Candice M. Lowe Swift

Candice Lowe Swift’s research interests include Indian Ocean worlds, African diasporas in Asia, Anthropologies of and for Education, and how the field of anthropology can contribute to thinking about inclusion, belonging, and transformative educational practice. Working in Mauritius as a lead researcher for the Ministry of Arts and Culture, she contributed directly to the inscription of Le Morne Brabant Mountain on the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization's (UNESCO’s) World Heritage List. Extending this work on education and heritage, she co-edited “Le Morne Cultural Landscape: History, Symbolism, and Tradition” (2010) with Mauritian scholars. Once she completed this volume, she continued to develop her interest in anthropology and education, co-editing “Teaching Food and Culture” (2016), and more recently, she co-edited “Academic Belonging in Higher Education,” published by Routledge in December of 2023. 

Lowe Swift is the current Faculty Director of Teaching Development and she has served in a number of administrative roles at the College. Recent roles have included Liaison to the President for Race and Inclusion and Co-Principal Investigator on a Mellon Foundation Grant to develop mechanisms for addressing challenges faced by historically underrepresented students. Successful funding of that proposal allowed Vassar College to launch the Engaged Pluralism Initiative (EPI), which Candice directed for the first 3.5 years. Lowe Swift also initiated, co-founded, and directed the Summer Immersion in the Liberal Arts, which was Vassar’s first credit-bearing summer bridge program for students from historically underrepresented backgrounds. Lowe Swift served on the presidentially appointed committee to institutionalize EPI into EP at the College. She also serves on non-profits boards in the broader community, including Omprakash Edge and the Haiti Project.