From the Editors

February 1, 2020

Newsletter Seeks News

Looking back over the last year of issues of the SfAA Newsletter, we were struck by their similarity to writing term papers.  The classic instruction, passed on to high school students and undergrads, has resembles the rhythm of this publication.  You “tell them what you’re gonna tell them; then you tell them; and then… you tell them what you told them”.  In the case of the Newsletter, the fall issue tells members what they might expect from the Annual Meeting; winter provides actual highlights of upcoming sessions; and spring recaps what took place in the meeting city.  Summer, academics go back to the field and practitioners continue practicing and then the whole cycle starts over again.

Surely there is more going on out there that deserves to be considered through the anthropological eye?  We would like to hear from Australian colleagues dealing with fires.  How do Israeli or Palestinian members view Iranian instability and tempers? What’s the British assessment of Brexit?  What’s happening near the U.S. – Mexican border?  We would also like to learn more about how you teach applied anthropology and about doing anthropology in the ‘real world’ outside academia.

The Newsletter is a place where you can speculate on what you will ultimately publish after a few years of rewrites and referees.  But it’s happening now, and we want to know about it as the problem or project plays out.  For instance, Orit is on sabbatical this semester and is working on the life story of a Navajo master silversmith who was designated living treasure of Arizona for his contribution in preserving his culture through his artwork.  Jeanne just began doing oral histories with the remaining copper miners who worked underground at the Copper Queen Mine in Bisbee, AZ until it closed in 1975.  The mine is a toxic beauty being photographed by my long-term project partner.  We have members who are novelists, crafts persons, political activists, and a myriad of other things it would be wonderful to explore.  

So, send us your contributions when you are in the mood to write.  We’ll hold on to them and to the photos you send that illustrating your work, until the next deadline. 

Jeanne Simonelli and Orit Tamir