Dr. Simmons is an Associate Professor in the departments of Anthropology and Health Promotion, Education and Behavior at the University of South Carolina. David received his PhD from Michigan State University (2002) and completed a three-year National Science Foundation Postdoc at Harvard Medical School in the Department of Social Medicine, Program in Infectious Disease and Social Change (2002-2005). David is an active member of the American Anthropological Association (where he serves as President of the Association of Black Anthropologists), is on the Board of Directors for the South Carolina TB Association
David’s primary research explores the dynamic and often conflicting relationship between vernacular forms of medicine and biomedicine. Underlying this broad project is an interest in how power comes to shape the terms of engagement, and indeed the very meanings, of health, healing, and therapeutic practice among differently positioned actors. In this regard, he is interested in epistemic violence—that is how biomedicine establishes its truth claims on healing efficacy and how subaltern forms of healing respond to this process.