Since 2007, an experimental Pentagon program has been sending teams of civilian anthropologists and other social scientists into the hardest-fought regions of Iraq and Afghanistan to pursue a mission that's both deeply controversial and increasingly important to U.S. military strategy.
Monday, April 26
7:00 p.m.
University of Wisconsin-River Falls
North Hall Auditorium
In conjunction with the Working Journalists Series, the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting and the University of Wisconsin - River Falls present
Fragile States
From Afghanistan to West Africa
Vanessa M. Gezari is a Washington-based writer who covers national and international affairs with a focus on South Asia, West Africa and Afghanistan. Her forthcoming book assesses the US military's Human Terrain program, which embeds social scientists and anthropologists with troops in Afghanistan. Her reporting has been featured on NPR and in The Washington Post Magazine.
Jason Motlagh is a freelance journalist based in Istanbul whose reporting focus includes insurgencies in India, civilian casualties in Afghanistan, and a 25 year civil war in Sri Lanka. His reporting has been featured in TIME, The Economist and The New Republic. His four-part series on the Mumbai terror attacks, published exclusively on the Virginia Quarterly Review blog, recently won an Ellie, a National Magazine Award for Digital Media in News Reporting.
Moderated by Professor of Journalism Dr. Patricia Berg
Recently
Join journalists Anna Badkhen and Vanessa Gezari, and Fulbright Scholar Mohammad Kazem Shakib as they discuss their perspectives on Afghanistan and what the future may hold for the region.
Pulitzer Center-sponsored journalist Vanessa Gezari will speak about Afghanistan and her human terrain reporting project and the role of anthropologists at 1 p.m.
