provides independent, timely, and confidential research and analysis to the California State Legislature, the Governor’s Office, and other state constitutional officers. She is part of an intellectually curious group of librarians and researchers who identify, collect, and organize information to make it readily available to clients in an accessible, understandable format. Actively and intensely multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary, in 2020 Kellie and her colleagues at the CRB collaborated with the UC Berkeley Institute of Governmental Studies to conduct a virtual internship with 18 fellows (see the story here), co-leading a team that focused on COVID-19 and vulnerable populations. It went so well that they are again partnering with IGS with a new set of fellows, virtually walking along with them during the course, coaching them on developing their research topics and design, and mentoring/supporting them over the summer when they serve in hopefully-in-person Sacramento legislative and agency placements. Kellie was appointed a Visiting Scholar at IGS as part of our partnership, working on a related project having to do with the impacts of COVID-19 on minority businesses in California. Thank you for the important work you do Kellie!

Bridget Kelly  (B.A. 2016) graduated with a master’s degree in Nationalism Studies from Central European University in summer 2020, and fall 2020  began her first semester as a PhD student in Sociocultural Anthropology at the University of Michigan. She hopes to spend many summers (and later, research years) conducting fieldwork in northern Transylvania, a place she first came to love after studying Romanian at IU. Her work touches on the material and semiotic transformations of home gardens before, during, and after state socialism, particularly on the changing valence of the “homegrown” as villagers now migrate back and forth across Europe for work.

Sarah Marion (Ph.D. 2013) started a new job in 2020 just before Covid hit as Director of Syndicated Research with Murphy Research, a market research company based in Los Angeles. She lives in Seattle, WA, with her husband and two young children. As a remote position, when everyone else started working remotely too, it made life easier! Previous to this position, she was at The Hartman Group, a Seattle-based market research and consulting firm focused on the food and beverage industry, where she directed their syndicated research program. Sarah writes, “Otherwise, I spent the year like many others - in my house, trying to maintain my sanity!” We are glad to hear from you Sarah!

Dr. Emma McDonell (Ph.D. 2019) and has published an edited volume with Dr. Richard Wilk on superfoods, the product of a conference and workshop held at Indiana University in 2019 and supported by the workshop in political theory. Here is the full reference: 2020. Emma McDonell and Richard Wilk, Critical Approaches to Superfoods. Bloomsbury Academic.

Eric Shattuck (Ph.D. 2015) had a highly productive year in 2020. Having moved from a postdoc position into an Assistant Research Professorship at University of Texas at San Antonio, he was named Interim Director for the Institute for Health Disparities Research. He co-authored two papers published in 2020 in the American Journal of Human Biology and in the journal Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience. Since then, he has had two more co-authored papers accepted for publication, one on sleep duration and increased mortality, and another on infectious diseases and social distancing in nature. He has recently begun two funded research projects, “Pathways to Prevention” funded by a five-year grant from San Antonio Metro Health District, and “Integration of mobile positioning, sociodemographic factors, and household health for urban scale energy consumption simulation and planning” with the UTSA Transdisciplinary Teams (T2) Program. As if that were not enough, Eric began a two-year term as a Program Committee Member in the American Association of Physical Anthropologists. Congratulations on these many accomplishments Eric!

2020s

Dr. Kristin Otto (Ph.D. 2020) specializes in the study of material culture and the anthropology of art. She has recently begun work as Curator at New Mexico State University’s University Museum, which is part of the university’s Department of Anthropology. Says Dr. Otto, “In my work I emphasize the relationality of museum collections—the capacity of an object to connect with materials, people, ideas, and places far beyond its physical existence—and the centrality of these relationships in museum practice and material culture research.”

Dr. Emily Buhrow Rogers (Ph. D. 2020) specializes in American textile traditions and took up a American Council of Learned Societies (ACLS) Leading Edge Fellowship at the Smithsonian Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage. In a recent article, Stories to Tell: Carolyn Mazloomi and the Women of Color Quilters Network in 2020, she profiles the work of Carolyn Mazloomi with the Women of Color Quilters, who stitch works of beauty and tragedy that are both brilliant and resilient. The above article by Emily is itself a model of appreciative collaboration.

Congratulations to our recent Ph.D. graduates and thank you to all our alumni who provided these updates!