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Annual Meeting

2022 Annual Meeting

March 22-26, 2022, Sheraton Salt Lake City Hotel, Salt Lake City, UT

The 2022 SfAA Annual Meeting offers researchers, practitioners, and students from diverse disciplines and organizations the opportunity to discuss their work and consider how it can contribute to a better future. SfAA members come from a host of disciplines -- anthropology, geography, sociology, economics, business, planning, medicine, nursing, law, and more. The annual meeting provides a fertile venue in which to trade ideas, methods, and practical solutions, as well as an opportunity to enter the lifeworlds of other professionals.

Often called the “Crossroads of the West,” Salt Lake City, Utah, is bounded by the Western Rockies, the Great Salt Lake, and the Bonneville Salt Flats. The region’s most important cultural hub, Salt Lake City is known for its vibrant live music and arts scene, its coffee houses and pubs, many of which are an easy walk from the meeting hotel, the Sheraton Salt Lake City. Resting in the shadow of the Mount Timpanogos National Monument, Salt Lake City is a gateway to an incredible array of national parks, monuments, and forests. Not to mention the Spiral Jetty, Robert Smithson’s iconic land-art sculpture, and Robert Redford’s Sundance Mountain Resort.

Our annual meeting is one of the most treasured benefits of SfAA membership, and not being able to meet in person for the past two years has been personally and professionally disruptive for many of our members. The annual meeting is also SfAA’s major source of revenue—we depend on successful annual meetings to sustain our operations and help meet our members’ needs throughout the year.

We are committed to hosting a safe in-person meeting in 2022, and to giving our members the information they need to make informed decisions about whether to come to Salt Lake City or attend online. As a Marriott International hotel, the Sheraton Salt Lake City has implemented protocols and practices to mitigate risks from Covid-19 (https://whattoexpect.marriott.com.slcsi). Current information on Covid-19, vaccination rates, and masking policies for Utah can be found at https://coronavirus.utah.gov/. Utah follows restrictions based on a transmission index with guidelines by county. We will continue to monitor the situation with Covid and keep our members and conference participants updated.

We know that not everyone will be able to travel to Salt Lake City for our 2022 annual meeting. We will miss you, but we are offering an online component for the annual meeting. If you attend remotely, you can access: a digital content library including pre-recorded papers, video posters, and any recorded in-person events (available for 180 days after the in-person meeting ends); selected onsite live-streaming sessions; and, synchronous and asynchronous opportunities for virtual engagement and networking. Remote participation will be accessible through Whova, our meeting platform, and all online content will also be available to onsite participants.

Theme

The Revolutionary Potential of the Social Sciences: Transforming Possibilities
82nd Annual Meeting of the Society for Applied Anthropology (SfAA)
March 22-26, 2022
James H. McDonald, Program Chair

Our natural and social worlds are undergoing tectonic transformations. In confronting these challenges, the social sciences, and their revolutionary potential, must frame, interpret, and understand the rapidly emerging contexts of new possibilities. What is this revolutionary potential? It is the ability to practice varied roles in research, application, and activism that build bold and transformative ideas and methods.

Anthropologists and allied social scientists engage with the world, full of complex and often colliding ideas, values, practices, structures, and systems. We challenge ourselves to gain enduring and holistic understandings that advance research and application. It is indeed a daunting task, given the resounding social and environmental problems of our time, including: human-driven climate change; mass displacement and migration; deep public health challenges and pandemics; rapidly shifting political orientations toward authoritarianism; the advent of entrenched ethno-nationalisms; reactions to these political dynamics through social and racial justice movements; new and ongoing violent conflicts; poverty and global economic crises; tremendous realignments of our major social institutions.

We invite you to join us for the 2022 Annual Meeting of the Society for Applied Anthropology (SfAA) to explore and define the many potentials of applied anthropology and other social sciences. The meeting will be hybrid in format, with onsite meetings in Salt Lake City, Utah, complemented by online participation. We will celebrate and engage local communities, and extend our efforts to support and involve global colleagues. We will ask questions fundamental to a social science that seeks to be revolutionary, such as: What are we for? What is our place in the world? How do we work, and for whom? How do we best communicate and engage? We will address these questions, and more, in the context of SfAA’ s efforts to support practitioners, scholars, and researchers committed to racial and social justice, diversity and inclusion, and relevant application of anthropology and kindred social sciences.

Come join together in Salt Lake City (or hybrid online), where life’s elevated. Nestled at the foot of the Western Rockies, you will be treated to breathtaking views from a booming tech hub. The city serves as a gateway to national monuments and scenic byways. The downtown has a thriving arts scene, and iconic film industry locales—Park City and Sundance—are nearby destinations. We look forward to seeing you in the “Beehive State,” known for its incredible innovation, industriousness, and hospitality.

Program Chair, James H. McDonald, University of Montevallo (jmcdonald@montevallo.edu), 435-704-1524
Annual Meeting and Awards Coordinator: Don Stull (stull@ku.edu); 785-764-8967
Society for Applied Anthropology (info@appliedanthro.org); 405-843-5113

Co-Sponsors

The Society for Applied Anthropolgy has invited cognate professional associations to join as co-sponsors in the Annual Meeting. Those groups who have accepted the invitation are now working actively with the Program Chair on the content of the sessions. The groups include:

The Applied Anthropology Network (AAN) is the main European platform dedicated to the exchange of information and experiences related to practical applications of anthropology and ethnography. The network enables a circular transfer of knowledge between academia, private and public sectors, NGOs, interest groups, students and other individuals. The network is part of the European Association for Social Anthropologists (EASA)

The Council on Nursing and Anthropology (CONAA) is an organization that brings together nurses, anthropologists and others interested in understanding and promoting the health of peoples and cultures around the world through research and practice innovations. Common interests of CONAA members are basic and applied health research, improved health care for vulnerable populations, and encouraging cultural and social justice content in education and research. CONAA holds yearly business meetings at SfAA followed by informal receptions for networking and mutual support. For more information about CONAA, visit http://www.conaa.org.

The Culture & Agriculture (C&A) Section of the American Anthropological Association (AAA) aims to develop the study and understanding of agrarian systems from a holistic, social science perspective, and to link academics and practitioners concerned with agrarian issues, agricultural development, and agricultural systems through dissemination of scientific research, encouragement of effective instruction, and to encourage application of knowledge to public policy.

Ethnographic Praxis in Industry Community (EPIC) promotes the use of ethnographic principles to create business value and brings conceptual leadership and practical skills to the problems and opportunities faced by organizations, markets, and society. EPIC people draw on the immense expertise of our global community to learn, connect, and develop as professionals, amplifying our impact together. We are practitioners who work to ensure that innovation, strategies, processes, and products are anchored in deep understandings of people and their everyday lives. Our community hails from all kinds of organizations and industries—technology corporations, product and service companies, a range of consultancies, universities and design schools, government and NGOs, and research institutes. EPIC people draw on tools and resources from the social sciences, humanities, data analytics, design, agile, scenario planning and other approaches to realize value for business and communities.

The National Association for the Practice of Anthropology (NAPA) promotes human-centered work applied to practical problems by linking a network of professional anthropologists working across employment sectors. We support all anthropologists in bringing real solutions to communities, organizations, and policymakers, by offering advocacy, information, networks, mentoring, and continuing education.

The Political Ecology Society (PESO) has as its object the promotion of interdisciplinary scientific investigation of the political and economic principles controlling the relations of human beings to one another and to the environment. As part of its efforts to meet these goals, PESO supports the publication of the Journal of Political Ecology, a peer reviewed electronic journal that publishes articles and reviews in English, French, and Spanish.

The Society for Anthropological Sciences (SAS) was organised to promote empirical research and social science in anthropology. The members of SAS want to further the development of anthropological science as empirical knowledge based on testable theory, sound research design and systematic methods for the collection and analysis of data. We seek to fulfill the historic mission of anthropology to describe and explain the range of variation in human biology, society, and culture across time and space.

The Society for Disability Studies (SDS) is a scholarly organization dedicated to promoting disability studies. More than twenty-five years of rich history has enabled the organization to reach national and international members with expertise ranging from advocacy to perspectives on disability from a variety of disciplines.

The Society of Ethnobiology (SoE) is a non-profit organization of scholars, activists, and communties promoting and supporting the interdisciplinary study of past and present relationships between peoples and the environment. Ethnobiology is the study of dynamic relationships among people, biota, and environments. The Society of Ethnobiology gathers and disseminates knowledge of ethnobiology and fosters ongoing appreciation for the richness of ethnobiology worldwide.

The Society for Medical Anthropology (SMA), formed in 1967 and incorporated into the American Anthropological Association (AAA) in 1971, is dedicated to the profession and practice of medical anthropology, which uses concepts and methods from anthropology to produce new understandings of health, disease, illness, treatment, and care. Open for membership worldwide, the SMA brings together medical anthropology graduate students, practicing anthropologists, scholars, and scholar activists. The SMA includes a number of special interest groups organized to advance endeavors – including policy-related initiatives as well as research and teaching – on topics and priorities identified by these groups. The SMA publishes the journal Medical Anthropology Quarterly and offers venues for members to present their research at conferences.

Program Committee

2022 Program Committee

Program Chair

James McDonald
U of Monetevallo
jmcdonald@montevallo.edu

Associate Program Chair

Elaine Bennett
St. Vincent College
elaine.bennett@stvincent.edu

Program Committee

Liz Olson
Sothern Utah Univ
elizabetholson@suu.edu
ethnoecology

Kate Sullivan
Cal State-LA
ksulliv4@exchange.calstatela.edu
fisheries, coastal governance, environment, climate

Heide Castaneda
Univ South Florida
hcastaneda@usf.edu
global health, migration

Carla Pezzia
Univ of Dallas
cpezzia@udallas.edu
global health, health disparities, mental illness

Peter Taber
Univ of Utah
peter.taber@hsc.utah.edu
epidemiology, development, governance

Lois Stanford
New Mexico State Univ
lstanfor@nmsu.edu
agriculture, food, identity

Patti Sunderland
EPIC
patti@crastudio.com
corporate, business, ethnography

Rita Denny
EPIC
rdenny@epicpeople.org
corporate, business, ethnography

Sarah Luna
Tufts Univ
sarah.luna@tufts.edu
gender, violence, identity, Mexico

Roberto Gonzalez
San Jose State Univ
Roberto.gonzalez@sjsu.edu
militarization; ethics; activism

Adam Gamwell
This Anthro Life podcast / Missing Link Studios / MotivBase Research
adam@missinglink.studio
professional development, business, podcasting

Meta Gorup
Ghent Univ
meta.gorup@gmail.com
higher ed

Monica Griffin
William & Mary Univ
mdgrif@wm.edu
education, engaged learning, diversity and equality

Carlos Velez Ibanez
Arizona State Univ
carlos.velez-ibanez@asu.edu
transborder issues; education; urbanization

AKM Mazharul Islam
Shahjalal Univ of Science and Technology, Institute for Applied Anthropology
akmmislam@gmail.com
All things Bangladesh, India, and Nepal

Judith Freidenberg
Univ of Maryland
jfreiden@umd.edu
health, migration

P.O. Box 2436 • Oklahoma City, OK 73101 • 405.843.5113 • info@appliedanthro.org

Annual Meeting

2022 Annual Meeting

March 22-26, 2022, Sheraton Salt Lake City Hotel, Salt Lake City, UT

Theme

Theme

Co-Sponsors

Co-Sponsors

Program Committee

2022 Program Committee

Program Chair

Associate Program Chair

Program Committee​​​​

Program Committee