Photo by Jon Chase PROFESSOR JAMES L. WATSON William James Hall, Room 370 (third floor) 33 Kirkland Street Cambridge, MA 02138 (617) 49501415 jwatson@wjh.harvard.edu Dr. Watson is Fairbank Professor of Chinese Society and Professor of Anthropology.  B.A. University of Iowa (Chinese Studies), 1965 Ph.D. University of California, Berkeley (Anthropology), 1972 Prior to his move to Harvard in 1989, Prof. Watson taught at the University of London (School of Oriental and African Studies) and the University of Pittsburgh. He is Past-President (2003-2004) of the Association for Asian Studies and Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.  He was appointed Harvard College Professor (2003-2008) in recognition of services to undergraduate teaching. Prof. Watson is an ethnographer who has spent over 30 years working in south China, primarily in villages (Guangdong, Jiangxi, and the Hong Kong region).  He learned to speak country Cantonese in the Hong Kong New Territories during the late 1960s and has subsequently worked in many parts of the People’s Republic (using Mandarin). His research has focused on Chinese emigrants to London, ancestor worship and popular religion, family life and village organization, food systems, and the emergence of a post-socialist culture in the PRC.  In recent years Prof. Watson has worked with graduate students in Harvard’s Department of Anthropology to investigate the impact of transnational food industries and genetically modified food in East Asia, Europe, and Russia. Read a magazine profile of Prof. Watson and his research Listen to an interview on NPR's "The Connection" Listen to N.Y. Times interview on Chinese Women's Lives