Headshot of Justin Raycraft1st Place Winner

Justin Raycraft

McGill University

“This is Allah’s Plan”: Local Perceptions of Environmental Change in Rural Tanzania

Justin Raycraft is a Ph.D. student in the Department of Anthropology at McGill University, with specialization in environmental anthropology and photography. His graduate studies are supported by a Vanier Canada Graduate Scholarship from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC). Justin’s ethnographic research focuses on the political ecology of marine and wildlife conservation in Tanzania, with attention to the lived experiences of people affected by protected areas. He is especially interested in the interplay between space, politics, and subjectivity in the context of conservation areas and landscapes. In support of his doctoral research, Justin was awarded the Richard Salisbury Award, a scholarship offered annually by the Canadian Anthropology Society to an exceptional doctoral student studying at a Canadian University. His field research is also supported by the McGill Institute for the Study of International Development. Justin’s photographs have been published by notable magazines and news platforms, including National Geographic, the Nature Conservancy, and Current Biology. His academic research has been published in well-known journals, including Marine Pollution Bulletin, Geoforum, Ethnobiology Letters, and Visual Ethnography. Justin is deeply humbled to receive the 2019 Peter K. Award First Prize.

Headshot of Carey DeMichelis2nd Place Winner

Carey DeMichelis

University of Toronto

Biomedical Refusal: Pediatric Decision Making and the Settler State

Carey is a PhD candidate in Applied Psychology and Human Development and the Joint Centre for Bioethics at the University of Toronto. Her research focuses on situations in which young people and their families resist or refuse forms of life-saving biomedical treatment for a variety of cultural, religious, and political reasons. Grounded in critical ethnographic case study, Carey’s dissertation raises pressing questions about young people’s capacity to make their own medical decisions, about who is empowered to determine the best interests of a medically fragile child, and about the limits of multicultural accommodation in a secular liberal democracy.

3rd Place Winner

Peter Lee

University of Cambridge

Caring without Curing: Parasites, Student Medical Brigades, and Transitory Care in Rural Nicaragua