Kate Goldfarb

Anthropology that Breaks Your Heart: Loss and Found - American Ethnological Society Nothing Found

The first of three collections in the AES Online “Anthropology that Breaks Your Heart” series, “Loss and Found,” is live!

americanethnologist.org/online-conte...

Bordering and the War on Migration - American Ethnological Society Nothing Found

My first collection published as Digital Content Editor for AES! This collection edited and organized by Anna Simone Reumert, Wendy Vogt and Charlie Piot.

Check it out: americanethnologist.org/online-conte...

Colorado’s Marshall Fire survivors find healing and meaning through oral history project Oral history contributors were able to share their stories, and many felt a sense of healing.

It’s a privilege collaborating with the Louisville Historical Museum on the Marshall Fire Story Project. Gigi, Sophia, Lucas and I are excited to share this write-up. Public archive coming soon (but still a lot more work to be done)!

theconversation.com/colorados-ma...

1/ For ProPublica’s “Life of the Mother” series, winner of the 2025 Pulitzer Prize for public service, we reported on five pregnant women who died after not receiving timely medical care in states with strict abortion bans.

These are their stories 🧵

Former Weather Service Leaders Warn Staffing Cuts Could Lead to ‘Loss of Life’ (Gift Article) The former agency directors say current employees will face an “impossible task” to maintain service just as hurricane season begins.

“Five former National Weather Service directors have taken the unusual step of signing onto an open letter warning that cuts to the organization by the Trump administration may soon endanger lives.”

Gift link: nyti.ms/3YrIw3Q

“Scientific societies, patient groups, and Democrats in Congress all need to call for NIH spending to start back up unhindered. NIH must be allowed to spend its budget.”

Trump’s War on Measurement Means Losing Data on Drug Use, Maternal Mortality, Climate Change and More By slashing teams that gather critical data, the administration has left the federal government with no way of understanding if policies are working — and created a black hole of information whose con...

The CDC eviscerated divisions that oversee a database on accidental deaths and injuries AND the team that maintains a tool for tracking sexually transmitted diseases.

The EPA will stop requiring that industry measures greenhouse gas emissions.

If you don't measure, it's not a problem, right?

Stand Up for NOAA Research – The Time to Act is Now The AMS is a global community committed to advancing weather, water, and climate science and service.

The 2026 budget passback plan calls for eliminating NOAA Research, the scientific backbone that keeps weather forecasts, alerts, and warnings accurate and effective. This would have disastrous consequences.

Read the AMS statement, in partnership w/ @nwas.org: bit.ly/4cz2RtC

Playing @cornellupress.bsky.social book stack game. My own book lives in both my home and office stacks! 😍

Higher education is one of the last industries where the US still has a massive competitive advantage.

Naturally, Trump is doing everything he can to destroy it.

The general vibe we are getting across #NIH institutes is deeply bleak — that the agency is nearly, if not already dead.

Top people are leaving or have left. Nearly everyone's looking for other jobs. People still care about what NIH was, but are growing resigned to its death.

1/

A 5 alarm fire for US governance and democracy and for you. 🚨

If Trump and Musk can do this criminal shredding of USAID w/ no consequence they will come for you next.

Democratic Senators and House members shld stop their days and head down to USAID w/ the Capitol Police and cameras and stop this.

Internal Memos: Senior USAID Leaders Warned Trump Appointees of Hundreds of Thousands of Deaths From Closing Agency One million children will go untreated for severe malnutrition, up to 166,000 people will die from malaria and 200,000 more children will be paralyzed by polio over the next decade, the memos…

Tuberculosis, the deadliest infectious disease on the planet, kills more than 1.25M people a year. New infections are expected to surge by 30% as a result of closing USAID, a memo says. The increase will inevitably lead to cases in the U.S.

More NOAA Employees May Be Let Go, Making 20% of Staff Cut Together with recent firings and resignations, the new cuts could hamper the National Weather Service’s ability to produce lifesaving forecasts, scientists say.

Another 1000 scientists, proposals for cutting due Tuesday

Inside the Collapse at NIH Administration officials pressured NIH to avoid clear advice from the agency’s own lawyers to restart grant funding now.

By @katherinejwu.com

"The NIH... supported 99 percent of the drugs approved in the U.S. from 2010 to 2019. The agency has had a hand in “nearly all of our major medical breakthroughs over the past several decades,”

The NIH is in a struggle for its (and our) lives. This is existential to America:

Please read—this is becoming serious!

Ugh sorry… hope you feel better soon!!

F.D.A. Cancels Meeting of Vaccine Experts Scheduled to Advise on Flu Shots (Gift Article) The cancellation plays into fears among scientists who worry that Robert F. Kennedy Jr. will use his position as health secretary to sow doubts about vaccines.

With the next FDA vaccine meeting cancelled, concerns are rising about whether flu vaccine will be ready on time for next year. w/ @sherylnyt.bsky.social

The stakes are high: 86 kids and 19,000 adults died so far this flu season.

www.nytimes.com/2025/02/26/u...

US climate research agency braces for ‘efficiency’ cuts: ‘They will gut the work’ Workers at National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration fear crackdown will have global fallout

High stakes— both planetary and personal. These scientists are doing crucial work.

Why It’s Important to Talk about Race with Children Children start learning about race and racism as early as preschool. Talking about race early, however difficult, will help them become more antiracist

How to support kids in rejecting racism— some concrete tips.

The DOGE Project Will Backfire Trump’s war on public employees is bad for all of us.

New, from me @theatlantic.com:
*No, the federal government is not too big
*It has real human capital needs
*Firings are indiscriminate, weakening state capacity
*Creating a toxic and politicized workplace is driving away dedicated employees
www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archiv...

Come work with me! Please share with cultural anthro grads.

Federal Register hold makes ‘end run’ around court pause on NIH funding freeze NIH-related updates to the Federal Register, which are required for the scheduling of study sections and advisory councils, are on hold indefinitely, according to an email reviewed by <i>The Transmitt...

A large portion of grants awarded by the U.S. National Institutes of Health cannot be funded for the foreseeable future because of an indefinite hold on submissions to the Federal Register, according to an email reviewed by The Transmitter.

By @avaskham.bsky.social

bit.ly/3X8ngz8

WASHINGTON – Today, the U.S. Department of Education published the information collection for the 2026-27 Free Application for Federal Student Aid ( FAFSA®) form in the Federal Register, the first public step in the FAFSA development process. The Department is on track to launch the 2026-27 FAFSA by Oct. 1, 2025 as mandated by the FAFSA Deadline Act. The Department also announced that current and future FAFSA forms will rightfully reflect the biological reality that there are only two sexes: male and female. Department officials will remove “nonbinary” as a gender identification option from the current year’s FAFSA form. “The Trump Administration will correct the failures of the last Administration and ensure students and families can easily access the FAFSA form in a timely manner,” said Acting Under Secretary James Bergeron. “Resolving ongoing problems with the 2024-25 form, reflecting biological reality by referencing sex identifiers, and beginning the process for the 2026-27 form on-time will allow the Department to earn back the trust of the American people. Families and students depend on the FAFSA form to plan their futures, and any release delays or unnecessary politicization of the form is wholly unacceptable.”

Screenshot showing open comment form on federal register site

Department of Education FAFSA changes are open for public comment. The changes include requiring trans students to misgender themselves and removes the nonbinary option on forms. Note: comment period is 60 days, and comments are publicly visible.

Form here: www.federalregister.gov/documents/20...

CDC cuts expected to devastate Epidemic Intelligence Service, a ‘crown jewel’ of public health Members of the CDC's Epidemic Intelligence Service were warned Friday that many of them were about to be fired

Make no mistake. This is an all-out attack on health in America.

Not only is the EIS vital to controlling infectious disease; it was where a remarkably high fraction of our public health leaders received formative training and experience.

www.statnews.com/2025/02/14/t...

I’ve been thinking of you and that we’re overdue for a catch-up, and at the same time it’s hard to know what to say these days. Anyhow I’ll text you 🩵

Welcome! You are invited to join a webinar: Defending Public Research Webinar. After registering, you will receive a confirmation email about joining the webinar. This month, the Trump administration has begun an attack on public research to further their extreme, right-wing agenda: freezing federal grants, undermining university budgets, censoring research on ...

On Monday, join academic workers for a webinar on science funding, & NIH indirect cost rate, and the threats to research from the the Trump administration.

us06web.zoom.us/webinar/regi...

list of banned keywords

🚨BREAKING. From a program officer at the National Science Foundation, a list of keywords that can cause a grant to be pulled. I will be sharing screenshots of these keywords along with a decision tree. Please share widely. This is a crisis for academic freedom & science.

Easy to join and do.
www.usaidstopwork.com/individuals