New Stories All Stories
Table of contents
Introduction 0 Why Write for the Public? 1 What to Expect, from Pitch to Publication 2 How to Write a Pitch 3 How To Tell a Great Story, Part 1: Structure 4 How To Tell a Great Story, Part 2: Style 5 Navigating Ethics and Reducing Harms 6 Habits of Thriving Public Anthropologists 7 Cultivating the Craft of Writing 8
Table of contents
Introduction 0 Why Write for the Public? 1 What to Expect, from Pitch to Publication 2 How to Write a Pitch 3 How To Tell a Great Story, Part 1: Structure 4 How To Tell a Great Story, Part 2: Style 5 Navigating Ethics and Reducing Harms 6 Habits of Thriving Public Anthropologists 7 Cultivating the Craft of Writing 8
Teaching
General Anthropology
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Unit 1

Professional Anthropology

An older man in a blue shirt stands touches one building in a small replica town on a table in front of him.

In this unit, students will learn about the ways trained anthropologists use their skillsets outside of an academic setting. They will read about and discuss different career paths, how anthropologists are bridging work in higher educational institutions with projects beyond traditional settings, and how anthropological training can support work in other industries and careers. Finally, students will be able to take stock of their own skills as anthropologists in training and consider how they might apply them in the future.

Sapiens articles
Social Science in Humanitarian Action Platform - In responding to the Ebola epidemic, local religious leaders, such as those shown here from Forécariah prefecture (Guinea) near Sierra Leone, allied with international public health workers to help disseminate information about prevention.
essay / Crisis

Can Social Scientists Help Control Epidemics?

Elizabeth Svoboda
New collaborative efforts, such as the Social Science in Humanitarian Action Platform, are allowing anthropologists and other scholars to help align public health efforts with the on-the-ground knowledge and lived experience of people facing epidemics.
A black stuffed figure with large eyes and a wide mouth wearing a black hat lies beside a black, white, and yellow comic book on a dark wooden table.
essay / Expressions

Can Indigenous Language Comics Save a Mother Tongue?

Aaron Gerry
Publishers and researchers are creating graphic publications to help stem the loss of Hñäñho, spoken by the Ñäñho people.
Keywords
View All in Policy
The ruins of a gray stone building stand below a cerulean sky with fluffy white clouds.
essay / Standpoints

How Colonialism Invented Food Insecurity in West Africa

Anya Gruber
Archaeological evidence and Oral Histories show people in what is today Ghana lived sustainably for millennia—until European colonial powers and the widespread trade of enslaved people changed everything.
A whale’s tail appears above the water, creating white foam as it splashes on the ocean’s surface. A small bird flies in the background.
op-ed / Viewpoint

Protecting Ancestral Waters Through Collaborative Stewardship

Elic Weitzel
The proposed Chumash Heritage National Marine Sanctuary, along California’s Central Coast, would be the first of its kind in the U.S. to be nominated by Native peoples.
A stylized painting of a person’s head—with wide eyes, red lips, and a headscarf—is covered in various numbers and symbols, and set against a black background.
essay / Wayfinding

Grappling With Guilt Inside a System of Structural Violence

Anna L. Jordan
Criminals and Gangmembers Anonymous, a 12-step recovery program, has proliferated in California’s carceral system. An anthropologist investigates the program, which sees criminality as a chronic addiction that can be treated through intervention.
An older person wearing a black headscarf and embroidered skirt sits on the ground, resting against a concrete wall.
essay / Human Rights

Living as Stateless Palestinians in Jordan

Michael Vicente Pérez
Israel’s war on Gaza that erupted in 2023 continues a long history of systemic displacement of Palestinians. Over 2 million Palestinian refugees currently live in Jordan in indefinite exile, tens of thousands without citizenship in any country.
A photograph looks down a gray gravel road with two yellow lines down its center. The road cuts through a dark forest of tall, green, leafy trees with a single ray of sunshine getting through the forest’s canopy.
essay / Letters

Best of SAPIENS 2023

In another year of exceptional challenges and hardships, anthropologists tackled a range of issues and questions about what it means to be human. Here are some of SAPIENS’ best from this year.
Two people hug in a bathroom, with one seated on a closed toilet and the other kneeling on a tan-and-brown tiled floor. Two standing onlookers flank the image’s foreground.
op-ed / Standpoints

How Eugenics Shaped the U.S. Prenatal Care System

Dána-Ain Davis and Kelley Akhiemokhali
Black women in the U.S. are far more likely to die from complications related to pregnancy and birth than White women. Two scholars explore how the discrediting of Black midwives helped create these racial disparities—and call for alternative models of prenatal care.
Professor Talking Points
  • Most people with an advanced degree in anthropology do not end up teaching in academia.
  • Anthropological training can be applied in many different professional sectors. A few examples are: conservation, international development, disaster intervention, technology, communications, and arts and culture.
  • Skills such as conducting research, understanding society and culture on a macro and micro scale, synthesizing data, and carrying out ethnographic work are in high demand.
  • Different terms are used to refer to people with anthropological training who work with a broader public. Three of the most common are: applied anthropologist, practicing anthropologist, and professional anthropologist.
  • An applied anthropologist functions from an academic base and conducts research intended to effect change.
  • A practicing anthropologist uses anthropological skills in the workplace but may not be called an anthropologist in their position.
  • A professional anthropologist actively uses their skills and generally calls themselves or are called an anthropologist in the wider world.
Academic Articles

  1. Cronin, Shannon, and Erica M. Hawvermale. 2021. “‘Applying’ Education: A Focused Review of the 2019 American Anthropology Master’s Career Survey Data.” Annals of Anthropological Practice 45 (1): 119–135.

  2. Fiske, Shirley J., and Judith N. Freidenberg. 2018. “Introduction: Where Is Practice in Practicing Anthropology?” Practicing Anthropology 40 (1): 2–17.

  3. Hyland, Stanley E., and Linda A. Bennett. 2013. “Responding to Community Needs Through Linking Academic and Practicing Anthropology: An Engaged Scholarly Framework.” Annals of Anthropological Practice 37 (1): 34–56.

Student Discussion Questions
  1. What are the histories of the terms “applied,” “practicing,” “professional,” and “public interest” anthropology?
  2. What does “practicing” anthropology mean to Fiske and Freidenberg?
  3. What is the difference between applied, practicing, professional, or public interest anthropology? Provide an example for each field.
  4. What is the central argument of the Cronin and Hawvermale piece? What do you think of their suggestions for change?
  5. Which of the examples presented in the Hyland and Bennett piece seem most interesting to you? What principles guide their framework?
  6. Go through two SAPIENS articles and make a list of the skills anthropologists are using to effect change in their respective fields. Do any of them surprise you?
Activities
  • Have students research professionals with anthropology degrees who currently work in applied fields.
  • Have students select a career outside of academia and consider how their anthropological training might be used as an asset in that position.
  • Encourage students to look through The Toolkit of a Good Professional Anthropologist and think about what skills they currently have, which ones they would like to develop, and what skills would be helpful in a job or career they would like to have.
Additional Resources

  1. Book: A Handbook of Practicing Anthropology

  2. Handout: Translating Anthropology for the Workplace

  3. Webinar: 5 Secrets for Building Networks that Lead to Jobs

  4. Website: The National Association for the Practice of Anthropology’s The Toolkit of a Good Professional Anthropologist

  5. Website: The American Anthropological Association’s Careers in Anthropology

  6. Website: Career Readiness Commission

  7. Website: Society for Applied Anthropology

Unit By

Eshe Lewis (2022)

Teaching
General Anthropology
-
Unit 2

Anthropological Poetry

A person with many small, long, black braids tied up and flowing down their back looks out onto the water.