Denielle A Elliott
Department of Anthropology
Department of Social Science
Professor
York Research Chair in Injured Minds
On sabbatical 2024-2025
Office: York Lanes 311
Email: dae@yorku.ca
Primary website: Beautiful Brains Collaboratory
Media Requests Welcome
Accepting New Graduate Students
Denielle Elliott, PhD, is a Professor of socio-cultural anthropology at York University, where she holds a York Research Chair in Injured Minds. She is also the Deputy-Director of the Institute for Technoscience and Society. Her current research explores the embodied experience of people living with altered neuro states and knowledge-making practices in the clinic and laboratory, and their convergences. She is particularly interested in how patients, doctors, and scientists make sense of that which is imperceptible and often beyond language and scientific knowing. As part of this, her research considers how sensory ethnographic methods can augment neuro-scientific understanding and facilitate collaborative and empowering epistemological approaches in neurology.
She has conducted ethnographic fieldwork in British Columbia (Vancouver's Downtown Eastside on HIV/AIDS, epidemiological surveillance, and colonial health) and in Nairobi and Kisumu, Kenya (‘Safari Science’, experimental medicine, scientific infrastructure, & the politics of transnational science).
She is also interested in ethnographic writing and experimental methods. She is the co-editor of A Different Kind of Ethnography and Naked Fieldnotes: A rough guide to ethnographic writing (Minnesota), and the author of Reimagining Science and Statecraft in Postcolonial Kenya.
She is currently working on two related projects. Denielle Elliott, PhD, is a Professor of socio-cultural anthropology at York University, where she is also the Deputy-Director of the Institute for Technoscience and Society. Her current research explores the embodied experience of people living with altered neuro states and knowledge-making practices in the clinic and laboratory, and their convergences. She is particularly interested in how patients, doctors, and scientists make sense of that which is imperceptible and often beyond language and scientific knowing. As part of this, her research considers how sensory ethnographic methods can augment neuro-scientific understanding and facilitate collaborative and empowering epistemological approaches in neurology. She is the co-editor of A Different Kind of Ethnography, as well as the forthcoming Naked Fieldnotes, and the author of Reimagining Science and Statecraft in Postcolonial Kenya.
Dr. Elliott also has an interest in literary ethnographic writing, and the use of creative and visual arts in ethnographic practice. She is a founding member of the Centre for Imaginative Ethnography – an interdisciplinary, research collective dedicated to new scholarship fusing creative arts, social theory, and social research. She has held research funds from British Columbia Medical Services Foundation, the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, and the Wenner-Gren Foundation in Anthropological Research.
Websites
Graduate Programs
• Graduate Faculty, Department of Anthropology: http://anth.laps.yorku.ca
• Graduate Faculty in Science and Technology := http://sts.gradstudies.yorku.ca/
• Graduate Program in Gender, Feminist and Women Studies Additional Profiles
• Centre for Imaginative Ethnography: http://imaginativeethnography.org
• Academia.edu Profile: http://yorku.academia.edu/DenielleElliott
Area of Specialization
Cultural Anthropology; African Studies; Urban Anthropology; Postcolonialism and Colonialism; Science and Technology Studies
Degrees
PhD, Cultural Anthropology, Simon Fraser UniversityResearch Interests
Denielle Elliott and Matthew Wolf-Meyer, eds. 2024 Naked Fieldnotes: A rough guide to ethnographic writing. University of Minnesota Press.
Denielle Elliott and Dara Culhane, eds. 2021 November Réinventer L’ethnographie: pratiques imaginatives et méthodologies créatives. Quebec City: University of Laval Press.
2018 Reimagining Science and Statecraft in Postcolonial Kenya: Stories from an African Scientist. London: Routledge Press.
Denielle Elliott and Dara Culhane, eds. 2016 A Different Kind of Ethnography. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.
Denielle Elliott, PhD, is a Professor of socio-cultural anthropology at York University, where she holds a York Research Chair in Injured Minds. She is also the Deputy-Director of the Institute for Technoscience and Society. Her current research explores the embodied experience of people living with altered neuro states and knowledge-making practices in the clinic and laboratory, and their convergences. She is particularly interested in how patients, doctors, and scientists make sense of that which is imperceptible and often beyond language and scientific knowing. As part of this, her research considers how sensory ethnographic methods can augment neuro-scientific understanding and facilitate collaborative and empowering epistemological approaches in neurology.
She has conducted ethnographic fieldwork in British Columbia (Vancouver's Downtown Eastside on HIV/AIDS, epidemiological surveillance, and colonial health) and in Nairobi and Kisumu, Kenya (‘Safari Science’, experimental medicine, scientific infrastructure, & the politics of transnational science).
She is also interested in ethnographic writing and experimental methods. She is the co-editor of A Different Kind of Ethnography and Naked Fieldnotes: A rough guide to ethnographic writing (Minnesota), and the author of Reimagining Science and Statecraft in Postcolonial Kenya.
She is currently working on two related projects. Denielle Elliott, PhD, is a Professor of socio-cultural anthropology at York University, where she is also the Deputy-Director of the Institute for Technoscience and Society. Her current research explores the embodied experience of people living with altered neuro states and knowledge-making practices in the clinic and laboratory, and their convergences. She is particularly interested in how patients, doctors, and scientists make sense of that which is imperceptible and often beyond language and scientific knowing. As part of this, her research considers how sensory ethnographic methods can augment neuro-scientific understanding and facilitate collaborative and empowering epistemological approaches in neurology. She is the co-editor of A Different Kind of Ethnography, as well as the forthcoming Naked Fieldnotes, and the author of Reimagining Science and Statecraft in Postcolonial Kenya.
Dr. Elliott also has an interest in literary ethnographic writing, and the use of creative and visual arts in ethnographic practice. She is a founding member of the Centre for Imaginative Ethnography – an interdisciplinary, research collective dedicated to new scholarship fusing creative arts, social theory, and social research. She has held research funds from British Columbia Medical Services Foundation, the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, and the Wenner-Gren Foundation in Anthropological Research.
Websites
Graduate Programs
• Graduate Faculty, Department of Anthropology: http://anth.laps.yorku.ca
• Graduate Faculty in Science and Technology := http://sts.gradstudies.yorku.ca/
• Graduate Program in Gender, Feminist and Women Studies Additional Profiles
• Centre for Imaginative Ethnography: http://imaginativeethnography.org
• Academia.edu Profile: http://yorku.academia.edu/DenielleElliott
Area of Specialization
Cultural Anthropology; African Studies; Urban Anthropology; Postcolonialism and Colonialism; Science and Technology Studies
Degrees
PhD, Cultural Anthropology, Simon Fraser UniversityResearch Interests
All Publications
Denielle Elliott and Matthew Wolf-Meyer, eds. 2024 Naked Fieldnotes: A rough guide to ethnographic writing. University of Minnesota Press.
Denielle Elliott and Dara Culhane, eds. 2021 November Réinventer L’ethnographie: pratiques imaginatives et méthodologies créatives. Quebec City: University of Laval Press.
2018 Reimagining Science and Statecraft in Postcolonial Kenya: Stories from an African Scientist. London: Routledge Press.
Denielle Elliott and Dara Culhane, eds. 2016 A Different Kind of Ethnography. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.