Tessa Farmer

Anthropology and Global Studies

434-953-1919 / trf6k@virginia.edu

Education
2014 University of Texas at Austin
Ph.D. Anthropology
2007 University of Texas at Austin
Master of Arts in Anthropology
2001 University of Rochester
Bachelor of Arts in Anthropology. Magna Cum Laude. Phi Beta Kappa. Departmental Honors.

Academic Experience
2022-Current Assistant Professor, Department of Anthropology and Program in Global Studies, University of Virginia.
2016-2022 Assistant Professor, Department of Middle East and South Asian Languages and Cultures and Program in
Global Studies, University of Virginia.
2014-2016 Assistant Professor, Department of Anthropology and Sociology and Environmental Studies Program,
Whittier College.
2011, 07-08 Teaching Assistant, University of Texas at Austin

Publications
2023 Well-Connected: Everyday Water Practices in Cairo. Forthcoming the Water and Society series at Johns
Hopkins University Press, early 2023.
2020 “Gifting Water in a Climate-Impacted Megacity.” Anthropology News website, July 27, 2020. DOI:
10.14506/AN.1466
2020 “An Interview with Sophia Stamatopoulou-Robbins” Middle East Research and Information Project
(MERIP), Fall 2020. https://merip.org/magazine/296/
2020 “The Sabils of Cairo: Small Scale Urban Adaptations to Water Stress.” Journal of Sustainability
Education
2018 Tessa Farmer and Jessica Barnes. “Environment and Society in the Middle East and North Africa:
Introduction” International Journal of the Middle East Studies (IJMES) 50(3): 375-382.
2018 Review of Hydraulic City: Water and the Infrastructures of Citizenship in Mumbai by Nikhil Anand.
Anthropological Quarterly. 91(2)
2017 “Willing to Pay: Competing paradigms about resistance to paying for water services in Cairo, Egypt”
Middle East Law and Governance Journal 9 (2017): 3-19
2017 Review of Egypt’s Desert Dreams: Development or Disaster? by David Sims. Review of Middle East
Studies 51 (1); 125-128. https://doi.org/10.1017/rms.2017.45
2016 “Middle East Section Programming at the 2016 Annual Meeting” Anthropology News online
(http://www.anthropology-news.org/index.php/2016/09/21/middle-east-section-programming-at-the-
2016-annual-meeting/)
2015 “The Humble Tomato” Middle East Research and Information Project Blog January 16, 2015
http://www.merip.org/humble-tomato
2012 "Waste's Messy Challenge to Anthropology: Wastewater in Cairo's Ezbet Khairallah” in Ethical
Currents, Anthropology News, Volume 53. Issue 8. October 2012
2012 “Academic Freedom and Professional Responsibility: A Handbook for Scholars and Teachers of the
Middle East” self-published in collaboration with the Taskforce on Middle East Anthropology.
2012 “Academic Freedom and the Middle East” online article http://www.anthropology-
news.org/index.php/2012/10/31/academic-freedom-and-the-middle-east/
2009 “Agency and Illiberal Others: A Retrospective Review of Mahmood's Politics of Piety,” Text Practice
Performance Journal, Volume 8, October 2009.
2009 “Introduction: Habits and Rhythms,” Text Practice Performance Journal, Volume 8, October 2009.
2001 “Reflection of Identity in Majors,” co-authored, American Anthropology Association Journal: The
Anthropology Newsletter, February and March 2001.
Fellowships, Grants and Awards
2021 Global Mentors Grant, co-recipient UVA, 2021-2022
2021 3 Cavalier Grant, co-recipient UVA 2021-2022
2021 Faculty Fellow, Brown Residential College UVA
2020 Mellon Humanities Fellow UVA Institute of the Humanities and Global Cultures (IHGC), 2020-2021.
2019 Summer Stipend UVA College and Graduate School of Arts and Sciences for summer research 2020.
2018 Faculty Global Research with Undergraduates (FGRU) UVA Center for Global Inquiry and
Innovation (CGII) for research with two undergraduates on sabils in Cairo, 2018-2019.
2017 Summer Stipend UVA College and Graduate School of Arts and Sciences for summer research 2018
2016 Sustainability Course Development Fellowship sponsored by the University of Virginia Committee on
Sustainability, 2016-2017.
2016 LIASE Course Development Grant for the Environment in Asia, Whittier College
2015 Digital Liberal Arts Faculty Development Grant for Digital Pedagogy, Whittier College
2011 Graduate School Continuing Fellowship from the University of Texas at Austin for
dissertation writing, 2011-2012.
2010 Philanthropic Education Organization (PEO) Scholar Award for dissertation writing, 2010-2011.
2009 International Dissertation Research Fellowship (IDRF) with the Social Science Research Council for
dissertation research, 2009-2010.
2009 Fulbright-Hays Doctoral Fellow to Egypt for dissertation research, 2009-2010.
2009 Fulbright-IIE Student Grant to Egypt for dissertation research in Egypt, 2009-2010. [Declined]
2009 Critical Language Enhancement Grant for 3 months of continued Arabic Language training, Egypt
2009. [Declined]
2009 Graduate Dean’s Prestigious Fellowship Supplement, UT Austin, 2009-2010.
2007 Dissertation Proposal Development Fellow (DPDF) with the Social Science Research Council for pre-
dissertation research in Egypt, Summer 2007.
2006 Foreign Language and Area Studies Grant (FLAS), Department of Education, for Arabic. 2006-2007
Academic Year. U. of Texas at Austin.
2006 AIMS Research Grant, American Institute for Maghrebi Studies, for fieldwork & Arabic Language
training in Morocco, Summer 2006.
2005 Foreign Language and Area Studies Grant (FLAS), Department of Education, for Arabic. 2005-2006
Academic Year. U. of Texas at Austin.
2004 Foreign Language and Area Studies Grant (FLAS), Department of Education, for Arabic.
2004-2005 Academic Year. U. of Washington and American University in Cairo.
2004 Foreign Language and Area Studies Grant (FLAS), Department of Education, for Arabic.
Summer 2004. U. of Washington and Lebanese American University in Beirut, Lebanon.
2003 Schwartz Fellow, U. of Washington. 2003-2004.

Invited Presentations
2021 “Sabils as ethnographic object” Virtual invited talk for graduate class at American University in Cairo
(AUC). October 24, 2021.
2020 “Following Cairo’s Water: Building a Picture from the Puddle Up” Virtual invited talk for graduate class
at American University in Cairo (AUC). Nov 1, 2020.
2020 Panel Discussion for book launch of Stories with Oil Stains: The World of Women ‘Digest’ Writers in
Pakistan by Kiran Nazir Ahmed. Oxford University Press, 7th annual Islamabad Literature Festival,
October 25, 2020.
2020 “Willing to Pay: Water as Ethnographic Object” Virtual invited talk for class at Centre of Excellence
Quaid-i-Azam University (QAU), Islamabad. June 17, 2020.
2019 “The Gift of Water: Sabils in Cairo’s Urban Landscape.” Presented at the Cities of Globalization
conference at University of Southern California March 26, 2019.
2018 “Curricular design at the intersection of Regional and Global Scales: Building (G)lobal (S)tudies-
(M)iddle East (S)outh Asia (GSMS).” Presented in the panel Global Studies and Area Studies at the
conference Global Knowledge, Local Universities. UVA March 24-25, 2018.
2018 “Ethnographic Knowledge Production in the Modern Middle East” MESACL Interdisciplinary UVA
Forum. November 9, 2018.
2018 “Willing to Pay Paradigms” workshop MADCAP: Movements and Directions in Capitalism UVA April
27, 2018.
2017 “Biyista3batu: the political mechanism of acting “as if” and ambivalence towards legibility” presented at
Soil, Flesh and Flows: Environmental Temporalities and Expertise in the Middle East sponsored by the
Center for Middle East Studies and the Anthropology Department, Harvard University March 23-
25,2017.
2017 Panel Discussant for panel “Temporalities of Hope and the Question of the Political” at the American
Anthropological Association (AAA) Annual Meeting December 2017. Washington, DC.
2016 “Thinking about Cities” Emory University panel discussion on contemporary approaches to the
anthropology of urban life.
2015 “Informal Water Arrangements in Cairo, Egypt” United Nations Association, Whittier Chapter.
2013 “Urban Water Infrastructure: Animosity and Possibility” Presented at the Harvard Center for Middle
Eastern Studies' (CMES) Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Water and the Environment 2013 Conference.
Cambridge, MA.
2012 “Water and Waste in Cairo's Ezbet Khairallah” Presented in the panel “The Politics of Water
and Waste” Texas South Asia Conference April 2012. Austin, TX.
2011 “Sewage in the City” Presented at the Harvard Center for Middle Eastern Studies' (CMES)
Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Water and the Environment 2011 Conference. Cambridge, MA.
2010 "Squatter Water: Investigating Water and Sewage in an Informal Settlement in Egypt" SOAN MA
Roundtable, American University in Cairo.
2008 “The Berber/Amazigh in Morocco: An Introduction.” Fulbright Scholars 2008 Pre-Departure
Orientation for Morocco. University of Texas, Austin.
2009 Round Table Participant on Water and Conflict in the Middle East. Think Local Act Global Conference.
University of Texas, Austin.

Research Network- Middle East Environmental Worlds

2015-Present Founding Member
2022 Presenter, Discussant, Middle Eastern Environmental Worlds Workshop, April 22-23. Washington, DC.
2021 Presenter, Discussant, Middle Eastern Environmental Worlds Workshop, October 1-2. Virtual
2021 Presenter, Discussant, Middle Eastern Environmental Worlds Workshop, April 30- May 1. Virtual.
2020 Presenter, Discussant, Middle Eastern Environmental Worlds Workshop, February 20-22, 2020.
University of South Carolina.
2019 Presenter, Discussant, Middle Eastern Environmental Worlds Workshop, November 1-2, 2019.
Virtual
2018 Convener, Presenter, Discussant, Middle Eastern Environmental Worlds Workshop, Oct 29-30, 2018.
Virtual
2018 Presenter, Discussant, Emergent Ecologies of the Middle East, April 20-21, 2018. Amherst College
2017 Convener, Presenter, Discussant, BioSphere in the Middle East and North Africa: Global
Currents in Place, April 28-29, 2017. University of Virginia
2016 Convener, Rethinking Middle East Environments Workshop, Oct 28-29, 2016. Virtual
2016 Convener, Presenter, Discussant, Environment Middle East Workshop, March 25-26, 2016. Virtual

Peer Reviewed Conference Presentations

2021 “Vernacular Water Sabils in Contemporary Cairo.” In the panel “The Politics of Urban Space.” At the
Middle East Studies Association Annual Meeting. Virtual. November 30, 2021.
2021 Panel Discussant “Infrastructure and Society in the Middle East and North Africa.” Middle East Studies
Association Annual Meeting. Virtual. December 2, 2021.
2021 RoundTable Organizer and Participant “Infrastructure and Future Truths” American Anthroplogal
Assocation Annual Meeting. Baltimore, MA. November 19, 2021.
2021 RoundTable Organizer and Participant “The Future Now: Investigating the Temporal Politics of
Environmental Projects” Society for Applied Anthropology. Virtual. March 24, 2021.
2020 Roundtable Participant in the “Islam and the Commons: Social, Spiritual, and Material Dimensions of
Muslim Communal Life” podcast for the virtual American Anthropology Association conference Raising
Our Voices; and talkback session on November 10, 2020.
2020* “Fostering Material and Ethical Futures through Gifting Water: Cairene Sabils.” In panel “The Future
Now: How Temporality Matters for Environmental Projects” at the American Anthropological
Association (AAA) Annual Meeting November 18-22, 2020. St. Louis, MO. *Canceled due to COVID-19
2020 “Ezbet Khairallah and the challenges of negotiating precarity in informal housing in Cairo” in Panel
“Living Precariously in Illiberal Times “[Organizer, Presenter] at the Middle East Studies Association
Annual Meeting. October 2020. Virtual.
2020* “Making Connections: the Good, the Bad, and the Contradictory.” Roundtable [Organizer, Participant]
American Ethnological Society Meetings March 26-28, 2020. Austin, TX. *Canceled due to COVID-19
2019 “Charitable Water Sabils as Vernacular Memorials and Neighborly Practice.” Presented in the
“Contemporary Urban Practices in the Arab World” panel [Panel Organizer] at the American
Anthropological Association (AAA) Annual Meeting November 21-44, 2019. Vancouver, BC
2019 “Water Sabils as Neighborly Practice in Cairo, Egypt.” Presented at Cities of the Arab World conference
at Michigan State University February 14-16, 2019
2018 “Preserving Cairo’s antiquities, managing Cairo’s contemporary housing: Wastewater and land tenure
systems in Ezbet Khairallah.” Presented in the panel “Localizing international regimes of expertise in the
MENA region” at the Middle East Studies Association Annual Meeting November 2018. San Antonio,
TX.
2017 “Coherence and Equivalence: Geographic Imaginaries of Global/Middle East/South Asia.” Presented in
the panel “Teaching in and on MENA: Programs and Histories” at the Middle East Studies Association
Annual Meeting [Panel Chair, Presenter]. November 2017. Washington, DC.
2017 “Caring and Careful: Rituals of welcoming in and holding at bay.” Presented in the panel “Intimate
Exposures” at the American Anthropological Association (AAA) Annual Meeting December 2017.
Washington, DC.
2015 Organizer and Roundtable Participant in the panel “Meditating on Spaces: The Anthropology of the
Environment in the MENA Region.” Joint American Anthropological Association (AAA) / Middle East
Studies Association (MESA) Meetings in Denver Colorado, November 2015.
2015 “The Olfactory City: Considering Urban Infrastructure Sensoriums” Presented in the panel “Engaging
Embodies Infrastructures: Material Sensoriums” American Anthropological Association (AAA) Annual
Meeting [Panel Organizer; Panel Chair] November 2015. Denver, CO.
2015 Roundtable Participant “Anthropology, Activism, and the Current Political Moment” at the American
Ethnological Society (AES) Spring Meeting 2015. San Diego, CA.
2014 “Accounting for water: thinking through Water theft and charitable gifting of water from the urban
Margins.” Presented in the panel ““Building Territory: On the Ethnographic Rendering of Landscape and
Infrastructure.” American Anthropological Association (AAA) Annual Meeting December 2014.
Washington, DC.
2013 “Traveling Tomatoes: Love, Circulation and Virtual Water.” Presented in the panel “City Water/Country
Water: Tensions and Possibilities.” American Anthropological Association (AAA) Annual Meeting
November 2013. Chicago, Il.
2011 “Managing Marginal Water in an Egyptian Squatter Settlement” Presented in the panel
“Examining Environments: New Themes in the Environmental Anthropology of the Middle East.”
Middle East Studies Association (MESA) Annual Meeting December 2011. Washington, DC.
2011 “Potholes and Puddles: Legacies of Waste in an Urban Squatter Settlement.” Presented in the
panel “Ephemerality and Perdurance: Tracing the Likeness, Confounding the Difference.”
American Anthropological Association (AAA) Annual Meeting November 2011. Montreal, Quebec.
2011 Social Science Research Council's IDRF Spring Workshop for Fellows.
2009 “Scarcity and Plenty: Vernacular Water Worlds in Egypt's Siwa Oasis” Presented in the Panel “The
Nature(s) of Contemporary Water Worlds.” American Anthropological Association (AAA) Annual
Meeting 2009. Philadelphia, PA.
2008 “Water and Oasis: Social Meanings and State Administration of Water in the Egyptian Oasis of Siwa”
Water 21: The Political and Cultural Economies of Water in the 21st Century. University of Texas,
Austin.
2008 “Washing Machines in the Desert: New Technologies and Women's Labor in Siwa Oasis.” Emerging
Scholarship in Women's and Gender Studies 2008. University of Texas, Austin.
2008 “Water and Oasis: Social Meanings and State Administration of Water in the Egyptian Oasis of Siwa”
New Directions in Anthropology Graduate Symposium. University of Texas, Austin.

Service Work
Track Director Global Studies-Middle East and South Asia Track, 2017-Present
Board Member American Anthropology Association (AAA) Middle East Section (MES) Board Member at Large, 2020-
 Present.
Co-Chair American Anthropology Association (AAA) Middle East Section (MES) Distinguished Scholar Award
Committee 2021, 2022.
Chair Global Studies Rising Scholars Postdoc Selection Committee Spring 2021; Mentorship Committee
member AY 2021-2022.
Chair MESALC Hiring Committee Arabic Language General Faculty Position AY 2021-2022
Chair MESALC Third Year General Faculty Review Committee AY 2021-2022.
Member MESALC Peer Review Revision Committee AY 2020-2021
Member MESALC Lecture Series Committee 2020-Present
Member MESALC Hiring Committee Arabic Language General Faculty Position AY 2019-2020
Chair MESALC Third Year ECE Review Committee AY 2018-2019
Co-Organizer MESALC Spring Symposium “Envisioning 21st Century Middle Eastern and South Asian Studies, 2017-
2018 AY
Member Faculty Senate (UVA), MESALC Representative, 2016-2018
Member University Sustainability Committee (UVA), 2017-2018 AY
Member University Sustainability Committee (UVA) Teaching and Research Subcommittee, 2017-2018 AY
Member Faculty Senate Committee Faculty Recruitment, Retention, Retirement, & Welfare Committee, 2016-
2017 AY
Member Middle East and South Asian Languages and Cultures Department Chair Search AY 2017-2018
Chair American Anthropology Association (AAA) Middle East Section (MES) Program Committee 2016
Member American Anthropology Association (AAA) Middle East Section (MES) Program Committee 2015
Facilitator Workshop Facilitator for Undergraduate Research panel on Water at the 2015 Middle East Studies
Association (MESA) meetings.
Chair New Directions in Anthropology Spring 2008 Graduate Research Symposium, Pilot Year
Responsibilities: organization and implementation of conference from conception to completion,
including: sponsorship solicitation, budgeting, logistics, public relations and advertisement, event
planning, catering organization, speaker participation.
Co-Editor Text Practice Performance Journal, Volume 8
Responsibilities: Soliciting Submissions, assigning reviewers, notifying applicants, editing articles, co-
authoring the volume’s introduction.
Co-Chair Margaret Mead Centennial 2001 “Change the World” Conference
Responsibilities: organization and implementation of conference from conception to completion,
including: sponsorship solicitation, budgeting, logistics, public relations, event planning, speaker
participation, commemorative web site.
Co-Editor Participant Observer, University of Rochester Anthropology Department Newsletter.
Responsibilities: budgeting and managerial tasks, writing articles, soliciting materials for publication,
reporting events, and editing documents. Academic Year 1999-2000.

Grants Reviewed
2020 Reviewer for the Fulbright Commission in Egypt’s AY2020-2021 Egyptian Fulbright Student Program.
2019 Reviewer for the Fulbright Commission in Egypt’s AY2019-2020 Egyptian Fulbright Student Program.
2017 Reviewer for the UVA Global Internships Grants
2017 Reviewer for the UVA MESALC MasterCard Award
2016 Reviewer for the Fulbright Commission in Egypt’s AY2017-2018 Egyptian Fulbright Student Program.
2015 Reviewer for the Social Science Research Council (SSRC) Dissertation Proposal Development
Fellowship (DPDF) Student Research Competition for 2015
2015 Reviewer for campus-wide competition for Mellon-Mays Undergraduate Program, Whittier College

Courses Taught (Undergraduate)

The Global in Situ: Perspectives from the Middle East and South Asia; Sustainable Environments in the Middle East and
South Asia; Culture and Society of the Contemporary Arab Middle East; Global Development Theory and Case Studies
II; Environmental Anthropology; Anthropology of the Built Environment; Water Worlds/Water Wars: An Element in
Social Context; Gateway to the Middle East and South Asia; A Changing Middle East: Revolutions in Perspective;
Introduction to Peoples and Cultures of the Middle East; Ethnographic Methods; Understanding Culture.

Fieldwork Experience
2019 (2 Weeks) Research on sabils for second book project with undergraduate mentee [FGRU funding
through UVA’s CGII]
2018 (3 months) Follow up research for book manuscript [Faculty Funding UVa]
2016 (2 months) Follow up research for book manuscript [Faculty Funding Whittier College]
2009-2011 (16 Months) Dissertation Research, Cairo Egypt [Funding: Fulbright-Hays & SSRC’s IDRF]
2007 (3 Months) Pre-Dissertation Research, Siwa Oasis, Egypt [Funding: SSRC’s DPDF]
2006 (3 Months) Master Thesis Research, Agadeer, Morocco [Funding: AIMS research/Arabic Lang]
2005 (3 Months) Master Level Research, Cairo, Egypt [Funding: FLAS]
2000 (3 Months) Senior Honors Thesis Research, Siwa Oasis, Egypt

Language Skills
Modern Standard Arabic: intermediate reading, writing, speaking and comprehension.
Egyptian Arabic: fluent speaking and comprehension (in country 2000, 2005, 2007, 2009-2011, 2016,
2018, 2019).
Moroccan Arabic: intermediate speaking and comprehension (in country 2006)
Lebanese/Shami Arabic: intermediate speaking and comprehension (in country 2004)
Tamazight/Berber: beginner speaking and comprehension