Sharon E. Hutchinson

Ph.D,. University of Chicago, 1988
Professor of Anthropology &
Director of the African Studies Program
At UW-Madison since 1990

Cultural Anthropology

Affiliations: African Studies Program, Religious Studies Program, Global Studies and Development Studies

Research

Professor Hutchinson has conducted ethnographic research in Sudan since 1980.  For much of this period, her research has concentrated on war-provoked processes of social and cultural change among Sudanese Nuer, the second largest ethic group in southern region of the country.  Her current research interests include the anthropology of civil warfare and post-war reconstruction, international humanitarianism and human rights, war-provoked population movements and post-conflict returns, and the local impacts of expanding international oil development activities in Sudan. She is presently working on a book manuscript on the ethical complexities of conducting long-term ethnographic research in a war zone.

Teaching

Sharon Hutchinson teaches courses that include a History of Anthropological Theory, Classics in Ethnography, Anthropology and Human Rights, International Humanitarian Interventions in Anthropological Perspective, Kinship and Social Organization, the Anthropology of Religion, Economic Anthropology, Cultural Anthropology and Africa: An Introductory Survey.  

Selected Publications

• Sharon Hutchinson (2007, forthcoming) “Perverse Outcomes: International Monitoring and the Perpetuation of Violence in Sudan.” In Genocide: Truth, Memory and Representation. Kevin L. O’Neill & Alex Hinton, eds. Duke University Press.

• Sharon Hutchinson (2005) “Food Itself is Fighting With Us:” A Comparative Analysis of the Impact of Sudan’s Unresolved Civil War on South Sudanese Civilian Populations Living in the North and the South.” In Violence and Belonging: The Quest for Identity in Post-Colonial Africa. Vigdis Broch-Due, editor. Pp. 131-152. New York & London: Routledge.

• Sharon Hutchinson (2005) “Spiritual Fragments of an Unfinished War.” In Religion and African Civil Wars. N. Kastfeld, ed. Pp. 28-53. London: C. Hurst & Co.

• Sharon Hutchinson & Jok Madut Jok (2002) “Gendered Violence and the Militarization of Ethnicity: A Case Study from South Sudan.” (Co-authored with Jok Madut Jok.) In Postcolonial Subjectivities in Africa. Richard Werbner, editor.  Pp.84-108. New York & London: Zed Books.

• Sharon Hutchinson (2001) “A Curse from God? Political and Religious Dimensions of the Post-1991 Rise of Ethnic Violence in South Sudan.” Journal of Modern African Studies 39 (2): 307-331.
• Sharon E. Hutchinson (1996) Nuer Dilemmas: Coping with Money, War and the State. “A Centennial Book.” Berkeley: University of California Press.

Contact

Anthropology Office: 5202A Sewell Social Science Bldg.
African Studies Office: 207 Ingraham Hall
Office phone: (608) 262-7381 or 2866 (Anthropology)
(608) 262-4460 or 2380
Email address: sehutchi@wisc.edu