Stanford University
Department of Anthropology
Building 50, Central Quad
Stanford, California 94305-2034

kohrman@stanford.edu
(650) 723-3421 (voice)
(650) 725-0605 (fax)

Matthew Kohrman joined Stanford’s faculty in 1999. His research and writing bring anthropological methods to bear on the ways health, culture, and politics are interrelated. Focusing on the People's Republic of China, he engages various intellectual terrains such as governmentality, gender theory, political economy, critical science studies, narrativity, and embodiment. His first monograph, Bodies of Difference: Experiences of Disability and Institutional Advocacy in the Making of Modern China, examines links between the emergence of a state-sponsored disability-advocacy organization and the lives of Chinese men who have trouble walking. In fall 2003, Prof. Kohrman launched a new research project aimed at analyzing and intervening in the biopolitics of cigarette smoking among Chinese citizens. Underwritten by a U.S. National Cancer Institute Career Development Award, this project expands upon analytical themes of Prof. Kohrman’s disability research and engages in novel ways techniques of public health. He is now working on a new monograph tentatively entitled Clouds: Making Life and Death in China’s Cigarette Market.