USU anthro prof honored as ‘global citizen’
November 16th, 2010 Posted in OpinionBonnie Glass-Coffin Receives Prestigious Eleanor Roosevelt Global Citizenship Award
LOGAN–Utah State University anthropology professor Bonnie Glass-Coffin is this year’s recipient of a prestigious Eleanor Roosevelt Global Citizenship Award from the Center for Public Anthropology at Hawaii Pacific University. Public anthropology seeks to address broad critical concerns in ways that promote understanding of what anthropologists offer, allowing the public to understand simply.
“Dr. Glass-Coffin has been recognized with this award because she so effectively takes classroom knowledge and applies it to real world challenges, thereby encouraging students to be responsible global citizens,” said Rob Borofsky, the center’s founder and director. “By actively addressing important ethical concerns within anthropology, Dr. Glass-Coffin provides students with the thinking and writing skills needed for active citizenship.”
The Global Citizenship award, named to honor the 20th century’s “First Lady of the World” is awarded to less than 1 percent of university instructors teaching introductory anthropology classes across North America.
Glass-Coffin was chosen for her recent work with introductory anthropology students as she guided them, along with faculty and students from 21 other universities, to discuss the responsibilities anthropologists have to the public as they investigate and report on indigenous cultures. The students debated whether or not anthropologists have an obligation to intercede on behalf of Yanomami Indians of Brazil and Venezuela, who have demanded the return of blood samples collected more than 40 years ago and stored in research laboratories today.
Glass-Coffin’s students were particularly effective in arguing their positions, with 21 claiming top honors in a competition that included 4,000 total students.
“USU is proud to have high-caliber individuals such as Dr. Glass-Coffin on our faculty,” said Utah State University Executive Vice President and Provost Raymond Coward. “The receipt of this award, combined with her recognition by the Carnegie Foundation as a U.S. Professor of the Year, is a testament to how expertly Dr. Glass-Coffin challenges her students to engage with broad issues and explore the value of an anthropological perspective for solving difficult, world problems.”
Glass-Coffin is a professor in USU’s anthropology program based in the Department of Sociology, Social Work and Anthropology, College of Humanities and Social Sciences.
TP
Tags: anthropology, Bonnie Glass-Coffin, Roosevelt Global Citizen Award
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