Kiera Eckhardt

Kiera Eckhardt is an anthropologist whose interdisciplinary research examines how migration, citizenship, legal and bureaucratic systems, and institutional structures shape health, equity, and belonging. Her scholarship brings ethnographic and qualitative approaches into conversation with questions of governance, public policy, and social justice, with a particular focus on how institutional systems produce and negotiate inequality. Her current research examines refugee integration and migration governance in Ecuador, exploring how legal and bureaucratic processes shape access to rights, resources, and social belonging. Her community-engaged approach emphasizes collaborative scholarship that connects anthropological research to questions of policy and practice. Eckhardt is a graduate research fellow with the Neotropical Anthropology Laboratory and a PhD candidate in anthropology at the University of Kansas. She holds an MS in anthropology and applied community and economic development from Illinois State University and has professional and community-engaged experience with the Peace Corps in Ecuador and AmeriCorps VISTA.