Elizabeth Carpenter-Song, PhD

Research Professor, Department of Anthropology, Dartmouth College
Co-Investigator, Implementation Research Core, COBRE Center for Implementation Science

Dr. Carpenter-Song's research centers the lived experiences of rural community members experiencing poverty, housing insecurity, mental illness, and substance use. Through her work, she applies ethnographic and community-engaged research methods to learn about illness, suffering, and individuals' experience navigating complex care landscapes. In partnership with people with lived experience, direct service providers, and researchers, she aims to translate community members’ lived experiences in rural New England into actionable recommendations for change to improve health and wellbeing in the region. Her work at the intersection of anthropology and medicine strengthens the capacity of multiple research teams at Dartmouth by integrating rigorous qualitative methods into health services and implementation science research.

Dr. Carpenter-Song studied anthropology at Dartmouth College (A.B., 2001) and at Case Western Reserve University (Ph.D., 2007), and completed postdoctoral training in the Department of Global Health and Social Medicine at Harvard Medical School through a National Institute of Mental Health Fellowship (2007-08). Throughout her career, she has collaborated with colleagues in medicine, health services research, and public health.  As an educator, she has taught and mentored diverse student populations (e.g., undergraduates, MPH and medical students, doctoral students, and trainees) in qualitative and community-engaged research methods. She currently teaches the ethnographic methods course for Dartmouth undergraduates, co-leads the Dartmouth SYNERGY Community Engagement Module, and is Co-Director for the Dartmouth Healthcare Foundations Program.