Katherine Verdery

Katherine Verdery is an American anthropologist, author, and emeritus professor, following her tenure as the Julien J. Studley Faculty Scholar and Distinguished Professor at the City University of New York's Graduate Center. Before this she was the Eric R. Wolf Professor of Anthropology and Director of the Center for Russian and East European Studies at the University of Michigan (1997-2005), following twenty years as Assistant/Associate Professor of Anthropology at the Johns Hopkins University (1977-1997). Verdery played a number of important roles in academic research institutions. The first anthropologist to be elected to the presidency of the national Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies (2004-2006), she also held important advisory positions. From 1987 to 1990 she was the American Anthropological Association's representative to the American Council of Learned Societies/Soviet Academy of Sciences Commission on Ethnography,' and during 1989-90 she was vice-president of the Romanian Studies Society. She served on the National Council for Soviet and East European Research as Trustee, 1989–96; Executive Board member, 1991–93; and Chair of the Board, 1995-96. In 2002-2005, she was a member of the Executive Board of the Social Science Research Council, as representative for Anthropology. She also served on the Boards of the American Anthropological Association and the American Ethnological Society.