Almost forty years after Laura Nader\u27s initial rallying call for anthropologists to “study up,” research on power holders and elite individuals and institutions still constitutes only a small fraction of ethnographic work. In addition, many of the methodological and ethical issues specific to studying up remain under-examined. Most discussions of methodological and ethical dilemmas in anthropology to date have assumed a power differential that favors the anthropologist. What happens when the power vector points in the other direction? Through the retelling of dilemmas faced when dealing with a very powerful and prominent field subject, I set the stage for a broader examination of the often taken-for-granted ethical and methodological norms of contemporary anthropological fieldwork. While pulling apart the intertwined narratives of a corporate scandal and a corporate-sponsored women\u27s soccer team, I attend to the ways that studies of those in power often de-center commonly held assumptions within anthropology about the primacy of participant observation, the importance of rapport, the question of for whom we write, and the need to protect subjects’ anonymity. Underscoring the analytical utility of attending to the process of ethnography, rather than just its products, this essay aims to raise some questions about the ethical and intellectual responsibilities of anthropologists, specifically those questions that arise when one studies up

Aesthetic agency refers to conditions, capacities, and states that inform artistic forms of acting and exerting power on social structures. In resistance to the marginalization of women of color, aesthetic agency is exercised through creative acts of culture-making and critique of such practices to challenge domination and representation of the oppressed other. To support this work as a feminist Christian ethicist, I construct a theological framework for aesthetic agency. This paper proposes a theological understanding of transformative aesthetics and then describes the exercise of aesthetic agency for Christian communities by using a television special, Black Girls Rock! as an example. Racism, sexism, and oppression of minorities are ethical problems that assume varied forms. One form identified by Iris Marion Young as cultural imperialism is expressed through cultural forms that universalize a dominant group's experience and make it the societal or cultural norm. (Welch 2008) Cultural imperialism concurrently stereotypes and marks a group as "other" while rendering the perspectives of those from inside the group as invisible. By perpetuating patterns of invisibility and aversion, cultural imperialism pushes minority groups to the margins of a culture. (Welch 2008) Stereotypes of women and people of color are communicated through society's cultural forms: books, advertising, television, and artistic images. Yet, resources for resisting this marginalization can also assume cultural forms. Artworks and literature can be sites of resistance; galleries, museums, and schools can be spaces of opposition. The act of creating is self-affirming and when undertaken by marginalized peoples can be a source of empowerment to counter their mistreatment. In Art on My Mind: Visual Politics, bell hooks states, "It occurred to me then that if one could make a people lose touch with their capacity to create, lose sight of their will and their power to make art, then the work of subjugation, of colonization, is complete. Such work can only be undone by acts of concrete reclamation." (Hooks 1995, xv) Hooks' statement provokes consideration of how artistic and aesthetic practices can address the ethical problem of the marginalization of women of color in the United States.

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The number of reptiles and amphibians is diminishing worldwide, with habitat destruction and fragmentation as the main cause of decline. The protection of these species depends upon long term studies of herpetofauna and an understanding of species-habitat interactions. Land managers now regard herpetofauna as an important part of land management plans, and the southeastern United States is one of the richest spots in the world for herpetofauna diversity. For this project we inventoried three sites in the southern Appalachians for herpetofauna: Rabun Gap -Nacoochee School, Tessentee Creek Bottomland Preserve, and the Buck Creek Serpentine Barrens. These sites have unique ecological and geological features, are currently being managed, and had never been inventoried for herpetofauna before. Coverboards were placed at all three sites and checked weekly over an approximately one month period. A leaf litter bag technique was used in streams at each site to inventory salamanders. The purpose of this study was to document the diversity of reptile and amphibian species within these three unique sites to provide a baseline for further studies of these areas.

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