MEREDITH REIFSCHNEIDER 

Assistant Professor, Anthropology, San Francisco State University

My recent project is located at the Salton Sea in Southern California’s Imperial Valley. This project is based within the Salton Sea community of Slab City, known as the “last free place” to residents. I conduct ethnoarchaeological research at Slab City to explore how the landscape of the Salton Sea both restrains and fosters unique opportunities for environmental and social justice. Since its creation in 1905, the Sea has been considered both an environmental threat and an economic opportunity in the imaginary of white settlers, conservationists, state officials, and private corporations. Today, state-funded redevelopment schemes frame the Sea as a disaster zone ripe for economic development. These plans potentially endanger communities who use the Sea’s landscape for innovative and sustainable forms of human habitation. In this project, I ask, how do discursive representations of the Sea as a ruined space overlook the viability of local communities? How do Slab City residents use material features of the landscape to address the impacts of climate change and promote sustainable practices? How might “green energy” projects threaten Slab City’s unregulated land use status and its continued existence? By attending to the materiality of ruins as capacity-building resources, this project addresses how ruins may embody opportunity zones for informal economies of sharing, cooperation, and emergent possibilities. I also ask how ruined landscapes may act as sites of significant moral and material contestation in late capitalism. 
 

Bio
Meredith Reifschneider is an Assistant Professor in Anthropology at San Francisco State University. She is an archaeologist who specializes in North American archaeology; her research bridges disciplinary fields, integrating method and theory from anthropology, archaeology, and history. Her research sites to date include the Caribbean island of St. Croix, the Presidio in the San Francisco Bay Area, and most recently, Southern California. Her recent book manuscript is titled, The Archaeology of Healthcare and Medicine.