Nitasha Sharma
Election
Position
Name
Nitasha Sharma
Candidate statement
Professor of Asian American Studies in the Council for Race and Ethnic Studies, Northwestern University
AAAS has been my academic home since 1998, and running for the position of its president nearly thirty years later reflects my appreciation for and commitment to the organization. Asian American Studies and its flagship organization have informed my intellectual path and political orientation. Serving in multiple AAAS roles--as the Midwest representative, conference program co-chair, book awards committee member--and inaugurating the "Professor Is In" and the Book Awards Ceremeony has administratively prepared me for this role. I also hope to apply to this position what I've learned from directing an Asian American Studies program at Northwestern University and co-directing an ethnic studies unit funded by a large Mellon grant while serving on the Executive Committee of a larger organization (American Studies Association). While much of this role is administrative, the impetus for running focuses on the field, its members, and our current moment. My career-long commitments that I would prioritize include mentoring at all levels, increasing collaboration across the subfields of Ethnic Studies and with Indigenous and Gender & Sexuality Studies, and foregrounding our field's political commitments to addressing local and global injustice. I bring to this position my advocacy of interdisciplinarity and formal affiliation with and training in multiple disciplines, including Black Studies, anthropology, performance studies, critical mixed race studies, and Native and Indigenous Studies. Perhaps most critically, I know how to throw a great reception.
AAAS has been my academic home since 1998, and running for the position of its president nearly thirty years later reflects my appreciation for and commitment to the organization. Asian American Studies and its flagship organization have informed my intellectual path and political orientation. Serving in multiple AAAS roles--as the Midwest representative, conference program co-chair, book awards committee member--and inaugurating the "Professor Is In" and the Book Awards Ceremeony has administratively prepared me for this role. I also hope to apply to this position what I've learned from directing an Asian American Studies program at Northwestern University and co-directing an ethnic studies unit funded by a large Mellon grant while serving on the Executive Committee of a larger organization (American Studies Association). While much of this role is administrative, the impetus for running focuses on the field, its members, and our current moment. My career-long commitments that I would prioritize include mentoring at all levels, increasing collaboration across the subfields of Ethnic Studies and with Indigenous and Gender & Sexuality Studies, and foregrounding our field's political commitments to addressing local and global injustice. I bring to this position my advocacy of interdisciplinarity and formal affiliation with and training in multiple disciplines, including Black Studies, anthropology, performance studies, critical mixed race studies, and Native and Indigenous Studies. Perhaps most critically, I know how to throw a great reception.