Doctoral Student, Cornell University
Research Interests
Affect Theory | Africa | Anthropology of Knowledges | Digital Health | Public health |
About Hannah
Informally known as the woman who spent night shifts playing cards with residents in Toronto’s shelter system, Hannah Ali is a PhD student in Medical and Cultural Anthropology at Cornell University. Her doctoral project explores the various ways Somali Canadians draw on religious and cultural repertoires in response to Toronto’s drug toxicity crisis. More broadly, Hannah’s research interests include the intersections of art-based methods (such as play), care, health, and Islamic constructions of healing within the Somali diaspora.
Contact
Contributions to Platypus, The CASTAC Blog
View all of Hannah's posts on Platypus, The CASTAC Blog.
Laughter and Dreaming of Wins in Recovery
“Hannah, roll a six!,” Mahad, Alliance Wellness recovery program resident, pleaded as the game of Ludo intensified. Ludo, a strategic and competitive board game, was popular among Somali American men, such as Mahad, who were in the process of renegotiating their dependency on substance use. These men also held vivid memories of playing Ludo in Somalia and neighboring countries that they moved through as they sought asylum from Somalia’s civil war. I first heard about Ludo when I began fieldwork at Alliance Wellness, a recovery program for an East African communities that was developed out of community need in Bloomington, Minnesota. With increasing rates of opioid related addiction and deaths among Somali Americans, Yussuf Shafie recognized a need for culturally appropriate therapy and recovery programs for Somali Americans in Minnesota (Feshir 2019). (more…) (read more...)