Megan A Carney

Interests

Research

Transnational im/migration; women’s im/migration; anthropology of food and health; sociocultural anthropology; medical anthropology; critical food studies; food security/insecurity; migrant health; borderlands; biopolitics; social movements; social organization of care and caring labor; mental health, distress, and social suffering; immigrant detention; Latin America; Italy and the Mediterranean; feminist theory; ethnography; qualitative research; participatory research.

Teaching

Transnational im/migration; women’s im/migration; anthropology of food and health; sociocultural anthropology; medical anthropology; critical food studies; food security/insecurity; migrant health; borderlands; biopolitics; social movements; social organization of care and caring labor; mental health, distress, and social suffering; immigrant detention; Latin America; Italy and the Mediterranean; feminist theory; ethnography; qualitative research; participatory research.

Courses

Scholarly Contributions

Books

• Carney, M. A. (2021). Island of Hope: Migration and Solidarity in the Mediterranean.
• Carney, M. A. (2015). The Unending Hunger: Tracing Women and Food Insecurity Across Borders. University of California Press.

Chapters

• Carney, M. A. (2017). Sickness in the Detention System: Syndemics of Mental Distress, Malnutrition, and Immigration Stigma in the United States. In Stigma Syndemics: New Directions in Biosocial Health.
• Carney, M. A. (2014). “La Lucha Diaria”: Migrant Women in the Fight for Healthy Food. In Women Redefining Food Insecurity: Life Off the Edge of the Table.

Journals/Publications

• Owen, G., Carney, M. A., & Bellante, L. E. (2022).

  Bellante, L., Carney, M.A., & Owen, G. 2022. Leveraging university resources to build awareness, support regional food policy, and disrupt dominant narratives guiding food-based development: Examples from the University of Arizona’s Center for Regional Food Studies. Journal of Agriculture, Food Systems, and Community Development. Advance online publication. https://doi.org/10.5304/jafscd.2022.113.017

  . Journal of Agriculture, Food Systems, and Community Development. doi:https://doi.org/10.5304/jafscd.2022.113.017
• Basu, S., Carney, M. A., & Kenworthy, N. J. (2017). Ten years after the financial crisis: The long reach of austerity and its global impacts on health. Social science & medicine (1982), 187, 203-207.
• Carney, M. A. (2017). "Back There We Had Nothing to Eat": The Case of Transnational Food Insecurity. INTERNATIONAL MIGRATION, 55(4), 64-77.
• Carney, M. A. (2017). "Sharing One's Destiny": Effects of austerity on migrant health provisioning in the Mediterranean borderlands. Social science & medicine (1982), 187, 251-258.
  More info

  Italy has been on the frontlines of the European Union's "migration crisis," intercepting hundreds of thousands of migrants and asylum-seekers at sea and on its shores. Yet it has lacked adequate resources to ensure humane reception, as other forms of welfare state provisioning have also been rolled back through recent and ongoing austerity measures enforced by the EU and the IMF. While Italians face fewer employment opportunities, lower pensions, and higher taxes, migrants of precarious legal status and asylum-seekers struggle to navigate the weakened bureaucratic apparatus of the Italian state, including the health system. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork conducted in the Italian provinces of Lazio and Sicily in early 2014 and 2016, this article documents the imbricated economic and health struggles of Italian citizens and noncitizens, and alludes to lived experiences of and community responses to economic austerity characterizing much of the Mediterranean borderlands. I argue that marginalization by the state of both citizens and noncitizens in this setting undergirds some of the local and community responses to economic austerity. Moreover, I suggest that contemporary struggles in this geopolitical context intersect in important ways with the repercussions of austerity legacies that have contributed to widespread displacement in neighboring regions and subsequent migration into the EU.
• Carney, M. A., Gomez, R., Mitchell, K., & Vannini, S. (2017). Sanctuary Planet: A Global Sanctuary Movement for the Time of Trump. Society and Space.
• Yates-Doerr, E., & Carney, M. A. (2017). Demedicalizing Health: The Kitchen as a Site of Care. Medical anthropology, 35(4), 305-21.
  More info

  Attention to culinary care can enrich the framing of health within medical anthropology. We focus on care practices in six Latin American kitchens to illuminate forms of health not located within a singular human subject. In these kitchens, women cared not for individuals but for meals, targeting the health of families and landscapes. Many medical anthropologists have critiqued health for its associations with biomedicine/biocapitalism, some even taking a stance 'against health.' Although sympathetic to this critique, our focus on women's practices of caring for health through food highlights dissonances between clinical and nonclinical forms of health. We call for the development of an expanded vocabulary of health that recognizes health care treatment strategies that do not target solely the human body but also social, political, and environmental afflictions.
• Carney, M. A. (2015). Eating and Feeding at the Margins of the State: Barriers to Health Care for Undocumented Migrant Women and the "Clinical" Aspects of Food Assistance. Medical anthropology quarterly, 29(2), 196-215.
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  In this article, I examine the various meanings of Mexican and Central American migrant women's utilization of private food assistance programs. I present findings from 20 months of ethnographic fieldwork conducted between 2008 and 2011 with migrant women, public health workers, and staff and volunteers of food assistance programs in Santa Barbara County, California. I discuss the barriers undocumented women face in accessing formal health care and the social and moral obligations that underpin these women's role in feeding others. I also document the ways in which private food assistance programs are orienting toward a focus on health in service delivery, and how women depend on provisions from these programs to support feeding practices at home. I argue that these findings are significant for current engagement by critical medical anthropologists in studying framings of "the clinic" and cultural beliefs about "deservingness."
• Minkoff-Zern, L., & Carney, M. A. (2015). Latino Im/migrants, "Dietary Health" and Social Exclusion A CRITICAL EXAMINATION OF NUTRITION INTERVENTIONS IN CALIFORNIA. FOOD CULTURE & SOCIETY, 18(3), 463-480.
• Carney, M. A. (2014). "You Want to Feed Your Family, Don't You?" Exploring the Consequences of Economic Crisis for Everyday Food Practices in Immigrant Communities. Gender, Sexuality, and Feminism.
• Carney, M. A. (2014). The Biopolitics of "Food Insecurity": Towards a Critical Political Ecology of the Body in Studies of Women's Transnational Migration. Journal of Political Ecology.
• Greenhalgh, S., & Carney, M. A. (2014). Bad Biocitizens? : Latinos and the US "Obesity Epidemic". HUMAN ORGANIZATION, 73(3), 267-276.
• Carney, M. A. (2013). Border Meals: Detention Center Feeding Practices, Migrant Subjectivities, and Questions on Trauma. Gastronomica: The Journal of Critical Food Studies.
• Carney, M. A. (2012). Compounding crises of economic recession and food insecurity: a comparative study of three low-income communities in Santa Barbara County. AGRICULTURE AND HUMAN VALUES, 29(2), 185-201.
• Carney, M. A. (2011). The Food Sovereignty Prize: Implications for Discourse and Practice. Food and Foodways.

Proceedings Publications

• Carney, M. A. (2018, November). Chronic Disaster: Reimagining Diet-Related Disease as Structural Violence. In American Anthropological Association annual meeting.
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  Chair of session
• Carney, M. A. (2018, November). Immigration and Mental Health in the Era of Trump. In American Anthropological Association annual meeting.
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  Organizer of session.

Presentations

• Carney, M. A. (2018, November). Food Entrepreneurism and Culinary Innovation as Care in Migrant Solidarity Formations in Sicily. American Anthropological Association annual meeting. San Jose, CA.
• Carney, M. A. (2016, Fall). Invited Public Lecture. Visiting Scholar. Boise State University.
• Carney, M. A. (2016, Fall). Invited Speaker. Migration and Human Rights Conference (sponsored by the Jackson Foundation). University of Washington.
• Carney, M. A. (2016, Fall). Undocumented Health: Doing Community-Based Participatory Research with Immigrant Communities in Seattle. American Anthropological Association annual meeting. Minneapolis, MN.
• Carney, M. A. (2016, Spring). The Terrain of Migrant Mental Health in the United States: Highlighting Disparities, Advocating for Response. Organizer/Chair of Panel, Society for Applied Anthropology annual meeting. Vancouver, BC.
• Carney, M. A. (2016, Summer). Invited Keynote: Seeking Rights-Based Approaches to Migration. Migration, Human Rights, and Democracy Annual Summer School. University of Palermo, Palermo, Italy.
• Carney, M. A. (2015, Fall). Tutto e’ legato’: The Knottiness of Austerity Pasts, Presents, and Futures in the Lives of Sub-Saharan African Migrants in Italy. American Anthropological Association annual meeting. Chair of panel “Health in the Time of ‘Belt Tightening’: An Anthropology of Austerity in Europe and Africa.”. Denver, CO.
• Carney, M. A. (2014, Fall). Without ‘Criminal’ Cause: Punishment for Profits in the Immigrant Detention System. American Anthropological Association annual meeting. Washington, D.C..
• Carney, M. A. (2014, Spring). ’Confounding Meanings of ‘Target Populations’: Migrant Mental Health and the U.S. Immigration Regime. Society for Applied Anthropology annual meeting. Co-organizer with Anubha Sood of panel “Identifying Barriers to Global Mental Health.”. Albuquerque, NM.
• Carney, M. A. (2013, Fall). Women’s Migration and the Biopolitics of ‘Food Insecurity’: Disciplining Caring Subjects. American Anthropological Association annual meeting. Chicago, IL.
• Carney, M. A. (2013, Spring). Migrant Health and Food Insecurity in the United States. 12th Annual Pre-Health Conference: [In]Equality in Health Care. University of Washington, Seattle, WA.
• Carney, M. A. (2012, Fall). Does a Framework of Food Justice Include Transborder Communities?. Anthropological Association annual meeting. Discussant for panel “Food Justice.”. San Francisco, CA.
• Carney, M. A. (2012, Fall). Everyday Struggles of Migrant Women in the Transborder Food Environment. Foodways: Diasporic Diners, Transnational Tables and Culinary Connections. Centre for Diaspora and Transnational Studies, University of Toronto, Toronto, Canada.
• Carney, M. A. (2012, Fall). Managing the Non-Citizen Body: Nutrition Education, Obesity Prevention, and ‘Responsible Reproduction’ for Migrant Women in the US. American Anthropological Association annual meeting. Co-organizer of panel with Rani Mclean for the Society of Cultural Anthropology “Boundaries of Consumption.”. San Francisco, CA.
• Carney, M. A. (2012, Spring). Performing Citizenship: Migrant Women and the Embodiment of State Discourse. The Knowing Body, Conference of the Performance Studies Research Focus Group. UCSB, Santa Barbara, CA.
• Carney, M. A. (2011, Fall). Food Justice Research Forum. Community Food Security Coalition Annual Conference. Co-organizer with Alison Alkon. Oakland, CA.
• Carney, M. A. (2011, Fall). Transborder Food Environments: Conceptualizing Health and Food Insecurity Among Latina Immigrants. American Anthropological Association annual meeting. Montreal, Quebec.
• Carney, M. A. (2011, Spring). Food Empiricism? Deconstructing Subjectivity and Positionality in Dietary Research. Thinking Gender, Graduate Student Conference, UCLA. Los Angeles, CA.
• Carney, M. A. (2011, Spring). Food Policy Councils: Applied Social Science in the Realm of Grassroots Citizenship. Society for Applied Anthropology annual meeting. Co-organizer with Teresa Mares “Striving for Food Democracy: The Potential of Campus Community Partnerships.”. Seattle, WA.
• Carney, M. A. (2011, Spring). Food empowerment: Latin@ citizenship and the lack of food sovereignty in Santa Barbara. Food Justice Conference, University of Oregon. Eugene, OR.
• Carney, M. A. (2010, Fall). Research Forum. Community Food Security Coalition Annual Conference. Co-organizer with Molly Anderson and Anne Palmer.. New Orleans, LA.
• Carney, M. A. (2010, Spring). Food Sovereignty: Methodological Approaches and Practical Challenges. Society for Applied Anthropology Annual Meeting. Session Organizer and Chair. Merida, Mexico.
• Carney, M. A. (2010, Spring). The Making of Community-based Food Policy: Latinas in the Transition from Food Security to Food Sovereignty. National Association of Chicano Studies Annual Meeting. Seattle, WA.
• Carney, M. A. (2010, Spring). Women and the Human Right to Food: Examining Rights-based Approaches to the Gendered Cost of Food in the U.S.. Thinking Gender, Graduate Student Conference, UCLA. Los Angeles, CA.
• Carney, M. A. (2009, Spring). Food Security + Food Sovereignty: Repercussions of the Global Food and Economic Crisis on Latino Households in Santa Barbara County. Society for Applied Anthropology Annual Meeting. Santa Fe, NM.
• Carney, M. A. (2009, Spring). Repercussions of the Global Food and Economic Crisis on Latino Households in Santa Barbara County. Food Sustainability and Food Security Conference, UCSB. Santa Barbara, CA.

Reviews

• Carney, M. A. (2014. Book review of Aya Hirata Kimura’s Hidden Hunger: Gender and the Politics of Smarter Foods(pp 98-99). Gastronomica: The Journal of Critical Food Studies 14(2).
• Carney, M. A. (2013. Review of Emily Yates-Doerr The Weight of the Body: Changing Ideals of Fatness, Nourishment, and Health in Guatemala. Dissertation Reviews (www.dissertationreviews.org).
• Carney, M. A. (2012. Book review of Kurt Timmermeister’s Growing a Farmer. Gastronomica.
• Carney, M. A. (2011. Book review of Marion Nestle’s Pet Food Politics. Food and Foodways, 19(4): 339-343..

Others

• Carney, M. A. (2017, November). A “Hoppy” Bubble? Linking Labor and Capital in Washington State’s Beer and Cannabis Industries. FoodAnthropology Blog, Society for the Anthropology of Food and Nutrition.
• Carney, M. A. (2015, April). Women’s Migration through the Lens of Food Insecurity. Association of Feminist Anthropology Column of Anthropology News.
• Carney, M. A. (2014, April). Bodies on the Line: Fighting Inhuman Treatment with Hunger in Immigrant Detention. Access Denied: A Conversation on Unauthorized Im/migration and Health (Blog).
• Carney, M. A. (2012, June). Women’s Migration Narratives and Reconciling Memories of Violence. Anthropology News.