Nikketa Burges is a second-year graduate student in Medical Anthropology whose work focuses on harm reduction and unsheltered homelessness. Her paper on morbidity and mortality linked to encampment sweeps, written in Fall 2023, was edited, and published in Deceleration in May 2024. She has presented on her work assisting Marty Otañez’s graphic novel which has grown from his COMIRB-approved Naloxone Champions project and spoke at last fall’s CLAS Mixed Tape event on arts- and activism-based anthropology. Nikketa is also a founding member of a VA Harm Reduction Advisory Board, which brings together VA pharmacists and Veterans who use drugs to advocate for better harm reduction policies. This spring, she will be speaking at the Society for Applied Anthropology (SfAA) meeting in Portland about zines as a tool for activist and arts-based anthropology.
