Position: PhD Candidate, Department of Anthropology

Chloe affiliation: RIC Graduate Assistant

How has your work with the Program in Racism, Immigration, and Citizenship and the Chloe Center shaped your intellectual and professional trajectory?

RIC was a great opportunity from a lot of perspectives—attending and organizing talks by academics from across the country made me aware of both the connections and disparities between different approaches to the study of racism, immigration and citizenship. Intellectually, arranging a conference on surveillance was one of my favorite educational experiences at JHU. Reading and discussing the work of people who are part of my field in an interdisciplinary forum provided access to new conceptual approaches, authors, and brilliant colleagues. In a purely organizational but equally important sense, the everyday tasks of the job—making posters, booking speakers and rooms, getting graduate students to help organize teach-ins, are essential in making you part of your academic community.

Lastly, I will say the quiet part out loud: Opportunities like working for a center like the Chloe Center are also essential for international students in providing a monetary safety net which is often lacking for graduate students in the US and elsewhere. Because we can’t work off campus, working on campus helped me receive financial compensation for work that I enjoy doing. That in turn allowed me more time and space to consider my dissertation project in greater detail.