DIRECTOR AND FACULTY CHAIR
Stephanie Sadre-Orafai
Stephanie Sadre-Orafai is Associate Professor of Anthropology at the University of Cincinnati, where she has served as Director and Faculty Chair for the Taft Research Center since August 2024. Prior to this, she served as Taft Professor of Social Justice, Director of Undergraduate Studies for the Anthropology and Archaeology programs, and Co-Director of the Critical Visions program, a joint effort between faculty in the College of Design, Architecture, Art, and Planning and College of Arts and Sciences, aimed at teaching students how to effectively combine critical theory and social analysis with art, media, and design practice that she established with Jordan Tate in 2011.
Throughout her career Dr. Sadre-Orafai has pursued multidisciplinary, interdisciplinary, and collaborative projects that blend research and creative practice, resulting in public-facing video, curatorial, and experimental design work. Trained as a sociocultural and visual anthropologist, her own research explores emerging forms of expertise, discourses of realness, and the intersection of race, language, and visual practices in aesthetic industries. Using ethnographic methods, she analyzes how experts come to know, name, and represent people as types, tracing the relationship between these forms of expertise and how US publics see and imagine difference and inequality. Her current research probes the porous boundary between human and non-human types (including fashion models, typefaces, and natural history specimens) to better understand the mutually vivifying and dehumanizing potential of becoming a type and the political stakes and unexpected possibilities of objectification. She co-edited and co-led the redesign of Visual Anthropology Review, the journal of the Society for Visual Anthropology, from 2018–2021, and co-founded the Collective for Multimodal Makers, Publishers, Collaborators, and Teachers, another SVA initiative, in 2023. You can read more about her research here.
sadreose@ucmail.uc.edu 
513.556.3569
BUSINESS MANAGER
Sally Le Yang
Sally Yang serves as the Business Manager for the Taft Research Center. Sally formerly worked at Utah State University, where she lead operations and financial management duties, grants and contracts (in excess of $12 million), as well as other financial duties for the Department of Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering. Sally holds an MA in Workforce Development from the Ohio State University and has passed all the four sections of the Uniform Certified Public Accountant (CPA) Exam.
yang2l7@ucmail.uc.edu 
513.558.7368
PROGRAM DIRECTOR
Sean Keating-Crawford
Sean Keating-Crawford serves as the Program Director for the Taft Research Center. Prior to this, he served as Program Manager, Program Coordinator, and a Graduate Assistant at TAFT. Sean earned an M.A. in Philosophy from the University of Wisconsin - Milwaukee.
sean.keating@ucmail.uc.edu 513.558.7541
DIGITAL MARKETING SPECIALIST
Rikki Reese
Rikki is the newest addition to the Taft Research Center staff. She started her marketing career in the gaming and casinos industry, previously working for PENN Entertainment in a fast-track corporate management program and Churchill Downs Incorporated as a property-level Marketing Manager. Rikki holds a BA in Strategic Communication and American Studies from Miami University of Ohio and is eager to continue her education at the University of Cincinnati in the MBA program.
reeser4@ucmail.uc.edu 513.556.0675
GRADUATE ASSISTANTS
Ruqeya Afshan, MA in Sociology and MA student in Anthropology
afshanra@mail.uc.edu
Fatemeh Rezaei, MFA and MA student in Women's, Gender, and Sexuality Studies
rezaeifh@mail.uc.edu
Prateek Raj Srivastava, Ph.D student in Political Science with concentrations in International Relations and Feminist Comparative International Politics
srivaspe@mail.uc.edu
Marie-Rose Tshite, Ph.D student in Political Science with a concentration in Feminist Comparative International Politics
tshitema@mail.uc.edu