Professional Development Assignment Report, Fall 2011
Keri Brondo
I used my fall 2011 Professional Development Assignment to complete several manuscripts,
including a book, to begin preliminary research on a new project in Honduras, and continue to
foster new research partnerships with local organizations under our university’s commitment to
engaged scholarship.
Book Project
The majority of my fall semester was dedicated to writing my forthcoming book: Roots, Rights
and Belonging: Gender and Development in Garifuna Territory Before and After the Honduran
Coup, which will be published by the University of Arizona Press in Spring 2013. The book is
an ethnographic account of the relationship between identity politics, neoliberal development
policy, and rights to resource management in afroindigenous Garifuna communities on the north
coast of Honduras. The book employs feminist political ecology and critical race and ethnic
studies to shed light on current development paradoxes in Honduras. Three central paradoxes are
explored: (1) the recognition of multiculturalism and indigenous rights at the same time as
Garifuna are displaced from lands within their own communities in the name of development; (2)
the privileging of foreign research tourists in a Garifuna-inhabited protected area under projects
that promote of conservation ecotourism as sustainable development, but in turn effectively
marginalize the Garifuna from sources of traditional livelihood; and (3) the contradictions
inherent in Garifuna land rights claims based on native presence and cultural difference at the
same time that mestizos reserve rights to resources as natives themselves. Most crucially, the
book reveals how Garifuna women have been the most seriously marginalized as a result of
changing property regimes and neoliberal policies, but that they also stand at the forefront of the
most progressive forms of ethnic activism.
During my PDA, I also made final revisions to two manuscripts on my research with the
Garifuna population. Both were published before the end of my PDA. These were:
[1] Brondo, Keri Vacanti. From Fishing to Tourism? Conservation, Development, and
Garifuna Activism in the Cayos Cochinos Marie Protected Area. Cengage Learning’s
Anthropology CourseReader. Detroit: Gale, 2011.
[2] Brondo, Keri Vacanti, Natalie Bown and Laura Woods. Protecting Garifuna Territory for
Whom? Gender, Power, and Ecotourism in the Cayos Cochinos Marine Protected Area.
Practicing Anthropology. 33(4): 13-18.
New Research in Honduras
In addition to completing my ethnography on the Garifuna, I spent the early part of my PDA in
Honduras conducting preliminary research on a new project on the island of Utila. This new
research project focuses on conservation “voluntourism” and the relationship between mangrove
destruction and climate change within a rapidly urbanizing island tourist economy. I wrote and
presented a conference paper on this research at the 2012 Society for Applied Anthropology
annual meetings. The paper is now under development for submission to a peer-reviewed
publication, titled “A Vacation of Mud, Blood, and Sweat: Voluntouring to Save the Swamper.”
Disciplinary Service and Scholarship
I maintained a high level of active service to my discipline during my PDA, through my work on
the American Anthropological Association’s Committee on Practicing, Applied, and Public
Interest Anthropology (CoPAPIA) and as a member of the Consortium of Practicing and Applied
Anthropology Programs (COPAA). I became the Chairperson of CoPAPIA in fall 2011. I was
involved in several activities sponsored by the committee at the November 2011 AAA meetings.
Additionally, I contributed to two sessions on the future of applied anthropology. These are:
[1] Brondo, Keri Vacanti. Invited roundtable participation for “The Changing Face of
Anthropology: What it Means for Careers and for Departments,” co-organized by Shirley Fiske
and Linda Bennett. American Anthropological Association 109th Annual Meeting, Montreal,
Canada, November 16-20th.
[2] Brondo, Keri Vacanti, Wendy Bartlo, and Mary Odell Butler (Co-Organizers). The Changing
Job Market and Student Training: Linking Anthropology Departments and Practice. American
Anthropological Association 109th Annual Meeting, Montreal, Canada, November 16-20th.
Growing out of the work of this committee and my research on the status of women in applied
and practicing anthropology, I spent my PDA co-authoring the following manuscript on career
subjectivities in anthropology, which is in process for a December 2012 publication in our
discipline’s top journal.
Brondo, Keri Vacanti and Linda A. Bennett. (in press, forthcoming 2012). Career Subjectivities
in American Anthropology: Gender, Practice, and Resistance. American Anthropologist.
Local Engaged Scholarship
Locally, I used my sabbatical to continue my collaborative work with Shelby Farms Park
Conservancy on local perceptions of greenway expansion, bike/pedestrian infrastructure, and
sustainable transportation. I co-presented a paper at the American Anthropological Association’s
annual meetings in November 2011 that captures this collaborative work. The paper was written
with my community partner from Shelby Farms, an alumnus of our program, and several
graduate students who led various aspects of data collection on Memphis’ greenway expansion.
Anglin, Scout Anglin, Keri Brondo, Matt Farr, Mia Murray, Kevin Baune, and Angela Helt.
2011. “It Will Be a Superhighway for Drugs and Crime!”: Neighborhood Perceptions of
Greenlines, “Urban Danger.” American Anthropological Association 109th Annual Meeting,
Montreal, Canada, November 16-20th.
The paper helped to advance ideas that I later developed in the following peer-reviewed book chapter:
Farr, Matthew A., Keri Vacanti Brondo, and Scout Anglin (under review). Building Bridges with
Bicycles: Exploring the Intersections and Implications of Infrastructure and Social Connectivity in
Memphis, TN. In Cindy Isenhour, Gary McDonogh and Melissa Checker’s (eds.) Sustainability as Myth
and Practice in the Global City.
Support
I collaborated on two internal proposals to support the expansion of environmental studies at the
University of Memphis. First, working with community leaders and university faculty and staff, I
submitted and received a Green Fee grant in fall 2011. The grant covered the expenses of an
interdisciplinary conference on sustainability that was held in April 2012 at the FedEx Zone.
Second, I authored a proposal to support a service-learning course in environmental studies,
which was taught by an adjunct professor in spring 2012 under ENVR 4000. The course had
students partner with Shelby Farms Park Conservancy to collect resident input into a proposed
access point to the Shelby Farms Greenline in the Humes Heights neighborhood.
[1] Ignite: Sustainability. Co-PIs Amelia Mayahi, Matt Farr, Doug Campbell, Jenna Thompson,
John Hochestein, and Keri Brondo. Green Fee Grant Program, University of Memphis. ($7545.)
[2] “Environmental Studies Service-Learning.” College of Arts and Sciences. University of
Memphis. ($1000 research funds plus $1500 adjunct line).