Anthro Early On
Shapiro grew up in a suburb of Milwaukee with her parents, older brother and younger sister. As a child, she did not think much of the fact that her parents are Tibetan Buddhists. However, she has come to concede, “Maybe they had a bigger influence on me than I realized at the time. When I tell people about my parents, they look at me and say ‘Well, that explains a lot.’” Growing up in America with this atypical background piqued Shapiro’s interest in exploring other belief systems and cultures—a defining feature of the anthropological discipline.
Shapiro took her first anthropology course as a junior in high school. In retrospect, she realized that the high school course skimmed only the very surface of anthropology, but it was enough to spark her interest permanently.
“A lot of the questions I had been asking in relation to my other courses, I couldn’t take as far as I wanted,” she explained. “Anthropology seemed to me to be a discipline where you could really probe with those questions.”
Shapiro added, “I would have moments in the anthro course during the semester when everything came together. My courses began to relate to each other in some ways. Anthropology provides a holistic way of looking at things, and it opened a lot of interesting intellectual doors for me. I find it very compelling.”
As a result of her fascination, Shapiro entered college thinking of majoring in anthropology. She first went to the University of Michigan-Ann Arbor, which has one of the best anthropology departments in the country. She transferred to Amherst College after a year, however, longing to be on a smaller campus. The first anthropology course she took at Amherst was Anthropology of the Middle East with Assistant Professor of Anthropology Christopher Dole, and she loved it.
Professor of Anthropology Lawrence Babb, who served as Shapiro’s thesis advisor praised Shapiro’s intelligence and commitment to anthropology. “Lily is an excellent student. She is highly motivated, bright, engaged. I don’t have a bad word to say about her,” he said.
Interest in India
During her junior spring and summer, Shapiro travelled to India, participating in the South India Term Abroad. The program took place in the relatively small south Indian city of Madurai.
Shapiro said that what she remembers most from this experience is her host family. “They were just phenomenal,” she recalled. “They were very welcoming, and it wasn’t long before it just felt like home. After I finished school each afternoon, I would just want to go home for the rest of the day and be with them.”
Shapiro spent six weeks traveling with friends in India and Thailand, and then ended up staying in India over the summer to work on a project researching waterborne illness and water treatment practices. “Waterborne illness is a complicated problem,” she explained, “because many things will influence a community’s relationship to and understanding of water, health and disease. I basically did research investigating people’s water treatment practices and beliefs in order to make a public health intervention more successful.” For Shapiro, this research was the perfect application of her anthropologic knowledge to the humanitarian causes for which she cares so deeply.
Delving into Hinduism
Given Shapiro’s experiences in India, it came as no big surprise that she chose to write her thesis on issues concerning Hinduism. In her thesis, she examined the conflict between Hindus in the U.S. and American academics who study Hinduism. She also looked at the complicated relationship between Hindus in the U.S. and India, including their ties to nationalist politics.
“I compared the relationship of American academia to global systems of power and examined the insularity of American academics, which raises old and troubling questions about disparities between researcher and subject, suggestions of Orientalism and imperialism,” Shapiro explained. “I looked at the relationship between Hindus in the United States, Hindu nationalism—and thereby knowledge control and political violence—in India, and Orientalism, and its modern avatars in the form of religious studies departments in the U.S.”
Shapiro admitted that the relationships between these groups of people are complicated. “It’s tricky because none of these groups can be in any way uncomplicatedly identified as such. And it gets hard, too, because to equate, for example, the Hindus in the U.S. with nationalist political violence in India is to deny their claims any legitimacy,” she said. “By the same token, to equate contemporary academics with their ancestors, who contributed to the violence of colonialism, likewise denies them any right to speak about Hinduism in the first place. The point is, though, that it’s really a false dichotomy, where both sides are mutually constructing and maintain a complicated relationship with one another.”
Shapiro emphasized that her thesis was a very rewarding experience for her. “These issues have implications for anthropology and social sciences which are really interesting. They raise questions about who speaks for whom, politics and how the history of anthropology is represented.”
Babb agreed that Shapiro’s thesis was very interesting. “She did quite original research in connection to what she studied. She actively got in touch with a number of individuals. She took the trouble to contact people, interview scholars and put it together into an extremely interesting piece of work,” he said, adding, “It takes a certain amount of sensitivity, empathy and stamina to respond as thoroughly as she did.”
The process of completing her thesis elicited a diverse range of emotions for Shapiro. “There were points at which I hated it, there were points at which I felt depressed by it and there were points at which I loved it,” she said. “I felt as though I were on a roller coaster.”
Face AIDS
Shapiro’s interest in anthropology and social justice was not limited to the classroom. She co-founded, with Clare Howard ’10, an Amherst chapter of the organization Face AIDS, a national organization that raises money and awareness of AIDS in Africa.
There is a humorous story behind the inception of the Amherst chapter of Face AIDS, Shapiro revealed. Shapiro explained that she was “Facebook-stalked” by someone who requested that she start the group on campus. “Mountains Beyond Mountains,” was listed among her favorite books on her profile. Shapiro received the book from her high school anthropology teacher after winning an award. The book tells the story of Paul Farmer, a founder of Partners in Health. Howard, too, listed the book as one of her favorites on her profile, and was likewise contacted with a similar request via Facebook. Together, Shapiro and Howard responded to their altruistic “Facebook stalker” and shortly after formed the Amherst chapter of Face AIDS.
Shapiro feels very strongly about the issue of AIDS. “People here tend to be hopeless about AIDS,” she said. “The statistics are daunting. There are horrible stories. It is a tragedy.”
Yet, she maintains that there is cause for hope and, through Face AIDS, she has worked to inform people about the gravity of AIDS. “AIDS also offers a hopeful space to re-conceptualize ideas of equality and humanity, partly because it highlights social fault lines and inequalities that are easy to hide. AIDS is a means of confronting more things, via this one channel.”
A major event that Face AIDS organized last year was the AIDS Awareness Dinner. The dinner helped to highlight how AIDS negatively impacts even those who are not infected. “There are so many places where AIDS ties into other things. Face AIDS gives us a space to work with those things,” said Shapiro.
Jonathan Andicoechea ’09 spent many hours each day with Shapiro as they helped to organize the event. He praised her caring personality and genuine passion. “Lily was very instrumental and indispensable in planning the AIDS dinner. She is amazing and wonderful.”
Andicoechea added, “We talked about a lot of deep stuff. Whenever we talked about human rights or health care or poverty or global warming, she’d get very passionate about the subject. She provided the impetus for the AIDS dinner.”
Seeing Beyond the
Stereotypes
Besides engaging passionately in political and social activism, Shapiro dabbled in a few other activities while at Amherst, including the Amherst College Outing Club and the Vagina Monologues. She also enjoyed spending time with friends.
“Lily is optimistic and fun,” said her good friend Sarah Craver ’08. “She is incredibly intelligent. She listens openly to others’ opinions and also skillfully argues her own. When I’ve come to her with a problem or a question, she has managed to cheer me up while also acknowledging the importance of my feelings. I am so glad to be her friend.”
Shapiro is certain that what she will miss most about Amherst are the people. “The people I met, the friends I made, the hilarious or sad or intense conversations I had with them—I definitely will remember all of that,” she said.
“It seems that Amherst students often get a bad rap, and are said to be snobby and competitive,” she continued, after a moment of reflection. “Maybe that’s true on some level, but for me, I’ve always been pleasantly surprised by the genuine, down-to-earth and fascinating people here.”
When asked what advice she would give to Amherst underclassmen, Shapiro’s response could be expected, in light of how much she has done at Amherst. “Join an organization that you’re interested in to meet others who are interested, too. And take advantage of how much ridiculous money this school has.” Alluding to herself, she explained, “You can get money to fund a Face AIDS day and you can get money to study in India. Take advantage of the College’s money, and do something constructive with it.”
Continuing Activism
Eventually after graduation Shapiro plans on attending graduate school in anthropology. For the next few years, however, she hopes to engage in other interesting activities.
Shapiro took a job with Grassroots Campaign, where she will help to run a Democratic campaign office in Madison, Wis. until September, and then move to wherever the campaign needs her until November. After the presidential election, Shapiro plans on doing some traveling, likely around India, before spending her second year doing international volunteer or field work in India or Africa.
Ultimately, her dream profession is a mixture of her passions. “Ideally, I would love to have some combination of activism and research and teaching,” Shapiro said. Given her commitment and sincerity, her dream may well one day become reality.