Risa Cromer
- Associate Professor // Anthropology
- Affiliated Faculty // Critical Disability Studies // SIS
- Affiliated Faculty // Women's Gender and Sexuality Studies // SIS
Research Focus
Anthropology of medicine, science, technology; reproductive politics; social movements
Office and Contact
Courses
ANTH 210 Technology and Culture
ANTH 230 Gender Across Cultures
ANTH 340 Global Health: Anthropological Perspectives
Risa Cromer received her Ph.D. from The Graduate Center of the City University of New York in 2016. From 2016-2019, she collaborated on interdisciplinary teams as a postdoctoral fellow in the Thinking Matters program and Center for Biomedical Ethics at Stanford University. In 2018, she was a visiting scholar in the Reproductive Sociology Research Group at Cambridge University. Risa completed a Bachelors in Gender Studies from Willamette University and a Graduate Certificate in Women's Studies from the CUNY Graduate Center. She joined Purdue University faculty in Fall 2019.
Specialization
Medical Anthropology, Feminist Science and Technology Studies, Reproductive Politics, Race, Religion, Social Movements, Mental Health, Veterans, United States
Risa is an anthropologist of biomedicine, science, and technology who investigates social justice issues within bioethical controversies concerning reproduction, race, and disability. She is currently working on an ethnographic book that examines the political movements and stakes concerning frozen human embryos left over from in vitro fertilization in the United States. Intersectional analyses of gender, race, disability, sexuality, and religion are important to how she thinks, mentors, and teaches.
In her applied work, she has contributed to team research projects on mental health services for veterans and stays active within grassroots efforts around reproductive justice.
Risa’s research has been supported by the Woodrow Wilson Foundation, the Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research, the Brocher Foundation, Stanford University, and the City University of New York. More information about her past and ongoing projects can be found here: www.risacromer.net