“I drink lots of black tea, have lived in two countries and four states, foster dogs, envy people who are good at gardening and can crack an egg with one hand.”
Meet Roisin Todd, a senior anthropology major who received the George Henry Perkins award for demonstrating superior intellectual commitment to anthropology, and will be sporting maroon and silver cords at graduation Sunday May 20.
Additionally, Todd was accepted into the Phi Beta Kappa society, a highly prestigious honors society along with three other graduating seniors.
“I did not expect to win any award,” she said. “It’s hard to imagine when you’re in the thick of it because there’s always another deadline on the horizon. It’s gratifying to know that those efforts were seen.”
But this award is not the only surprise Todd will have faced. In addition to her anthropology cords, on May 20 Todd will be called on stage to receive the Hannah Howard Prize.
The Hannah Howard Prize is awarded annually to a full time student in the College of Arts and Sciences with the highest GPA--a student who truly represents the commitment and achievements of liberal arts education.
“I think my strengths are in my engagement with and enthusiasm for the discipline and my ability to extend that beyond the classroom,” Todd said. “Along with what is probably unhealthy amount of time perusing CatQuest.”
But her GPA wasn’t the only thing that made her an outstanding student; her professors praised her as well.
“I feel very lucky to have been able to work with Ro,” anthropology professor Luis Vivanco said. “She's the kind of person a lot of professors dream about working with: a deep and creative thinker, a highly-gifted communicator and someone who is downright pleasant to be around.”
Vivanco attests to Todd’s ability to bring her passion and commitment to the world into all her work.
Another of Todd’s anthropology professors, Jeanne Shea, agrees that her eagerness about her studies tends to imbue a great energy on the project of undergraduate studies.
“When she speak and writes, one is struck by the joy with which she engages with scholarly ideas and cultural worlds,” Shea said.
What’s interesting about Todd’s story of success is that she didn’t come into UVM knowing she wanted to be an anthropology major.
“I stumbled upon the description for the social action focus the department offers and the more I read, the more it resonated with me and what I wanted to study,” she said.
This concentration allows students to explore inequality, diversity, and social justice, policymaking, international aid and advocacy through an anthropological lens.
In her four years at UVM, Todd completed a number of projects that truly exhibit the depth and complexity of forms a degree in anthropology can take.
“I feel really lucky to have had the scope to do some less conventional projects,” Todd said.
Her work ranged from soundscape analysis of capitalism in Burlington, ethnographic vignettes on childhood and education and a map and dictionary project on the institutionalization of early education.
“All of these projects involved doing anthropology outside of the classroom and connecting to the discipline off-campus,” she said.
Her favorite was a blog post project where she researched the ways in which Muslim punk offers unique avenues of resistance against contemporary anti-Muslim rhetoric and violence.
“I think that produced my weirdest bibliography to date,” Todd said.
Her work doesn’t end after graduation. Todd will be taking a year off from school to work, travel and apply to graduate schools, but will also continue pursuing another Anthropological project.
“I’ll be continuing work on an archival project digitizing and piecing together an oral history,” she said. “Which is exciting.”
For the most part, her excitement outweighs her fears of post undergraduate life, she said.
To any students considering or already in the Anthropology department, Todd has a few key suggestions.
“Find projects, causes and people that interest you, engage with off-campus organizations, stay with your curiousity, don’t take yourself too seriously,” she said. “But also take your work and contributions seriously.”
A bachelor of arts in anthropology is a flexible degree that allows students to pursue their individual interests while equipping them with the skills to meet the world’s challenges head-on, hands-on.
All in all, Todd said her senior year was a fulfilling, sometimes stressful blur.
For all her achievements and passion, Todd would especially like to thank Luis Vivanco, Ben Eastman, and Jonah Steinberg, as well as her advisor Emily Manetta and all her peers.
“I am so grateful to the whole community of the anthropology department and I’ve truly enjoyed being a part of it,” she said.
To learn more about Anthropology at UVM visit the department’s website at https://www.uvm.edu/cas/anthropology or pop into professor offices on the fifth floor of Williams Hall--they have a great view.
Editor's note: Roisin Todd was one of three CAS students who shared the 2018 Hannah Howard Prize. Also receiving the award for highest GPA in the College was Emily Pomichter (psychologcal sciences) and Anthony Spinella (neuroscience).