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SEAP welcomes new faculty: Juno Salazar Parreñas

juno headshot
November 9, 2020

Juno Parreñas is an ethnographer working at the intersections of human-animal relations, decolonization, and environmental justice.

 After completing her Ph.D. in Anthropology at Harvard University in 2012, she was an Agrarian Studies Postdoctoral Research Fellow at Yale University and a Postdoctoral Research Fellow with the Rutgers Center for Historical Analysis. In 2014 she became an Assistant Professor in Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies at Ohio State University and remained there until joining us at Cornell this fall as an Assistant Professor in Science and Technology Studies and Feminist, Gender and Sexuality Studies.

Parreñas’ scholarly interests in conservation biology, animal behavioral sciences, history, science studies, colonialism, queer theory, anthropology, and feminist studies are expressed in her book Decolonizing Extinction: The Work of Care in Orangutan Rehabilitation (2018). It received the 2019 Michelle Z. Rosaldo Book Prize from the Association for Feminist Anthropology as well as honorable mentions for the  2020 Harry J. Benda Prize from the Association for Asian Studies, the 2019 Diana Forsythe Prize from the Society for the Anthropology of Work and the Committee for the Anthropology of Science, Technology, and Computing, as well as the 2019 New Millennium Award from the Society for Medical Anthropology.

Her new project, “Who Gets to Retire? Human-Animal Life Histories of Labor” looks at the emergence of animal retirement and geriatric veterinary care around the world as a way to think about global political economy and thresholds between life, death, and work. Parreñas is also looking forward to developing new courses, and starting this spring 2021 she will teach “Environmental Ethics” for Biology and Society majors and the graduate level proseminar in Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies, which will foster discussion on emerging themes in interdisciplinary feminist studies.

Ever since she came to Cornell in fall 2015 to present a Gatty Lecture, she has sipped tea from her Cornell mug and looked forward to joining the vibrant and collaborative community here. SEAP is likewise excited to welcome her as the newest SEAP faculty member.

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