Margaret Bender (Ph.D., University of Chicago). Margaret Bender received her A.B. degree in English from Cornell University, her A.M. in the social sciences from the University of Chicago, and her Ph.D. in Anthropology also from the University of Chicago. She has studied the relationship between language and culture in a variety of contexts—from political rhetoric in Iran to family literacy education in Chicago. Bender believes strongly that the study of language is essential to our understanding of cultures, persons, and events. Her recent book, Signs of Cherokee Culture: Sequoyah’s Syllabary in Eastern Cherokee Life, explored the religious, social and political implications of reading and writing in the Cherokee language. Bender’s research and teaching interests also include educational anthropology, gender studies, and Native American studies. She is currently working on a comparison of attitudes toward and practices related to fatherhood and masculinity in two Oklahoma Native American communities, and on linguistic analyses of Cherokee medicinal and religious texts. Bender teaches in Wake Forest’s Linguistics Program as well as in the Department of Anthropology.[2000]
"Framing the Anomalous: Stoneclad, Sequoyah, and Cherokee Ethnoliteracy." In New Perspectives on Native North America (2006) (link to Nebraska Press)
Signs of Cherokee Culture: Sequoyah's Syllabary in Eastern Cherokee Life (2002) (link to UNC Press)
Signs of Cherokee Culture: Sequoyah's Syllabary in Eastern Cherokee Life (2002) (link to Amazon.com)
Linguistic Diversity in the South: Changing Codes, Practices, and Ideology (Southern Anthropological Society Proceedings, 37) (2004) (link to Amazon.com)
Postal Mail:
Margaret Bender
Anthropology Department
PO Box 7807
Winston-Salem, NC 27109
Phone: 336.758.5326
Email: benderm@wfu.edu
