About

Mimi Nichter, Ph.D. is Professor Emerita at the University of Arizona School of Anthropology, where she holds joints appointments in the College of Public Health and the Norton School of Family and Consumer Sciences. She is a cultural and public anthropologist who studies core concerns in contemporary American society. Her ethnographic research primarily focuses on adolescents and young adults. She is the author (or co-author) of four books. Her first book, Fat Talk, received the prestigious Margaret Mead Award from the American Anthropological Association, for a book that makes anthropology meaningful and accessible to a broad public audience. Hostage: A Memoir of Terrorism, Trauma, and Resilience is her first memoir.

In addition to her U.S. based research, Mimi has conducted long-term ethnographic fieldwork in South and Southeast Asia on subjects ranging from women’s health to global tobacco. Her research has been funded by the National Institutes of Health, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, and the Mayo Clinic, among others.

She regularly speaks to numerous audiences including educators, anthropology and public health professionals, journalists, and nonprofit organizations. Mimi has delivered keynotes and lectures on adolescent and young adult practices at the Truth Initiative, National Cancer Institute, US Congress, the World Health Organization and at universities around the U.S. and abroad (India, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, Switzerland).

Findings of her research have been featured on websites and in newspapers including The New York Times, The Washington Post, Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Toronto Globe and Mail, among others. She has discussed the findings of her research on the BBC, Australian Public Radio, New Zealand Public Radio, the Radio Health Journal, and other news media. Her writing has appeared in Newsweek.com and Brevity.

After graduating college, she traveled overland through Africa and Asia. She lived in South India for over four years and has continued to do fieldwork there for more than four decades. She has also conducted anthropology research in Indonesia, Turkey, Sri Lanka, and the Philippines. She currently lives in Tucson, Arizona with her partner and a growing collection of cacti. She has two sons and two grandchildren. Whenever possible, she escapes to the ocean, preferably to remote islands, where she spends time walking on the beach, swimming, bodyboarding, and snorkeling.