David B. Edwards

David Edwards

James N. Lambert '39 Professor of Anthropology

413-597-2194
Hollander Hall Rm 326

Education

B.A. Princeton University (1975)
M.A. University of Michigan (1979)
Ph.D. University of Michigan, Anthropology (1986)

Areas of Expertise

  • Afghanistan
  • Islam
  • Political violence
  • Documentary film & visual culture
  • Humanitarianism & post-conflict societies
  • Near East and South Asia

Courses

ANTH 210 / ARAB 210 / GBST 210 / HIST 210 / REL 240 LEC

The Challenge of ISIS (not offered 2023/24)

ANTH 222 / REL 273 SEM

Heroes, Saints and Celebrity (not offered 2023/24)

ANTH 232 SEM

Town and Gown: Investigating the Relationship of College and Community (not offered 2023/24)

ANTH 270 SEM

Object and Place/Memory and Nation (not offered 2023/24)

ANTH 335 SEM

In Between: The Ritual Construction of Identity and Difference (not offered 2023/24)

ANTH 347 / ASIA 347 SEM

Tribe and State on the Afghan-Pakistan Border (not offered 2023/24)

Scholarship/Creative Work

SELECTED RECENT PUBLICATIONS & DOCUMENTARIES

    • Caravan of Martyrs: Sacrifice and Suicide Bombing in Afghanistan. University of California Press, 2017

    • Counterinsurgency as a Cultural System. Reprinted in Paul A. Erickson and Liam D. Murphy (editors), Readings for a History of Anthropological Theory (4th Edition), 2013

    • New Lessons from the Swat Pathans: State Building in Afghanistan, 1995-2010. In Benjamin Hopkins & Magnus Marsden (editors), Beyond Swat: History, Society and Economy along the Afghanistan-Pakistan Frontier, 2012.

    • Kabul Transit. Bullfrog Films, 2006.

    • Afghanistan, Ethnography, and the New World Order. Reprinted in Antonius C.G.M. Robben and Jeffrey A. Sluka (editors), Ethnogaphic Fieldwork: An Anthropological Reader, 2007.

    • Print Islam: Media and Religious Revolution in Afghanistan. Reprinted in June Nash (editor), Social Movements: An Anthropological Reader, 2005.

     

     

Awards, Fellowships & Grants

2012-2013       Fulbright Fellowship, Charles University, Prague, Czech Republic

2004-2005       Open Society Institute Fellowship

2003-2004       Carnegie Scholar, Carnegie Corporation of New York

1999                Williams Class of 1945 World Fellowship

1998-1999       National Endowment for the Humanities Resident Fellowship, School of

American Research, Santa Fe

Professional Affiliations

Board of Trustees, American University in Afghanistan