Anatomy of a Coup: An Indignant Inquiry into the Honduran Embodiment of Militarized Capitalism

Free and Open to the public!

Each talk will be different, join us for one or all three lectures:

1. Tuesday April 10^th: Doctors Without Borders vs. Pueblo Sin Fronteras: Framing the Embodiment of the 2009 Honduran Coup
2. Wednesday April 11^th: Edwin Espinal and the Casualties of War
3. Thursday April 12^th: Neoliberal Madness and the Order of Ongoing Traumatic Stress

This trio of unique talks analyze the embodied impacts of disaster capitalism using as a case study the June 28, 2009 military coup in Honduras that ousted President José Manuel Zelaya Rosales and, with the support of the Obama/Clinton administration, came to mark a decisive political turning point for the hemisphere. Based on extensive ethnographic fieldwork carried out in Honduras and Washington, DC in the years since the coup, the lectures provide new insights into the meanings and felt impacts of militarized neoliberal capitalism.

Pine uses ethnographic and statistical data to demonstrate how neoliberal reforms implemented in Honduras since the coup have been as damaging to the health and well-being of Honduras as the accompanying U.S.-supported militarized takeover of neighborhoods and hospitals nationwide. She argues that the coup model implemented in Honduras has provided a blueprint for the violent imposition of the neoliberal fascism-with devastating implications for health and human dignity-in Paraguay, Brazil, the United States, and beyond.

About Adrienne Pine:

Adrienne Pine is a militant medical anthropologist who has worked in Honduras, Mexico, Korea, the United States, Egypt, and Cuba. In her book, Working Hard, Drinking Hard: On Violence and Survival in Honduras, she argues that the symbolic violence resulting from Hondurans' embodied obsession with certain forms of 'real' violence is a necessary condition for the acceptance of violent forms of modernity and capitalism.

Dr. Pine has worked both outside and inside the academy to effect a more just world. Prior to and following the June 2009 military coup in Honduras, she has collaborated with numerous organizations and individuals to bring international attention to the Honduran struggle to halt U.S. government-supported state violence (in its multiple forms). She has also conducted extensive research on the impact of corporate healthcare and healthcare technologies on labor practices in the United States. Her current research focuses on the intersections of nursing and democracy in Honduras, Cuba, and the United States. Dr. Pine holds masters degrees in Anthropology & Demography from UC Berkeley, and a PhD in Anthropology from UC Berkeley.