Coming soon…

The diagnostic state: Police discretion and the securitization of HIV/AIDS in the United States - Pyar J Seth, 2026 How do law enforcement agencies shape public health responses during epidemics? While scholars have examined the role of established medical institutions such a...

My piece, “The Diagnostic State: Police Discretion and the Securitization of HIV/AIDS in the United States” just dropped. This one started in graduate school so I’m happy it’s finally out in the world.

Check it out: journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...

Such a pleasure having you!

A wall with many posters for academic events, including a poster for my talk on my book _Putting Plastic Surgery on Paper_, which includes the cover of the book, my name, and my headshot in a light blue blazer.

The famous "Touchdown Jesus" mural on the Notre Dame library against a bright blue sky. The mural includes a haloed Jesus in white robes at the top with his arms held aloft. Figures surround him to the sides and under him.

The inside of the basilica on Notre Dame's campus, resplendant in blues and golds, with white columns, angels on the arched ceilings, and brown pews.

The outside of the Raclin Murphy Museum of Art with a sign saying "150 Years" out front. The building has white Ionic columns on either side of the tall, arched door and the façade is white marble. The sky above is bright blue and there is a sunburst to the right of the photograph.

Thank you to @pyarseth.bsky.social for inviting me to speak about my book at the Reilly Center @notredame.bsky.social !

Students & faculty had excellent Qs for me about art & plastic surgery; I had a blast visiting Hip Hop Public Health class; and I loved spending time at the Raclin Murphy Museum.

A Wayward Method: Zora Neale Hurston’s Critical Fabulation | Transforming Anthropology Abstract Zora Neale Hurston looked for angularity in everyday life, where some cast her as nothing more than a liar. Despite the criticism, she continued on a path toward what she viewed as a reinvent...

Been sitting on this one for a minute but I just had a piece on Zora Neale Hurston drop! Check it out!

“A Wayward Method: Zora Neale Hurston’s Critical Fabulation.”

www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/...

"Was George Floyd killed by a police officer?The official answer, according to a newly revealed set of federal government records, is no."

Thanks so much, my friend!

muse.jhu.edu/pub/12/artic...

Honored to be in the Hip Hop South special issue! Big love to my brotha Corey J. Miles for curating something so beautiful.

This piece about grandma was probably the hardest thing I've written - very grateful Southern Cultures allowed me to share her light with y’all

You Know the Novelist. Now Meet Toni Morrison the Editor.

"With great respect and meticulous research, [Dana] Williams reveals Morrison as a hard worker, a devoted literary citizen and one of the most important book editors of the 20th century." -- Martha Southgate
www.nytimes.com/2025/06/17/b...

#booksky #writingcommunity

Sea Grape Consciousness The trees teach us to unlearn the fear of change

“The water in us has perfect memory,” wrote Alexis Pauline Gumbs in our Floods issue last summer. Water, she writes, is both an ancestor and a mirror.

On floods, both literal and metaphorical, and what to learn from rising water.

Thank you for articulating this so well, Kelly Hayes and @olufemiotaiwo.bsky.social !

"_You struggle with the people who are there and who are willing to lock arms._ "

And black folk been telling y’all about technology pushing people out of jobs.

Just tired of acting like this is “new” —

I absolutely agree. We need to question AI and its impact. But some of this “crisis of humanity” stuff is overblown.

Students have always cheated. Cut and paste from Wikipedia. SparkNotes. Answers on the back of the calculator. Different forms but reflect a view many have always had of education

Join us on May 14th at Who Owns Black Vol. 2: The Past in Danger for a dynamic keynote conversation featuring Tamara Lanier, Yeshimabeit Milner, Alondra Nelson, and Marisa Parham, with an introduction by Kim Gallon.

Register here❗️ www.eventbrite.com/e/wobd2-rece...

Medicine on a Larger Scale Cambridge Core - History of Medicine - Medicine on a Larger Scale

Medicine on a Larger Scale: Global Histories of Social Medicine, eds @ahlie.bsky.social, Jeremy Greene, and me, will be available open access from @cambridgeup.bsky.social in May 2025. In a world of growing health inequity, radical social medicine has never been more urgent!
#histstm #histmed #sts

A photo of the book cover of Tackling The Everyday: Race and Nation in Big Time College Football by Tracie Canada.

Anthros- do your future self a favor and put this book on your syllabus as soon as you can. Will fit with intro to cultural anthropology, medical anthropology, economic anthropology, ethnographic methods, care theory, kinship theory, & much more.

this week!

if you're attending @appliedanthro.bsky.social's #SfAA2025 in portland, come check out my #SANA book panel on friday morning

i'm thrilled to be joined by five brilliant colleagues and to learn how they read my work. hope to see you there!

#SfAA #anthropology #appliedanthropology

Learn more about the artists we celebrated at the Baltimore Museum of Art for their works for Slavery in Motion with remains // an archive with a new in-depth interview on our Substack! lifexcode.substack.com/p/diving-dee...

Community and Belonging at HPRS YouTube video by Health Policy Research Scholars

"Thinking doesn't happen in isolation - it happens between people." See how HPRS builds community for doctoral scholars pursuing health equity: youtu.be/qLnbVwFl3FU

Apps close for our FINAL cohort in just 5 days on March 11! Apply now: rwjf.org/cfp/hprs9

@rwjf.bsky.social @bsph-hpm.bsky.social

Postdoctoral Fellowship in the Initiative on Race and Resilience Apply Now …

Postdoc Opportunity!

The Notre Dame’s Initiative on Race and Resilience (IRR) invites applications for a two-year postdoctoral fellowship to be located in the Department of Africana Studies, beginning in August 2025.

raceandresilience.nd.edu/news-and-eve...

Thanks, Kaela! Appreciate you!

Never imagined I’d write a book but I’m thrilled to be working with @nyupress.bsky.social

The Spectral Defect: Clinical Afterlives of State Violence coming to shelves near you!

I’m honored to be part of For the Wild’s Earthly Reads Series and podcast. You can listen this beautiful conversation about a blackness that precedes all, an earthliness that is divine through the lens of Audre Lorde & learn more about the upcoming live events here

forthewild.world/listen/earth...

Cooperating through distrust: seeking remedies to state and community violence This article focuses on a crucial issue in Black politics: the spectrum of trust. Building on Monica Bell’s theory of situational trust, I explain how community members in three South Side Chicago ...

This was YEARS in the making but my first solo authored publication is out. I do more than rant on social media. I also study situational trust! www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

Baltimore is so Black and queer and I am really obsessed with the beauty of it

You must be unintimidated by your own thoughts because if you write with someone looking over your shoulder, you'll never write.

~ Nikki Giovanni ✨️✨️

Lawd my Ravens finna do it to me again 😪