Chaise LaDousa

Sidney Wertimer Professor for Excellence in Advising and Mentoring; Acting Chair and Professor of Anthropology; Director, Education Studies

Areas of Study

Name

Anthropology

Name

Education Studies

Contact

Phone

315-859-4109

Email Address

cladousa@hamilton.edu

Website

website

Location

Kirner-Johnson 245

Chaise LaDousa has conducted field research in North India studying languages and the role they play in education and India’s rapidly changing political economy. Another project has focused on the importance of fun in expressive culture in institutions of higher education in the United States. In addition to publishing numerous professional articles, he is the author of Mother Tongue and English: The Politics of Language at Indian Universities (co-authored with Christina P. Davis), published in 2027, Hindi Is Our Ground, English Is Our Sky: Education, Language and Social Class in Contemporary India, published in 2014, and Signs of Play: Faith, Race, and Sex in a College Town, published in 2011.

Recent Courses Taught

Cultural Anthropology
Digital Technology and Social Transformation
Ethnography of Literacy and Visual Language
Seminar in Linguistic Semiotics

Research Interests

Language and culture, education, political economy, gender, literacy, social change initiatives, India, United States

Distinctions

Sidney Wertimer Professor for Excellence in Advising and Mentoring, Hamilton College, 2025–2028
Christian A. Johnson Excellence in Teaching Professor, Hamilton College, 2020–2025
Dean’s Scholarly Achievement Award, Notable Year Achievement, Hamilton College, 2023
Dean’s Scholarly Achievement Award, Early Career Achievement, Hamilton College, 2014
Dean’s Scholarly Achievement Award, Notable Year Achievement, Hamilton College, 2012
Class of 1966 Career Development Award, Hamilton College, 2010
Dissertation Prize, Graduate School, Syracuse University, 1999
University Dissertation Fellowship, Syracuse University, 1998
National Science Foundation grant no. SBR-9629784 (dissertation research), 1996

Selected Publications

Mother Tongue and English: The Politics of Language at Indian Universities (with Christina P. Davis). 2027. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Making Worlds that Make Sense (edited with Bonnie Urciuoli). 2026. Helsinki: Suomalaisen Kirjallisuuden Seura (Finnish Literature Society).
"The Agency of 'Doing Something': Ethnographic Research on Subject Positions at Predominantly White Institutions" (with Chenyu Wang). 2024. Journal for the Anthropology of North America 27(1):4–18.
Language, Education, and Identity (edited with Christina P. Davis). 2022. New York: Routledge.
"South Asian Language Practices: Mother Tongue, Medium, and Media" (with Christina P. Davis). 2022. Annual Review of Anthropology 51:281–305.
Hindi Is Our Ground, English Is Our Sky: Education, Language, and Social Class in Contemporary India. New York: Berghahn Books. (Published in South Asia by Cambridge University Press).

House Signs and Collegiate Fun: Sex, Race, and Faith in a College Town. 2011. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.
“Everyone’s Got Room to Grow”: A Discourse Analysis of the Rhetoric of Service Learning in Higher Education. Learning and Teaching: The International Journal of Higher Education in the Social Sciences 6(2):pp tbd, 2013
“Language Management/Labor,” with Bonnie Urciuoli, Annual Review of Anthropology 42:175-90, 2013
“On Mother and Other Tongues: Sociolinguistics, Schools, and Language Ideology in Northern India. Language Sciences 32(6):602-14, 2010
“Of Nation and State: Language, School, and the Reproduction of Disparity in a North Indian City.” Anthropological Quarterly 80(4):925-60, 2007
“Witty House Name”: Visual Language, Interpretive Practice, and Uneven Agency in a Midwestern College Town.” Journal of American Folklore 120(478):445-81, 2007
“Liberalization, Privatization, Globalization, and Indian Schooling: An Interview with Krishna Kumar.” Globalisation, Societies, and Education 5(2):137-52, 2007
“The Discursive Malleability of an Identity: A Dialogic Approach to Language “Medium” Schooling in North India.” Journal of Linguistic Anthropology 16(1):36-57, 2006
“Disparate Markets: Language, Nation, and Education in North India.” American Ethnologist 32(3):460-78, 2005
“In the Mouth but not on the Map: Visions of Language and Their Enactment in the Hindi Belt.” Journal of Pragmatics 36(4):633-61, 2004
“Advertising in the Periphery: Languages and Schools in a North Indian City.” Language in Society 31(2):213-42, 2002

College Service

Program director, Education Studies, 2014-present
Linguistics program committee, 2014-present (program director, 2024 fall)
Committee on Appointments, 2021-2024 (chair 2023-2024)
Department chair, Anthropology, 2011-14 and 2018-2024
Hamilton College Institutional Review Board for the Protection of Human Subjects, 2007-10, 2014-17, and 2026 (spring) (chair spring 2026, 2014-15)
Hamilton College Appeals Board, 2015-18 (chair 2016-18)
Council on Academic Policy, 2010 (fall) and 2011-14
Levitt Council member (Anthropology Department representative), 2009-12 and 2022-2024
Self-study for accreditation standards, Middle States Commission on Higher Education, co-Chair of Student Admission and Retention and Student Support Services Subcommittee, 2009-11
Shared Governance Subcommittee, Hamilton College Strategic Planning Initiative, 2008-10
Library Committee, 2008-10

Professional Affiliations

American Anthropological Association (Society for Linguistic Anthropology)

Appointed to the Faculty

2006

Educational Background

Ph.D., Syracuse University
M.A., Syracuse University
B.A., University of Chicago