Callie Maidhof is a sociocultural anthropologist with research and teaching interests in the state, middle-class cultural politics, religion and secularism, and settler colonialism. In particular, she is concerned with how the "anti-political" practices of everyday life have been cornerstone to the expansion of the Israeli state into the West Bank. She has conducted extensive fieldwork in Jewish-Israeli settlements, and is currently writing a book on the subject titled Borderline Settlers: Israel's Secular Middle Class in Palestine. This ethnography examines settler strategies aimed at reshaping the West Bank from the contested, militarized landscape of occupation to one of banal, homogenous suburbia. Focusing on these strategies, she shifts focus away from the spectacle (and specter) of religious fanaticism to consider how politically centrist and bourgeois sensibilities are mobilized in the service of violent, large-scale state expansion.
She holds a doctorate in anthropology from UC Berkeley (2016). Prior to coming to the University of Chicago, she taught Global Studies and Anthropology at Colby College and Earlham College, and held a Mellon postdoctoral fellowship at the Mahindra Humanities Center at Harvard University. For a CV including a complete list of publications, please see: https://chicago.academia.edu/CallieMaidhof/CurriculumVitae
Courses:
- GLST 23101, Global Studies-1, Fall 2020
- GLST 25209/ANTH 24110/NEHC 25209, Jews, Arabs, and Others: Nations from the Nile to the Jordan, Fall 2020
- GLST 25701/ANTH 25256, Anthropology of Borders, Winter 2021
- GLST 25630/RLST 26630/ENST 25630, Religious Violence, Spring 2021