Description: 
This project uses a combination of tools from Anthropology, Human Geography, and the Health Sciences to examine the ways in which cultural variation becomes embodied as health differentials within resource-poor urban neighborhoods.  A goal is to determine how cultural processes (such as social networks and household economic strategies) and cultural knowledge (such as Latino/a understandings of food, healing, and local environments) can be harnessed to build healthier and more just communities, even under conditions of rapid social, demographic, and economic change and uncertainty such as found in large, diverse cities like Phoenix. A particular focus is on the processes that relate to children's risk of obesity and diabetes, because the rates of these diseases are very high even among young children in this community and only appear to be growing.