Mai See Thao

Links

Mai See Thao CV

Areas of Focus

Medical anthropology, the body, critical refugee studies, ghosts and haunting, care, and chronic health/illness, biomedicine, science and technology

Affilations

Asian American Studies Program, University of Wisconsin-Madison

Department of Family and Community Medicine, Medical College of Wisconsin

Biography

I am currently an Anna Julia Cooper Postdoctoral Fellow before starting my Assistant Professor position in the Department of Anthropology and Asian American Studies in the Fall of 2024. My research examines post-refugee experiences with chronic disease and how it illuminates the structural vulnerabilities that refugees continue to face as they age in their place of home/resettlement. I am interested in the afterlives of imperialism, its materialization as health disparities in the refugee body, and the refugee’s critique of life after empire. These kinds of inquiries have led me to think about the interconnections of violence and care, aging for refugees, and the intervention of public humanities. I ascribe to the belief that research should be impactful for the communities in which it comes from. Therefore, I am a community-based participatory researcher (CBPR), teaching social science theory to community members and leading community-based projects on the social determinant of health for type 2 diabetes and a traveling exhibit on Hmong historical trauma and healing in Wisconsin.

Publications

Thao MS, Bochaton A, Caring in Diaspora: Hmong Americans Cares from Here and There. Edited volume Carework and Medical Travel: Exploring the Emotional Dimensions of Caring on the Move Edited by Cecilia Vindrola-Padros, Lexington Books/Rowman & Littlefield, Anthropology of Well-being Series, 5/15/2021

Shippee TP, Akosionu O, Ng W, Woodhouse M, Duan Y, Thao MS, Bowblis JR, COVID-19 Pandemic: Exacerbating Racial/Ethnic Disparities in Long-Term Services and Supports, J Aging Soc Policy 2020 May 31:1-11 PMID: 32476614

Trofholz AC, Thao MS, Donley M, Smith M, Isaac H, Berge JM, Family meals then and now: A qualitative investigation of intergenerational transmission of family meal practices in a racially/ethnically diverse and immigrant population. Appetite 2018 Feb 01;121:163-172 PMID: 29128396 PMCID: PMC5738271 11/13/2017

Culhane-Pera KA, Ortega LM, Thao MS, Pergament SL, Pattock AM, Ogawa LS, Scandrett M, Satin DJ. Primary care clinicians’ perspectives about quality measurements in safety-net clinics and non-safety-net clinics. Int J Equity Health 2018 11 07;17(1):161 PMID: 30404635 PMCID: PMC6222992 11/09/2018

Courses

Asian Am 540:  Southeast Asian Memory and Trauma

Anthro 265:  Introduction to Culture and Health