Steve Striffler, Ph.D., is the Doris Zemurray Stone Chair in Latin American Studies and Professor of Anthropology. Professor Striffler earned his Ph.D. from the New School for Social Research and has held postdoctoral fellowships at Yale, University of North Carolina, and Northwestern. He taught at the University of Arkansas before arriving at the University of New Orleans in 2008. His research focuses on Latin America and Latin American immigration into the US. His first book, In the Shadows of State and Capital (Duke University Press, 2002), explored the history of the banana industry in South America. It won two “Best Book” awards. As part of this research, he edited Banana Wars: Power, Production, and History in the Americas (Duke, 2003), and The Ecuador Reader: History, Culture, Nation (Duke, 2009). His second book, Chicken: The Dangerous Transformation of America’s Favorite Food (Yale University Press, 2005), examined the history of the poultry industry and Latin American immigration into the US South.
He is currently co-authoring “Solidarity: Cross-Border Alliances in the Making of the Americas,” which explores the history of international solidarity between the US and Latin America. As the Zemurray Chair, Professor Striffler has organized numerous conferences, hosted speakers, hired adjunct faculty, and supported faculty and student research/travel in Latin America.