Professional Development Assignment Report – Spring 2012
Katherine Lambert-Pennington
Thanks to the generous support of the College of Arts and Sciences and my colleagues in
Anthropology, I was able to use my Spring 2012 Professional Development Assignment
to write, present, and do research on the models and roles of engaged scholarship in
higher education, conduct engaged field research focused on neighborhood revitalization
and food access, and work on a book manuscript.
Engaged Scholarship in Higher Education
Over the past several years I have committed myself to doing engaged scholarship in two
Memphis neighborhoods and as member of the Administrative Team for the
Strengthening Communities Initiative (SCI). During my PDA I was able to use these
experiences to research and write about the impact and future of engaged scholarship in
higher education. This work explores the importance of participatory action research
(PAR) in developing a social justice centered approach to community-university
partnerships, principles of good practice for developing interdisciplinary engaged
scholarship, and strategies for institutionalizing engaged scholarship and service learning
in institutions of higher education. I wrote two articles in peer reviewed journals, gave
three presentations in national venues, and served on the national committee reviewing
this year’s nominees for the Ernest Lynton Award for Engaged Scholarship for Early
Career Faculty for New England Resource Center for Higher Education (NERCHE).
As a result of the presentations I delivered while on PDA, I have been invited to write an
article on civically engaged teaching for the winter 2013 issue of Diversity &
Democracy, a periodical published by the Association of American Colleges and
Universities (AAC&U). Additionally, I have been invited to give a keynote address for
the International Association for Research on Service-learning and Community
Engagement (IARSCE) conference in September 2012.
Finally, my PDA afforded me an opportunity to add an international focus to my interest
in community-university partnerships and PAR. Thanks in part to a CAS Travel
Enrichment Award and departmental support, during the summer of 2012 I was part of an
interdisciplinary research team, including students and faculty from the University of
Catania and the University of Memphis, doing community-based research in support of
regional planning efforts in the City of Zafferana Etnea and the Simeto River Valley. I
used my time in Sicily to study the institutional and resident-led models of community
involvement and development at work in this southern Italian context.
Local Research
During my PDA I also continued to do local engaged research focused on faith-based
community development, participatory planning, and food access in the Vance Avenue
and South Memphis neighborhoods. In Vance, I worked with a an interdisciplinary,
community-university team to complete the second phase of a participatory research
process for a Choice Neighborhood Planning Grant, which was funded by the City of
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Memphis and Housing and Urban Development. Throughout the spring we worked with
residents, small business owners, and leaders of faith-based organizations to document
their vision for the future of the neighborhood and move these ideas into implementable
action plans. The results of these participatory research activities were developed into the
Vance Choice Neighborhood Factbook and became the basis for Action Planning
Sessions and resident-identified program development.
In South Memphis, I continued to work with the Works, Inc. and a resident advisory
committee to measure the reach and impact of the South Memphis Farmers Market on
residents’ access to affordable, fresh fruits and vegetables. Collaborating with Dr.
Kathryn Hicks, we designed a participatory evaluation protocol for the South Memphis
Farmers Market for the 2012 market season, recruited and trained a graduate intern to
assist in the research, and worked with SMFM resident advisory committee to begin
collecting data. This research and partnership has resulted in co-authored a conference
paper for the 2012 Society for Applied Anthropology meetings, and a 2-year contract
with the Works, Inc. to evaluate the market.
Book project
In addition to writing about engaged scholarship, I also used my PDA to work on a booklength ethnography based on my research with urban Indigenous people in Sydney,
Australia. Framed by fieldwork conducted between 1999-2009, Representative Bodies:
Negotiating Urban Aboriginal Identity and Culture in an Age of Reconciliation is an
ethnographic exploration of the socio-political contexts and strategies that Kooris draw
on to construct their sense of being Indigenous in the face of long-term engagement with
non-indigenous policies and culture. The book uses a post-colonial understanding of
identity as socially produced, multiple, and performative, to critically examine how
Koori-ness has been brought into existence through state processes of recognition,
sustained in the public imaginary, and constantly remade and contested by the very group
it is meant to identify. My analysis reveals that Kooris at La Perouse, whose urban-ness
often makes them unrecognizable as Indigenous, construct a “black, but not white”
identity to emphasize their distinctiveness and survival as a social entity. Within these
constructions, land/place, community, kinship/ancestry, and cultural knowledge emerge
as key features of Koori identity politics. Importantly, the book exposes the complexities
and liabilities that result when Aboriginal people’s identity practices and priorities are at
odds with state and popular ideas about Aboriginal culture.
Publications
Lambert-Pennington, Katherine, 2012. Pursuing Engaged Scholarship In An Age Of
Austerity: A Postcard From Memphis, Metropolitan Universities Journal, 22 (3).
Forthcoming.
Lambert-Pennington, Katherine, 2012. Building a Culture of Engagement Journal of
Public Scholarship in Higher Education, Vol 2. Forthcoming.
Presentations
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Lambert-Pennington, Katherine, 2012. Pursuing Engaged Scholarship in an Age of
Austerity, University of Missouri, St. Louis, May 2-3, St. Louis, MO.
Lambert-Pennington, Katherine, 2012. The Lynton Award: Connecting the Dots for
Tenure and Promotion, New England Center for Research on Higher Education, Webinar,
March 20th.
Lambert-Pennington, Katherine, 2012. Fostering Transformational CommunityUniversity Partnerships, Association of American Colleges and Universities, Symposium
on Reversing a Civic Recession: What Higher Education Can Do, January 24th,
Washington, DC.
Lambert-Pennington, Katherine and Kathryn Hicks, 2012. “We Now Take EBT”:
Farmers Markets As Food Access Points In Low-Income Neighborhood, Society For
Applied Anthropology Annual Meeting, March 30, Baltimore, MD.
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