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Local angles: Chapel Hill; Encino, Calif.

UNC's Osterweil wins NSF research fellowship, will study resistance to economic globalization

By L.J. TOLER
UNC News Services

CHAPEL HILL -- Michal Osterweil, a student in the anthropology doctoral program at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, has won a National Science Foundation (NSF) Graduate Research Fellowship of approximately $33,000 a year for three years. She will use the award to continue her studies at UNC, and possibly also study in England.

Osterweil will research how institutions including the World Bank and various social movements influence globalization -- the increasing intertwining of cultures, economies and other entities worldwide. She hopes to develop an understanding of how the diverse voices of policy-makers, governments, social movements, non-governmental organizations and others contest and contribute to making policies on globalization, with an eye toward how they might foster social justice and human rights in the process.

"I hope that by making visible the power-laden struggles over creation, maintenance and production of specific policies and the conditions under which change is attained, my work will facilitate more effective efforts at democratizing the policy-making processes that define the terms of globalization," said Osterweil, whose first name is pronounced "mi-KAHL."

Osterweil graduated with highest honors from UNC in May 2001 with a bachelor's degree in cultural studies. She is the daughter of Dan and Erna Osterweil of 4955 Odessa Ave., Encino, Calif. A graduate of Encino's Harvard Westlake High School in 1997, she won a Morehead Scholarship to UNC, a four-year merit award that covers all undergraduate expenses plus summer learning and service activities. She was inducted into Phi Beta Kappa, the nation's most prestigious honorary society, and made the dean's list every semester

"Michal's outstanding academic achievements at Carolina leave no doubt that she will discover valuable insights through the NSF fellowship," said Dr. Robert Greenberg, director of UNC's Office of Distinguished Scholarships and Intellectual Life. "Seeking a humanities fellowship from NSF is extremely competitive, so this award a very special honor for Michal."

Already, Osterweil has had experience researching social movements and social and political change. Studying abroad in Chile in the spring of her sophomore year, she studied activism in two different generations of college student leaders: Those who opposed the dictatorship of Gen. Augusto Pinochet in the 1980s, contributing to the movement that brought on its collapse, and today's student leaders, who appear relatively unconcerned about politics and activism.

"My research discovered that the restructuring of higher education, the elimination of public debate and the conscious elimination of academic disciplines that emphasize critical thought all played a major role in de-politicizing the nation's youth," she said.

That summer, Osterweil conducted similar research in Havana, and in summer 2000, she traveled through India, studying non-governmental approaches to ending the poverty of women and other marginalized groups. Last summer she worked at the Society for International Development in Rome, writing for its journal and helping with research for a paper on women's movements and globalization.

Also through UNC, she facilitated community service work by students in the course "Race, Poverty and Politics" as part of the student-run APPLES service-learning program. She created and taught the course "Dealing with Difference: Identity, Democracy and Transformational Politics."

"My field research and work in a variety of disciplines have equipped me with the experience, willingness and capacity to approach the crucial issues of social and political change with a variety of tools, questions and the sincere belief that such knowledge will contribute to their effectiveness," Osterweil said.

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Photo URL: http://www.unc.edu/news/pics/students/osterwail_michal.jpg

Contact: Michal Osterweil, 919-225-3433, 919-933-5974, osterwei@email.unc.edu; Dr. Robert Greenberg, 919-843-7764 or 919-962-7550