10/4/18, Edmund Searles, 1
Edmund Searles, PhD
OfficeHome
Department of Sociology and Anthropology33 North Front Street
Bucknell UniversityLewisburg, PA 17837
Lewisburg, PA 17837570-522-1060
Current Position
Assistant Professor of Anthropology
RESEARCH INTERESTS
Social, historical and religious dimensions of human-environment relations of Native North Americans; self, society and cultural identity; memory, narrative, and historical consciousness; tradition, modernity, cultural identity, and ethnicity of Canadian Inuit. Quality of Life and social indicators; social cohesion in indigenous communities.
AREA SPECIALIZATION
Canada (Nunavut, Northwest Territories, Labrador), Alaska
EDUCATION
University of Washington
Ph.D., Sociocultural Anthropology, 1998
Dissertation: From Town to Outpost Camp: Symbolism and Social Action in the Canadian Eastern Arctic. A study of Inuit ethnicity and symbolic action in Nunavut.
M.A., Anthropology, 1993
Thesis: The Subsistence Uses of Vegetal Resources in Lake Clark National Park and Adjacent Villages. An analysis of the cultural dimensions of subsistence practices of Athapaskan, Yupiit and non-Natives in rural southwest Alaska.
Bowdoin College
B.A., Anthropology and Environmental Studies, 1989
Honor’s Thesis: An Ethnohistorical Account of the Crocker Land Expedition, North Greenland, 1914-1918. An ethnohistorical analysis of Polar Inuit-explorer relations in Northwest Greenland.
PUBLICATIONS
Articles and Book Chapters (peer-reviewed)
"Anthropology in an Era of Inuit Empowerment." Pp. 89-101. In Critical Inuit Studies in an Era of Globalization, Pam Stern and Lisa Stevenson, eds. University of Nebraska Press. 2006.
“Inuit: Canada and Greenland.” Pp. 279-281 in the Encyclopedia of Food and Culture, Volume 1. Solomon H. Katz, ed. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons. 2003.
“Noms, Récits, et Mémoire au Nunavut [The Embodiment of Cultural Memory and Meaning in Nunavut]," Anthropologie et Sociétés 26(2-3): 179-191, 2002.
"Food and the Making of Modern Inuit Identities" Food and Foodways 10(1): 55-78, 2002.
" Identity Politics, Research and the Construction of Inuit Identity," in Inuit Identities in the Third Millennium, ed. by Louis-Jacques Dorais. Quebec: L'Association Inuksiutiit Katimajiit. Pp. 95-109, 2001.
“Interpersonal politics, social science research, and the construction of Inuit Identity.” Etudes/Inuit/Studies 25(1-2): 101-119, 2001.
“Fashioning Selves and Tradition: Case Studies on Personhood and Experience in Nunavut.” American Review of Canadian Studies 31 (1-2): 121-136, 2001.
“Why Do You Ask So Many Questions?”: Dialogical Anthropology and Learning How Not to Ask in Canadian Inuit Society. Journal for the Anthropological Study of Human Movement 11(1): 47-64, 2000.
“The Crisis of Youth and the Poetics of Place: Juvenile Justice, Outpost Camps, and Inuit Identity in the Canadian Arctic.” Etudes/Inuit/Studies 22(2): 137-155, 1998.
Co-authored articles (peer-reviewed)
Duhaime, Gerard, Edmund Searles and Peter J. Usher, Heather Myers and Pierre Frechette, “Social Cohesion and Living Conditions in the Canadian Arctic: From Theory to Measurement.” Social Indicators Research 66(3): 295-317 (May 2004).
Usher, Peter J., Gerard Duhaime, and Edmund Searles, ""The Household as an Economic Unit in Arctic Aboriginal Communities and its Measurement by Means of a Mass Survey." Social IndicatorsResearch 61(2): 175-202, 2002.
Louis-Jacques Dorais and Edmund Searles, "Inuit identities" in Etudes/Inuit/Studies 25(1-2): 17-35, 2001.
Susan A. Kaplan and Edmund Searles. "Donald B. Macmillan and the Polar Eskimos 1913-1917." Anthropological Papers of the University of Alaska 25(1): 121-131, 2000.
Articles and Book Chapters (peer-reviewed) Accepted for publication but not published
“Prophecy, Reincarnation and Mystic Presence: Spirituality and Fieldwork in the Canadian Arctic and West Africa.” Manuscript accepted for publication by the University of Nebraska Press in an edited volume titled, Ethnographic Objectivity: From Rigor to Vigor, ed. by Jean-Guy Goulet and Bruce Miller.
Book Reviews
Upside Down: Seasons Among the Nunamiut, by Margaret Blackman, Polar Record 42(1): 89-90, 2006.
Arctic Migrants/Arctic Villagers, David Damas, Polar Record 40(3): 276-278, 2004.
Saqiyuq, Stories from the Lives of Three Inuit Women, Nancy Wachowich et al. Etudes/Inuit/Studies, 27(1-2): 549-552, 2003.
Protecting the Arctic: Indigenous Peoples and Cultural Survival, by Mark Nuttall, Etudes/Inuit/Studies, 27(1-2): 540-543, 2003.
Hunting Tradition in a Changing World, by Ann Fienup-Riordan with William Tyson, Paul John, Marie Meade, and John Active, Journal of Colonialism and Colonial History 3: 3, 2002.
Saqqaq: An Inuit Hunting Community in the Modern World, by Jens Dahl, American Ethnologist 29(2): 432-3, 2002.
Nunavut: Inuit Regain Control of Their Lands and Their Lives, edited by Jens Dahl, Jack Hicks, and Peter Jull, Polar Record38 (205): 175-176, 2002.
Tundra Passages: History and Gender in the Russian Far East, by Petra Rethmann, American Journal of Sociology107: 834-5, 2001.
Inuit Morality Play: The Emotional Education of a Three-Year Old, by Jean Briggs, Etudes/Inuit/Studies 23(1-2): 271-274, 1999.
Inuit, Whaling, and Sustainability, Milton M. R. Freeman et al., Études/Inuit/Studies 23(1-2): 283-286, 1999.
Imaging the Arctic, J.C.H. King and Henrietta Lidchi, eds. in Études/Inuit/Studies, in Etudes/Inuit/Studies, 22(2): 188-90, 1998.
WORKS IN PROGRESS
“Between Inuit and Qallunaat: Predicaments of Inuit Personhood.” Paper being prepared for submission to American Anthropologist.
SCHOLARLY PRESENTATIONS
Invited Presentations
“Writing Ethnography: Anthropologists At Work,” Writers At Work Lecture Series, Bucknell University, October 2003.
“Religious Identity among Inuit of the Canadian Arctic.” Department of Sociology and Anthropology, Brown bag series, October, 2003.
"Autonomy and Interdependence: The Predicaments of Being Inuit Today." Department of Anthropology, Anthropology Colloquium Series, Yale University, December, 2002.
"The Embodiment of Cultural Memory and Meaning in Nunavut:Case Studies from Baffin Island.” Conference: Memory and History in the North, November, 2001, Quebec, Canada.
" The Household as an Economic Unit in Arctic Aboriginal Communities and its Measurement by Means of a Mass Survey." (Co-authored with Peter J. Usher and Gérard Duhaime). Conference: Living Conditions Research and the Survey on Living Conditions in the Arctic, Nuuk, Greenland, April, 2001.
"Growing Into Your Names: The Dynamics of Identity and Tradition among the Inuit of Nunavut, Canada." University of Massachusetts-Boston's Department of Anthropology Colloquium Series. February 2001.
"Growing Into Your Names: Shaping Tradition and Personhood in Nunavut." Committee on Human Development, University of Chicago, February 2000.
“ Seal Meat and Snickers Bars: Food and the Making of Modern Inuit Identities in Nunavut, Canada”. Canadian Studies Lecture Series, University of California, Berkeley, November 2000.
“Sondage des conditions de la vie dans l’arctique circumpolaire: un bilan.” [Survey of Living Conditions in the Circumpolar Arctic: A Summary]. Inuit and Circumpolar Study Group’s Colloquium Series , Laval University, April, 2000.
“Identity Politics, Research, and the Construction of Inuit Identity,” Conference: Inuit Identity in the Third Millenium, Quebec, Canada, May, 2000.
Conference Presentations
“Shamans, Sacraments, and Name Souls: Rethinking Religion in the Canadian Arctic.” American Anthropological Association annual meeting, 2005.
“Cultural Spaces, Healthy Places: Identity, Wellness and Sense of Place among southern Nunavut Inuit.” Society for Applied Anthropology annual meeting, 2005.
“Emplacement and Identity among Nunavut Inuit.” Central States Anthropological Society Annual Meetings, 2004.
“The Predicament of Self and Other in Nunavut Inuit Society.” American Anthropological Association Meetings, 2003.
“Pure Blood, Mixed Cosmologies: Anti-Creolization in the Canadian Arctic.” American Anthropological Association Meetings 2002.
" On Shifting Ice: Anthropology in an Era of Inuit Empowerment." American Anthropological Association Meetings 2001.
" Social Cohesion and Living Conditions in the Canadian Arctic: New Directions in Partnership-based Research," Association for Canadian Studies in the United States, 2001.
"The Politics and Poetics of Seal Hunting and Seal Meat: Case Studies from South Baffin (Nunavut)." Fourth International Congress of Arctic Social Sciences, 2001.
"Social Cohesion as Measured by a Mass Survey: Concepts and Methods of the APS/SLiCA Questionnaire." Fourth International Congress of Arctic Social Sciences, 2001.
" Igloos and the Internet: Reconfiguring Inuit Identity and Tradition in the Information Age." Annual Meeting of the American Ethnological Society, 2001.
“Seal Meat and Snickers Bars: Food and the Making of Modern Inuit Identities in Nunavut, Canada” American Anthropological Association Meetings, 2000.
“The Social Dynamics of Food and Self-Identity in Canadian Arctic Society.” Association for Canadian Studies in the United States Conference, 1999.
“The Crisis of Youth and the Construction of Place: Juvenile Reform, Outpost Camps, and the Negotiation of Inuit Identity in the Canadian Arctic”. American Ethnological Society Meetings,1998.
"From Foraging Nomad to Cosmopolitan Canadian: Inuit Symbolic Action in the Urban Context", American Anthropological Association Meetings, 1997.
"Outpost Camps and Iqaluit, Inuit and Qallunaat, and the Tropes of Cultural Difference". Association for Canadian Studies in the United States Conference, 1995.
"Subsistence Uses of Forest Vegetal Resources by Resident Zone Members of Lake Clark National Park and Preserve," Alaska Anthropological Association Meetings, 1993.
“Subsistence Uses, National Parks, and Rural Communities: A New NPS Research Initiative,” by Darryll R. Johnson, Eugene Hunn, Matthew Carrol, Harry Bader, Alan Jubenville, Ciel Sanders, and Ned Searles. The Fourth North American Symposium on Society and Resource Management, University Park, Pennsylvania,1992.
Guest Lectures
"Healing Places and Real Spaces: Notes on Canadian Inuit Place-Making." Department of Sociology and Anthropology, Bucknell University, Lunch Colloquium Series, April 11, 2006.
“Psychological Anthropology,” Senior Seminar in Anthropology, Spring semester, 2006
“Inuit, Naming and Religious Syncretism,” Native American Religions class, Moravian College, February 6, 2004.
“Getting Back to the Land: Ethnographic Encounters in the Canadian Arctic,”: International Brown Bag Series, Moravian College, February 5, 2004
“Notes on Conducting Research in the Frontier North.” Anthropology 284, Yale University, December, 2002.
“The Politics and Pragmatics of Research in Nunavut,” Anthropology 201 (Methodology), Bucknell University, 2002.
“On est parfois ce qu’on mange. Praxis de l’alimentation et modernité chez les Inuit du Nunavut” `[You are What You Eat Sometimes: the Praxis of Food Consumption and Modernity among the Inuit of Nunavut]. Colloques d’Anthropologie, Department of Anthropology, Université Laval, December 1999.
“The Crisis of Youth and the Construction of Place: Juvenile Reform, Outpost Camps, and the Negotiation of Inuit Identity in the Canadian Eastern Arctic,” Brown Bag Series, Department of Anthropology, University of Illinois, April 1998.
“Les campements de chasse et l'identité contemporain des Inuits du Nunavut,” Guest Lecture in “Seminar on Identity,” Anth 301, Departement d’anthropologie, Université Laval, April 1996.
“The Politics of Subsistence in Alaska,” Guest Lecture, Introduction to Anthropology, University of Washington, February 1993.
FELLOWSHIPS, GRANTS AND AWARDS
Bucknell University
Common Learning Agenda, Course Development Grant, 2004
Senior Fellow, Environmental Residential College, 2002-2003
Dean’s Travel Fund, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005
National Science Foundation
International Research Fellow, 2000-2002
Two year postdoctoral fellowship conducted at Université Laval, Québec, QC
International Council for Canadian Studies
Academic Internship Grant, 2000
Dissertation Scholarship, 1996
Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research
International Conference Grant, 2000
Faculté des Sciences Sociales, Université Laval
Postdoctoral Fellowship, 1998-2000
Travel Grant, 1999
Canadian Embassy
Graduate Research Fellowship, 1998-1999
American Ethnological Society
Graduate Student Conference Travel Grant, 1998
The Canada-U.S. Fulbright Program
Pepsi-Cola Fulbright Scholarship, 1994
Conference Travel Grant, 1995
University of Washington
Recruitment Fellowship, 1990-91
TEACHING AND OTHER PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE
COURSES TAUGHT AT BUCKNELL UNIVERSITY
Hairdos, Piercings and Tattoos: Body and Identity (Foundation Seminar 095), Fall 04, Fall 06
Designed and taught this interdisciplinary and cross-cultural seminar on the social, cultural and psychological dimensions of bodily awareness and body modification around the globe.
Nature and Human Choice (Foundation Seminar 093), Fall 02
Co-designed and team taught this course, an introduction to environmental policy, focusing on case studies from the United States, Africa, Asia and Latin America.
The Environment in Cross-Cultural Perspective (Cross-listed as Anth 410 and as a Senior Capstone) Spring 03, Spring 04, Fall 04, Fall 05
Designed and taught this senior-only capstone focusing on how individuals and groups attach meaning to place. Using sources from various disciplines, including anthropology, history, culture studies, literature, philosophy, religious studies, and sociology, I asked students to reflect, describe and analyze their own sense of place as well as the experience of displacement. Students designed and conducted their own personal ethnography of place.
Anthropological Perspectives on Human-Environment Relations (Anthropology 260), Spring 03, Fall 03, Spring 05, Fall 06
Designed and taught this lower-division introduction to environmental anthropology course. In addition to learning key concepts in cultural ecology, the new ecological anthropology, and interpetive models of the environment (i.e. nature vs. society, gender and nature, etc.) students conducted cultural ecological studies of local townships and neighborhoods, presenting results in an informal class symposium.
Introduction to Cultural Anthropology (Anthropology 109) Every semester (Fall 02-Fall 06)
Designed and taught this course introducing key concepts and debates in cultural anthropology, including anthropology’s identity as a science; the goals and origins of interpretive anthropology; social and cultural change; ethnography and the politics of representation; and, gender, religion, and the analysis of key symbols.
Advanced Seminar in Anthropology (Anthropology 330) Spring 05
Revised this core course for junior and senior anthropology majors only. Using recently published and/or award winning ethnographies, we examined the state of contemporary ethnographic literature.
COURSES TAUGHT AT OTHER UNIVERSITIES
Person, Self and Society: Introduction to Anthropology (Anthropology 100x)
University of Alaska Fairbanks, Spring 02
Designed and taught lower division course that served as both an introduction to cultural anthropology and psychological anthropology. Covered main concepts in cultural anthropology and explored the symbolic and political dimensions of freedom, autonomy and belonging in various cultural settings.
Fundamentals of Sociocultural Anthropology (Anthropology 215)
University of Alaska Fairbanks, Spring 02
Designed and taught core theory course for the undergraduate major. Using ethnographies from various regions of the world, we studied methodology, various theoretical approaches, as well as the cultural construction of identity, art, and power.
Ecological Anthropology (Anthropology 427)
University of Alaska Fairbanks, Spring 02
Designed and taught this advanced undergraduate seminar in ecological anthropology. Using ethnographies from various regions of the world, we studied the methods, concepts and theories guiding this newly formed subdiscipline of anthropology.
Peoples of the Circumpolar North (Anthropology 438)
Department of Anthropology, University of Washington, Spring 1993
Designed and taught upper division seminar of circumpolar peoples, including Inuit, Athapaskan, Saami, and Chukchi. Studied local ecosystems as well as local modes of production, social organization, adaptation, and folklore.
ETHNOGRAPHIC AND ARCHAEOLOGICAL FIELD EXPERIENCE
Ethnographic Research
Canada
Long-term fieldwork conducted in Nunavut on Inuit relationships to the environment, to Qallunaat (non-Inuit) and to history, including 1991, 1994, 1996, 2000 and 2001
Coordinating the administrative and academic components of a statistical survey of living conditions of Inuit living in the Canadian Arctic. Consulted with Inuit organizations based in Labrador, Nunavik, Nunavut and the Northwest Territories. Conducted pilot tests in Labrador and Nunavut.
Portugal
Long-term ethnographic research on immigration and refugee communities of West African Muslims living in Lisbon, studied religious identity and transnational (economic, religious, cultural) connections between Africans living in Africa and Europe.
Guinea-Bissau, Africa
Long-term ethnographic research of religious identity, life-course rituals, gender relations, healing practices and subsistence production of Mandinga living in northern Guinea-Bissau, 1996-1997, summer of 2003.
Alaska
Qualitative and quantitative study of subsistence uses of vegetal resources in four rural communities, studied included assessment of the relationship between ethnic identity and subsistence values, Fall 1992, Spring 1993.
Archaeological Research
Canada
Assisted with investigation of the history of contact on Baffin Island, specifically the interaction between the crews of Martin Frobisher and Inuit, summers 1990, 1991
Assisted with the investigation of Thule, Dorset and Pre-Dorset sites on islands along the Labrador coast.
Assisted with the archiving, curation and storage of artifacts extracted from prehistoric sites in Labrador, Smithsonian Institution, 1989-1990
Consulting/Applied Experience
Helped to design, pretest and pilot test a quantitative survey of indigenous living conditions administered by Statistics Canada, Ottawa and Quebec City, Canada, 2001.
Helped to design and test a survey of ethobotanical knowledge and subsistence uses of a wilderness area in Alaska, 1992. “Subsistence Uses of Vegetal Resources in and around Lake Clark National Park and Preserve”, by Darryll Johnson, Eugene Hunn, Priscilla Russell, Mark Vande Kamp, and Edmund Searles. Technical Report NPS/CCSOUW/NRTR-98-16.
PROFESSIONAL ACTIVITIES AND ASSOCIATIONS
Professional Presentations
“Undergraduate Research in the Social Sciences: Promoting a Pedagogy of Engagement”, Bucknell University’s Faculty Development, April 5, 2005.
Academic Journal Editorial Duties
Invited Co-Editor
“Inuit Identities” Etudes/Inuit/Studies 25(1-2), 2001.
Manuscript and Proposal Review
Reviewed manuscripts for the following journals: Anthropologica, Anthropological Papers of the University of Alaska, Arctic, Arctic Anthropology, Etudes/Inuit/Studies, Food and Foodways.
Reviewed proposals for the National Science Foundation and the Social Science Research Council
Professional Association Duties
Section Chair for International Academic Conference
Reviewed and selected panels and papers for the “Aboriginal Peoples” section of the Association for Canadian Studies Conference 2001.
Session/Panel Organizer for Academic Conference
“Good Missionary, Bad Missionary: Rethinking the Missionary Position in the Americas.” American Anthropological Association Meetings 2005 (Accepted by the Society for the Anthropology of Religion.”)
“Food in Anthropological Perspective: Public Faces of Production, Exchange and Consumption”. American Anthropological Association Meetings, 2000. (Accepted by the American Ethnological Society)
“Rethinking Community and Change in the Canadian Arctic." Association for Canadian Studies in the United States Conference,1998.
Session Discussant for Academic Conference
"Understanding Aboriginal Politics/Comprendre la politique autochtone," 73rd Annual Conference of the Canadian Political Science Association, May, 2001, Quebec, Canada.
Faculty Development Workshops Attended
“Teaching Writing Across the Curriculum, August,” Bucknell University, August 2002.