Daniel Jordan Smith
Office: cabinet 306
email: Daniel_J_Smith@brown.eduTitle: Associate Director, Population Studies and Training Center; Stanley J. Bernstein Assistant Professor in the Social Sciences and Assistant Professor of Anthropology and Population Studies
Departmental affiliation(s): Anthropology
Background info:
Daniel Jordan Smith joined the Department of Anthropology at Brown University in July 2001 as Assistant Professor of Anthropology and Population Studies. He received an AB in Sociology from Harvard University (1983), an MPH from Johns Hopkins University (1989) and a Ph.D. in Anthropology from Emory University (1999), where he received dissertation fellowship support from Fulbright, The Population Council, NSF, and The Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research. From 1999-2001 Smith was a Mellon Postdoctoral Research Fellow in Anthropological Demography at PSTC. Since arriving at Brown he has completed several research projects with grants awarded by Wenner-Gren, NSF and NIH. In 2004 he was named the Stanley J. Bernstein Assistant Professor in the Social Sciences.Research interests:
The relationship between socio-cultural and demographic processes, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa; rural-urban migration; medical anthropology; HIV/AIDS; contemporary marriage; reproductive health and behavior.Current research:
He is currently leading the Nigeria component of a major NIH-supported five-country comparative ethnographic study entitled “Love, Marriage and HIV.” The research focuses on understanding the changing expectations and pragmatics of modern marriage, documenting and analyzing the structure of extramarital relationships, examining how gender is configured in contemporary sexual and romantic relationships, and evaluating the effect of these patterns on the transmission HIV. In addition to elucidating the cultural context of HIV transmission in the five countries, the study design represents a methodological renewal of anthropology’s comparative orientation, employing a shared ethnographic methodology to investigate social, demographic and health processes across five societies. Professor Smith also has a long-standing interest in the social organization of health, population and development interventions and he is currently working on a book about corruption in Nigeria.Selected publications:
2003 “Patronage, Per Diems and ‘The Workshop Mentality’: The Practice of Family Planning Programs in Southeastern Nigeria.” World Development 31(4):703-715.
2003 “Imagining HIV/AIDS: Morality and Perceptions of Personal Risk in Nigeria.” Medical Anthropology 22(4):343-372.
2004 “Contradictions in Nigeria’s Fertility Transition: The Burdens and Benefits of Having People.” Population and Development Review 30(2):221-238.
2004 “Burials and Belonging in Nigeria: Rural-Urban Relations and Social Inequality in a Contemporary African Ritual.” American Anthropologist 106(3):569-579.
2004 “Youth, Sin and Sex in Nigeria: Christianity and HIV-related Beliefs and Behaviour among Rural-Urban Migrants.” Culture, Health & Sexuality 6(5):425-437.
2004 “Premarital Sex, Procreation and HIV Risk in Nigeria.” Studies in Family Planning 35(4):223-235.
