• In 2012, Sociology / Anthropology major Dovey Balsam of Industry, Maine was chosen to represent UMF at the undegraduate research presentation day at the Maine State House and she received a Margaret Chase Smith Public Affairs Scholarship to continue her research for the 2012-2013 academic year. In 2011 she presented her research, "Combat Trauma and Religious/Spiritual Beliefs: Paradigm Shifts in Combat Veterans of the U.S. Military," at the Council of Public Liberal Arts Colleges (COPLAC) Undergraduate Research Conference held at Keene State College, N.H.

• Sociology / Anthropology major Melanie Strout of Southwest Harbor, Maine was named a 2012 Michael D. Wilson Undergraduate Research Scholar and received scholarship funding to support for her research on the physical and social barriers individuals with a disability face as they seek employment. In 2011 she spent the fall semester in Sydney, Australia conducting ethnographic fieldwork on impairment and disability.

• In 2011, Sociology / Anthropology majors Nicole Moreau of Livermore Falls, Maine and T.J. Parker of Hartland, Maine spent the fall semester studying Italian language, history, and archaeology at John Cabot University in Rome, Italy.

• UMF Asst. Professor of Athropology Gaelyn Aguilar was selected to present a paper, "Thinking Freedom: The Balance Between Autonomy and Care" at the Association of Social Anthropologists' annual meeting on Arts and Aesthetics in a Globalizing World to be held in New Delhi, India. She recently presented a paper, "Box the Compass" at (Re)Thinking Improvisation: International Sessions on Artistic Research in Music at Lund University in Malmo, Sweden. She was also a panelist on the "Building the Next Community Media Portal" panel at Juice -- The Creative Economy Conference in Camden, Maine.

• UMF Asst. Professor of Anthropology Nicole Kellett Paper recently presented "Competition and Cohesion: Exploring the Role of Microfinance in Women's Empowerment and Community Solidarity in the South Central Peruvian Highlands" at the American Anthropological Association Annual Meeting, in Montreal, Canada. She also co-authored a publication, along with Cathleen Elizabeth Willging, "Pedagogy of Individual Choice and Female Inmate Reentry in the U.S. Southwest," which appeared in the International Journal of Law and Psychiatry.

• UMF Sociology Professor of Sociology Jon Oplinger and UMF Assoc. Professor Composition Elizabeth Cooke recently published a book for children. The Wicked Small People of Whiskey Bridge is now available from Amazon.

• UMF Lecturer in Anthropology Lucas C. Kellett recently organized an extra credit "garbology" exercise for his Intro to Archaeology course where students examined one square meter of trash from the UMF residence halls and then reconstructed student consumption and disposal patterns, as well as considered current and potential improvements in campus sustainability. He also presented a co-authored paper, along with Brian S. Bauer (University of Illinois at Chicago), "Long-Term Obsidian Procurement Strategies in the Andahuaylas Region of Southern Peru " at the the 30th Annual Northeast Conference on Andean Archaeology and Ethnohistory, at the R.S. Peabody Museum of Archaeology in Andover, Mass.

• Several Sociology / Anthropology students have been named Michael D. Wilson Undergraduate Research Scholars and received scholarship funding to support for their research. Recent research projects included: Jessica Stuart's "The Communicative Process of Art: How Meaning is Produced and Consumed;" Matthew Lariviere's "The Blood Family?: Social Identity, Stigmatization and Community Among Adult Hemophiliacs in Maine;" Nicole Schoppee's "Tattoo: Self-Expression on the Surface;" Janna Gilbert's "Love, Faith and Drug Abuse: a Case Study," and Melissa Lyons' "Clique, Clique, Boom."

• In 2009, dual major: Sociology / Anthropology and Creative Writing Sarah Gauvin of Hancock, Maine received a UMF Student Research Fund Committee grant to help cover her expenses to attend a developmental studies program in Kampala, Uganda in 2010.

• In 2009 a UMF Sociology / Anthropology student Gillian Laidlow received a Michael D. Wilson Undergraduate Research Scholar award in collaboration with the Northern Forest Network centered at Plymouth State University in NH to study Maine loggers. Because Gillian comes from a logging family, her research was personally meaningful and contributed to her previous working knowledge of the forest industry.

• Sociology / Anthropology seniors routinely present their senior undergraduate research projects during the University's annual Michael Wilson Symposium Day. Some of the student research presentations from 2009 included: "Clothing as a Mask: A Study on Clothing's Characteristics of Self in American Society," "Fansons: a Cultural Study of Hanson Fans," "The Professorial Underground: Rank, Gender, and Parenthood in the University," "Class, Ethnicity and Higher Education: Influences on Educational Values."

• Academic "cross-pollination" is a UMF Liberal Arts hallmark. Here, students and faculty from one academic discipline routinely collaborate with those from other academic areas. For example, in 2009 a UMF Business Economics student collaborated with students in a "Power, Poverty & Society" Sociology / Anthropology course to collect data on world poverty for an Economics project. Similarly, Sociology / Anthropology students conducting undergraduate research on U.S. poverty are using the statistics skills of UMF's Business Economics students.

• Students in Sociology / Anthropology learn about real-world concepts and apply them to see how it can help them understand society in a variety of ways. For example, in the course Intro to Women's and Gender Studies, students became involved with and raised money for the Women's Empowerment Network (Olympia, WA) for the Mulukuku Women's Health Clinic in Nicaragua. And in a class on globalization students investigated the complexities of water, food and fuel crises by playing the role of a local government, the IMF, and a group of citizens working for change.

• Students in UMF's Sociology / Anthropology program regularly participate in activities and organizations outside the classroom. Many are involved in SEA-Change, a student organization designed to raise student awareness of social, peaceful, and environmental issues in the community, both at the local and national level. Other activities students have recently been involved with include Back to the Tap, Save Darfur, and establishing a "U.S. Dept. of Peace."

• In 2009 Sociology / Anthropology students (many of whom were SEA-Change members) helped coordinate the on-campus "Social Justice Cinema" film festival which examined topics such as militarization and the media, the water crisis, the economic crisis, and race & ethnicity. The 2008 festival focused on health care, immigration / sweatshop labor, fair trade, and social change.

For additional information about Sociology / Anthropology at the University of Maine at Farmington, just contact the Office of Admission:

Office of Admission
University of Maine at Farmington
246 Main Street
Farmington, Maine 04938-1994
US tel 207-778-7050
Intl. tel 00-1-207-778-7050
fax 207-778-8182
TDD/TYY 207-778-7275
umfadmit@maine.edu