Biography
A cultural and medical anthropologist, Dr. Reyes-Foster’s (she/her/ella) research examines the intersections of health, medicine, and society in a variety of different settings and regions, particularly the ways in which these intersections reproduce health disparities and social inequality. Her research foci include mental health, reproduction, coloniality, and gender. Her first book, Psychiatric Encounters, explores the experiences of patients and psychiatrists as they navigate the challenges of public psychiatric care in Mexico, closely examining the impact of the Mexican state’s neoliberal health reforms on how patients access care and doctors perform their duties. Engaging with madness, modernity, and identity, Psychiatric Encounters considers the enduring role of colonialism in the context of Mexico’s troubled contemporary mental health care institutions. Her second book, Sharing Milk, co-authored with UCF sociologist Shannon Carter, explores the emotional and material dimensions of the growing human milk sharing practice in the Global North and its implications for contemporary understandings of infant feeding in the US. Dr. Reyes-Foster has continued building on her previous research and currently has two projects in development, one on mental well-being and return migration from the US to Mexico, and another on maternal mental health, obstetric violence, and surgical birth in the US. Dr. Reyes-Foster has written about coloniality, identity, indigenous personhood and self, cultural constructions of health and illness, and the connections between religion, spiritual beliefs, and biomedicine. She received her PhD in Sociocultural Anthropology from the University of California, Berkeley, in 2011 and joined the UCF Faculty that same year. You can find her tweeting on @BeatriAnthro.
Research Specialization
- Anthropology of mental health
- Anthropology of reproduction and infant feeding
- coloniality of power
- critical medical anthropology
- Gender studies
- Feminist ethnography
- Latin America and the United States
Highlights
Please visit the News section for Dr. Reyes-Foster to find the latest information on her accomplishments.
May 2013:
Dr. Beatriz Reyes-Foster and Dr. Ty Matejowsky wrote a guest column piece for the Orlando Sentinel called, “Anthropologists should do a better job of promoting their field.” http://news.cos.ucf.edu/ucf-professors-write-guest-column-piece-for-the-orlando-sentinel/
August 2012:
Dr. Beatriz Reyes-Foster was chosen to serve as a Faculty Fellow with the Center for Success of Women Faculty for the 2012-2013 academic year. She organized workshops on life-work balance for UCF women faculty, mentored other women faculty on life-work balance, and generally promoted women faculty successes at UCF.
Working with Dr. Reyes-Foster
Dr. Reyes-Foster mentors graduate and undergraduate students in developing independent research projects on a wide range of subjects and locations, including facilitating field studies for those interested in conducting research in Mexico. She is also open to incorporating student independent research projects into her broader ongoing research projects. Dr. Reyes-Foster works with each of her students individually in developing interesting and rigorous research questions, designing appropriate methodologies, and frequent consultation during the data gathering and interpretation phases. She supports student dissemination of research via posters, conference presentations, and article publication. She also closely advises and assists students with PhD and MA program applications. Students may contact Dr. Reyes-Foster at beatriz.reyes-foster@ucf.edu to discuss their interests.
Dr. Reyes-Foster is looking for graduate students with an interest in:
- Sociocultural anthropology
- Medical anthropology
- Feminist ethnography
- Indigenous Studies
- Gender
- Latinx people and Latin American immigrants
- Race and social inequality
- Mexico and Latin America
- Pregnancy, birth, and postpartum period
- Mental health
- Doctors and Medicine
- Religion
Examples of research projects conducted by Dr. Reyes-Foster’s students:
- Bi+ experiences of mental well-being in the US
- Indigenous students and higher education in Yucatan, Mexico
- Tarot and healing
- Farmworker health
- Mental health experiences of theme park employees
- Illness narratives and endometriosis
- Domestic employees in Lima, Peru
