“My time in St Louis has been a wonderful and very inspiring experience, both academically and leisure wise. Just having finished my ethnographic fieldwork in The Netherlands, I entered Washington University at that stage of my research where I had to try to make sense of the data I had collected. Thanks to our program seminar, the freedom which was provided to us to audit other relevant courses, the wonderful faculty members and our fellow graduate students who were very approachable and always up for discussion, I gained a great many useful insights about my research data. Stating that it enhanced the quality of my research is doing my stay at “Washu” injustice – I will go as far as stating that it has been essential for my research. At this moment, a week before my return to The Netherlands, I know for sure I will genuinely miss the Washu anthropology community, with its ample knowledge exchange, enormous academic involvement, the helpfulness of the supporting staff and also the warm atmosphere at the Washu campus. And last but not least, I will miss my soccer teammates, biking and running in Forest Park, the good food, and the warm, friendly people of St Louis.”
– Susanne van den Buuse, PhD student, University of Amsterdam, The Netherlands.
“The Fall Semester 2015 within the Anthropology Department of Washington University in St Louis turned out to be a great opportunity to read – and debate! – French classical authors about institutions (such as government, law, science, medicine, finance) as well as expand my theoretical knowledge to the American repertoire. Indeed, the class with John Bowen is profoundly theoretically challenging and the discussion format invites every participant to use its own fieldwork to put a series of concepts to the test (such as performativity, frame, repertoire, practical schema, ‘dispositif’). The presence of archeologists in the department is also a very good surprise, enabling us to discover the investigating techniques of colleagues too rarely met in France. In this non-stop process of internationalization of academic exchanges, I look forward to continue the dialogue in Amsterdam and Paris!”
– Marie Le Clainche – Piel, PhD Candidate in Sociology, EHESS, Paris, France