Michelle Carnes

Evelyn Blackwood held up my undergraduate transcript and said, "Your strength is not Psychology; it's Gender and Anthropology." Since I had graduated with a BA in Psychology from Purdue University, I thought I had no choice but to continue in Psychology. Lucky for me, I was wrong.

In awe that such a degree even existed, I completed my MA in Women's and Gender Studies at Roosevelt University in Chicago, IL in 2002. There I discovered the writings of bell hooks, Ellen Lewin, Susie Bright, Linda Williams and Gloria Anzaldua. My MA thesis places Tristan Taormino's feminist pornography series on anal sex in a feminist sex education context, empowering women to know their bodies and sexual selves while challenging negativity about anal sex and so-called "non-existent" female porn audiences.
I am an Anthropology Ph.D. student in the Race, Gender and Social Justice concentration.

My dissertation research centers on African-American woman-identified communities and clandestine events in the U Street corridor where women strip for women. I believe ethnographic research must reach beyond an academic written text; the crucial work of anthropology is ideal for documentary film format. I am in production for my third documentary film, DC Is Burning (tentative), as a visual component to my written dissertation. Additionally, I am filming a sequel to my first documentary, History's Playground, about Civil War re-enactors. This year, I became a Carlos Cisneros Scholar through the Point Foundation, who generously funds my research. www.thepointfoundation.org