Ghoshal argues that several background factors including聽increasing U.S. racial diversity and complexity, norms for not contradicting people’s identity claims, and 21st-century activists’ efforts to ground gender in self-identification rather than biology may have fueled a less-recognized but similar move towards claiming self-identification as a basis for one’s race. His study tests this possibility, drawing on nationally representative survey data from over 1,000 American adults.

The study finds that support for racial voluntarism is modest, but not trivial: about a quarter of Americans agree with it and another quarter are neutral. Racial voluntarism is only slightly less supported than the much better-known idea of gender self-determination. Voluntarism is especially concentrated among people who see their race as hard for others to identify correctly, Hispanic and Latin Americans, and those who feel uncertain about their own multiraciality.

Ghoshal’s study does not aim to support or oppose voluntarism, but rather to illuminate how Americans think about the bases for identities like race and gender. His original survey data collection was supported by 黑料不打烊’s Faculty Research and Development.

The 2025 volume takes a case study approach to explore how and why global circulations of medical practices, technologies and ideas identified as “East Asian” have taken the forms they have. Runestad’s chapter explores the crystallization of sophrology (an “East-meets-West” philosophy used to mitigate pain) in Europe and its uptake in Japan as a way to improve birth experiences and outcomes in a maternity clinic.

She also articulates how sophrology is explained by academics, practitioners and the general public; noting that writers in all genres have participated in the circulation of unsubstantiated and problematic stereotypes of East Asia in describing Sophrology. She calls for critical reflexive reading and research skills that push writers to be more intentional and critically aware of their use of references. In addition to combining social science research and meta-analysis of ideological circulation, this chapter can be used in courses related to ethnography, maternal health, Japanese culture, writing across disciplines and critical thinking as everyday practice.

The chapter is titled “A Collaboration Between Mother and Baby: Sophrology in a Japanese Maternity Clinic and the Making of Medical Knowledge, and is published in “Therapy, Spirituality, and East Asian Imaginaries,” written by Eds Ioannis Gaitanidis, Luis Fernando Bernardi Junqueiria, Avery Morrow, and Sangyun Han.

Previous publications related to this project include:

• “Feeding Mothers, Making Citizens: Japanese Maternity Clinic Meals as Treatment, Care, and Identity.” Verge: Studies in Global Asias: 9(2): 157-185.
• “The Medical Anthropologist as Patient: Developing Research Questions on Hospital Food in Japan Through Auto-Ethnography.” AsiaNetwork Exchange: A Journal for Asian Studies in the Liberal Arts聽23(1): 66-82.
• Runestad also published a peer-reviewed book chapter on how to teach ethnographies in medical and global health classes in Spring 2024.
• “Global Health Anthropology Pedagogy: Using book-length ethnographies to teach global health worldviews in American undergraduate courses.” Routledge Handbook of Global Health and Anthropology.聽Eds Tsitsi Masvawure and Ellen Foley.119-137.

Before graduation, Garcia worked as a student assistant in 黑料不打烊鈥檚 Department of History & Geography, which helped her build skills essential for her career. A minor in geographic information systems (GIS) added to her qualifications, giving her proficiency in mapping – an indispensable skill in planning. Garcia advises students considering the minor that GIS instantly makes you more employable. Her studies also gave her an in-depth knowledge of North Carolina鈥檚 geography and community, which has proven essential in her role.

Garcia鈥檚 黑料不打烊 education allowed her the flexibility to shape her studies and prepare uniquely for her career by building her own major. She remains grateful for the mentorship of several faculty members Ryan Kirk, Sandy Marshall, Nina Namaste, Megan Isaac, Lauren Guilmutte, Jacob Rutz, Danielle Lake, Marnia McIntyre and Michael Matthews.

Now navigating relationships with the North Carolina Department of Transportation (NCDOT) and guiding development projects, Garcia plays a crucial role in ensuring developers meet local ordinances on property lines and landscaping. She finds that her youth offers an advantage in communicating with the community, explaining planning processes in ways that resonate with local residents. However, she has also observed some challenges. She notes that progress doesn鈥檛 always lend itself to a deeper sense of community, pointing to the disconnect that sometimes arise between development goals and neighborhood cohesion.

Garcia鈥檚 role goes beyond just regulations; she remains dedicated to building her community in other ways. On Nov. 8, she spoke at the West End Revitalization Association, a nonprofit focusing on environmental health and racial justice. Her engagement with this organization has not only inspired her professional role but also shaped her aspirations to work in planning with a broader social impact. As she considers future projects, Garcia is particularly interested in working with railway planning, envisioning a sustainable, efficient future for North Carolina鈥檚 transport network.

While Garcia鈥檚 career is on an upward trajectory, she faces challenges familiar to many young professionals, including managing a tight budget amid rising living costs. Her experience navigating these realities highlights the evolving demands of modern planning鈥攁 field in which her combination of expertise, empathy and ambition positions her as a rising leader in North Carolina鈥檚 urban landscape.

Runestad鈥檚 presentation, 鈥淔eeding Mothers, Making Citizens: Japanese Clinic Meals as Treatment, Care and Identity,鈥� was based on her peer-reviewed article published in Verge: Studies in Global Asias聽fall 2023 special issue on food and foodways. Namaste鈥檚 presentation, 鈥淒elineating Identities: Teaching Food as a Marker and Transgressor of Boundaries,鈥� was based on her forthcoming publication in Teaching Food & Literature聽(a Modern Languages Association volume) and on-campus course, IDS 2040 Edible Ideologies: Food, Power & Identity. Travel was supported by and the Center for the Advancement of Teaching and Learning.

The Umbra Institute food conference values the intersection between research and pedagogy and included three pedagogy sessions and several pedagogy-related individual papers. The theme this year was hybridity, and it provoked rich discussions about intersections, combinations and fusions. Runestad has participated and presented at the conference previously, while this was Namaste鈥檚 first time attending.

Runestad valued the focus on relationality and connection between people and places, particularly for applications within Asian Studies. Applying relationality to Japan (as opposed to often-used and problematic lenses of collectivism and group mindedness) helps explain socio-cultural trends in general. Relationality is also useful for teaching and conducting research in the anthropology of food because attention to place-based connections can address human factors in a way that a focus on the seasonality of food production cannot.

Namaste enjoyed the variety, depth and interdisciplinary nature of the research presented as well as learning about the extremely varied ways in which food studies courses are taught at other institutions.

Runestad and Namaste were also able to participate in a dinner event at Numero Zero, a restaurant that specializes in supporting neurodiversity in the community, and a tour of Perugia that highlighted the food history of Perugia as linked to local architecture and artistic expression.

“The Smell of Money” follows Elsie Herring and her community’s fight against the world’s largest pork corporation for their freedom to enjoy fresh air, clean water and a life without the stench of manure. Registration is open on the screening and coverage on聽.

Jamie Berger is a writer and documentary filmmaker born and raised in North Carolina. Her writing has been featured in聽Vox, The Guardian, USA Today, NowThis, The News & Observer,聽and more. Throughout her career, she has used writing and visual storytelling to draw attention to issues ranging from environmental racism to the climate crisis to other injustices wrought against people, animals, and the planet.

Shawn Bannon is an award-winning filmmaker whose films have screened at the Sundance Film Festival, AFI FEST, and featured on聽The Atlantic, Forbes,聽and聽BBC America. His short films,聽Hurricane Heroes, Bloody Barbara and A Ghost Story 鈥� 10 Pages,聽have all been selected for Vimeo Staff Picks. His recent film聽The Green Knight Documentary聽was made for A24 and premiered on iTunes.聽The Smell of Money聽is his first feature length documentary.

Chris Hawn is the co-director of Research and Education. Hawn is an environmental scientist who specializes in making science accessible to all. Growing up in the desert, their love of the environment is rooted in the southwest and blossomed in the southeast. They received their Ph.D. in zoology at NC State in 2015. Since then they鈥檝e been learning grassroots organizing skills to apply to the field of public science with the vision of science that supports accessible and liberated futures.

Based on the speaker鈥檚 recently published book,聽聽this presentation will illuminate the importance of Israel鈥檚 hiking trails and the development of a thriving recreational culture among locals and visitors alike to the country鈥檚 history, national identity and conservation efforts in a variety of ways. Using a seemingly superficial topic 鈥� hiking trails 鈥� this lecture will also explore their profound impact on Zionist thought, Israeli society and Palestinian national aspirations.

“This topic 鈥� hiking trails in Israel, and the way Dr. Rabineau engages it 鈥� crosscuts many issues that the inhabitants of Israel and Palestine have been dealing with in the 20th century,” said Baris Kesgin, associate professor of political science and policy studies. “The making of the trails network offers an uncommon window into the history of the state of Israel. Dr. Rabineau鈥檚 visit is immensely valuable for our campus community for its direct connections to many academic programs we offer, and to our campus offices and organizations. A seemingly trivial topic 鈥� hiking trails 鈥� will give our community the opportunity to think about Israel and Palestine from a different lens.”

Rabineau’s research and teaching lies at the intersection of history, politics and environment in Israel and the West Bank. He recently became the first person since 1934 to circle the Dead Sea on foot, and is writing a book on the history of the Dead Sea and its current environmental crisis.

Sponsored by the Fund for Excellence in the Arts and Sciences; Jewish Studies; and International and Global Studies.

Zito鈥檚 chapter walks novice and seasoned sociology instructors through the process of designing (or redesigning) a sociology of crime or deviance course rooted in best practices for engaged learning. The chapter begins with an exploration of what constitutes a uniquely sociological perspective on crime and deviance. Drawing heavily from scholarship on teaching and learning (SoTL), Zito details classroom strategies that develop higher-order skills in analyzing crime data and critically evaluating definitions of and responses to crime and deviance. She also includes specific strategies for fostering empathy and reflection in the classroom, as well as creating inclusive environments for the discussion of sensitive topics鈥攁ll of which are important for students generally, and future criminal justice professionals particularly.

Zito served as the criminology/delinquency area editor for the American Sociological Association鈥檚 TRAILS: Teaching Resources and Innovations Library for Sociology for six years. She drew heavily on her experience as a TRAILS area editor and TRAILS author in crafting the chapter as well as her recently published textbook, Engaged Criminology: An Introduction (SAGE Publications).

How will the end of Roe v. Wade impact reproductive outcomes for teenagers? Prior restrictive abortion laws in Texas offer a glimpse into the likely consequences of Roe鈥檚 demise.

Rena Zito, associate professor of sociology, and 黑料不打烊 alumna, Kaylynn Hiller 鈥�22, used quasi-experimental methods to study the causal effect of 2013 and 2014 Texas clinic closures on teenage and adult reproductive outcomes. The peer-reviewed study, 鈥溾�楾he Perfect Controlled Experiment鈥�: The Impact of Abortion Clinic Closures on Teenage and Adult Reproductive Outcomes in Texas,鈥� was published in a special issue on health inequalities and access to healthcare in the journal Sociological Imagination.

Zito and Hiller used difference-in-difference analysis to estimate the causal impact of Texas鈥檚 clinic closures on teenage and adult abortion and birth rates under different driving burden conditions (25-49 vs. 50-99, vs. 100+ mile increases), using data from the Texas Department of Health and Human Services, the CDC, and U.S. Census Bureau. Given the overarching trend towards fewer teenage pregnancies and abortions over time, their study examined whether the rate of decline was greater (for abortion rates) or weaker (for birth rates) in Texas counties more profoundly impacted by clinic closures relative to counties with unaffected access.

They found that Texas鈥檚 clinic closures reduced the rate of legal, medically managed abortions to people residing in counties where the distance to the nearest clinic increased by 50 miles or more, regardless of the age group under investigation. Thus, even modest increases in driving burden alter abortion rates. Consistent with hypotheses, their abortion results highlight the heightened vulnerabilities of teenagers, relative to adults, under restrictive policies, as the effect of increased driving burden was observed to be more extreme among teenagers.

Hiller developed the idea for this study while taking Zito鈥檚 Quantitative Research Methods course. Zito and Hiller compiled the necessary data, completed the analyses, and wrote the manuscript over several semesters, and they presented preliminary analyses at the Eastern Sociological Society conference in 2022. Kaylynn Hiller graduated from 黑料不打烊 in 2022. She majored in Public Health and Anthropology with minors in Biology and Human Service Studies. As an undergraduate, she pursued multiple research projects regarding reproductive healthcare and the complex barriers restricting access. Following graduation, she began work as a Clinical Research Coordinator to help develop new medications.

D鈥橝ndrea is a psychology and English double major with a minor in criminal justice studies and is a sociology major with a double minor in criminal justice studies and human service studies.

The Outstanding Student in Criminal Justice Studies Award recognizes senior students minoring in criminal justice studies who have shown outstanding academic achievement within the minor and/or service to the field of criminal justice studies through internships, independent study, research or participation in criminal justice studies organizations.

Both D鈥橝ndrea and Skelley have records of exceptional academic achievement and contributions to Criminal Justice Studies. Program faculty were enthusiastic about the quality of D鈥橝ndrea鈥檚 writing, her pursuit of an original independent study within the minor, and the creative ways she has made connections between her English major and her interest in the study of crime. Faculty were impressed by Skelley鈥檚 research on attitudes towards police reform, which she has presented at the Southern Sociological Society conference in Myrtle Beach, S.C., as well as her work with Family Abuse Services of Alamance County.

Jessica Skelley ’23 presented a study titled 鈥淧redicting Attitudes towards the Defund The Police Movement vs. Police Budget Reallocation Reform: An Exploratory Study鈥� at the Southern Sociological Society annual meeting in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, on March 30. This research was mentored by Rena Zito, Associate Professor of Sociology.

Skelley, an 黑料不打烊 College Fellow and聽sociology major, collected nationally representative survey data to explore the individual-level predictors of attitudes towards the language of #DefundThePolice and the police budget reallocation reforms it embodies.

Results from OLS regression models provided support for Skelley鈥檚 hypotheses. Specifically, she found (1) significantly more support for police budget reallocation than the DTP movement, (2) there is a large Black-White racial gap in attitudes towards the DTP movement but not towards police budget reallocation, (3) there are strong connections between perceptions of law enforcement and support for the DTP movement and budget reallocation reforms, and (4) the impact of perceptions of police on support for budget reallocation is conditioned by one鈥檚 level of concern about crime. Her study provides insight into the ongoing police legitimacy crisis, and it suggests that accomplishing meaningful reform will require a shift in messaging rather than a shift in attitudes.

Skelley will be attending the University of St.Thomas School of Law starting in fall 2023.