Indiana University

Faculty Member, Anthropology

Professor of Anthropology and Gender Studies

Arts and Sciences

Thesis Title: Agriculture, Ecology, and Domestic Organization among the Kekchi Maya

About

Richard Wilk is professor of anthropology and gender studies at Indiana University where he directs the Food Studies Program. With a PhD in Anthropology from the University of Arizona, he has taught at the University of California Berkeley, University of California Santa Cruz, New Mexico State University, and University College London, and has held fellowships at Gothenburg University and the University of London. His research in Belize, Europe, the USA and West Africa has been supported by three Fulbright fellowships, grants from the National Science Foundation and many other organizations.  He has also worked as an applied anthropologist with UNICEF, USAID, USDA, Cultural Survival and other development organizations. Most recently he has testified in several important Indian land tenure cases in the Belize Supreme Court. His initial research on the cultural ecology of farming and family organization was followed by work on consumer culture and sustainable consumption, energy consumption, globalization, television, beauty pageants and food. Much of his recent work has turned towards the history of food, the linkages between tourism and sustainable development, and the origin of modern masculinity. His publications include more than 125 papers and book chapters, a textbook in Economic Anthropology, and several edited volumes, The most recent books are “Home Cooking in the Global Village” (Berg Publishers), Off the Edge: Experiments in Cultural Analysis (with Orvar Lofgren, Museum Tusculanum Press) and “Fast Food/Slow Food” (Altamira Press).

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