Haley Millet

Haley Millet is a recipient of the Summer 2018 and Academic Year 2017-2018 Foreign Language and Area Studies (FLAS) Fellowship. The award provides undergraduate, graduate, and professional school students with financial support to develop fluency in less commonly taught languages (LCTLs) and expertise in the regions in which these languages are spoken. Every year the Center for Global Studies awards between 12-15 fellowships to UW students. Click here to learn more.

I am a masters candidate in the School of Public Health on the Global Health general track. Over the last seven years, I have worked with a nonprofit alongside a village in rural central Uganda doing participatory community development. This hands-on work has woven itself into my academic journey through studies in Public Health and Medical Anthropology. I am focused on the interaction between historical trauma and structural violence on indigenous and local knowledge, as well as the role of indigenous and local knowledge in global health and development work. My research has evolved around emergent issues salient to the communities I work with, namely the relationships between food sovereignty and security, agriculture, gender, and maternal and child health. Moving forward, I seek to continue applied and community-driven work around mental health and addiction in low resource settings, particularly in East Africa. The FLAS Language fellowship has supported my working knowledge of the Kiswahili language, which enables me to work more closely with communities in many East African settings. I hope to use these skills to better understand constructs around emotion and mental health in East African culture, and adapt existing treatment programs to include local knowledge and meet local needs.