Late July Update: Summer Research Team 2020 going strong! From upper left; Syona Hariharan, Emily Mendenhall, Allie Cho, Emma Morris, RJ Atwal, Anthony Panasci, Maydha Dhanuka, Lindile Cele, Emma Backe, Arthur Rodriguez
Summer 2020 Research Team (top left to bottom right): Lindile Cele (Wits), Emily Mendenhall (Georgetown/Wits), Maydha Dhanuka (Georgetown), Anthony Panasci (Georgetown), Andrew Kim (Northwestern/Wits), Emma Morris (Georgetown), Natalie Kim (Georgetown), Emma Backe (George Washington University), Edna Bosire (Wits)
Introducing Final Presentations for the Syndemics Centennial Lab
Edna Bosire and Andy Kim - “the dream team”
Undergraduate Mentees at Georgetown University include:
Bernadette Nelson (SFS) - field work in Kenya (2014); H. Stowe McMurry (SFS) - fieldwork in India (2015); Hannah Gerdes (SFS) - fieldwork in South Africa; Rebecca Rinehart (College) (2016); Jacqueline Kimmell (SFS) (2017); Marina Smith (SFS), Arista Jhanjee (SFS), Katelyn Shahbazian (SFS) - fieldwork in South Africa (2018); Sonia Vohra (SFS), Zachary Thompson (SFS) (2019)
End-of-seminar meditation session - here is the Centennial Lab group!
With PhD candidate Edna Bosire at Wits; we’ve worked together since 2014, first in Kenya and now in South Africa.
PhD Students
I work with PhD students at various institutions, including those at Georgetown in History (Dylan Proctor working on syndemics through history) and Government (Sara Fischer working on a critical ethnography of the Malawian Health System). I also mentor other informally, such as Andy Kim (Northwestern), who is passionate about complexities of epigenetics, systemic oppression, and resilience.
My primary PhD mentorship is associated with my honorary faculty appointment at University of the Witwatersrand. I have worked with my PhD student, Edna Bosire, MA, in the Faculty of Health Sciences at the University of the Witwatersrand (co-supervised by Dr. Jane Goudge and Dr. Shane Norris). Currently she is the lead on-the-ground researcher in many of our partnered projects in Soweto. Edna's scholarship investigates various dimensions of syndemic interventions for diabetes and poverty, from policy-level interventions like taxation for sugar sweetened beverages and clinical-level interventions like integrated chronic care at the Chris Hani Baragwanath Hospital in Soweto. After working together in Nairobi, Kenya, Edna moved to Johannesburg to further her studies with me as her PhD supervisor. She continues to use anthropological theory and methods to understand critical public health problems. Her new public piece in The Conversation brings her PhD research into conversation with COVID-19 in Kenya.