Steven Folmar

About Steven Folmar

Steve Folmar is an Anthropologist on faculty at Wake Forest University in North Carolina. He launched his ethnographic research in Nepal in 1979 and continues to do so today. For the past 24 years, he has concentrated on the life experiences of Dalit people, mainly in Lamjung District, but also in Lalitpur, Syangja and Kaski. His work has included investigations of the contribution of Dalit people to Village Tourism, Dalit identity and livelihood, Dalit identity politics, mental health and the effects of the 2015 earthquake on Dalit lives. Most recently he has attempted to illuminate the health seeking challenges facing Dalit and other marginalized people in Lamjung and the barriers to healthcare facing them. That project has evolved into a modest but significant effort to raise funds to support their efforts to improve their health, livelihood and other aspects of life. Folmar’s publications include: Identity Politics among Dalits in Nepal; Being, Becoming, Belonging: Revisiting the Effects of Caste and Disaster on the Mental Health of Dalits in Nepal and; Addressing Dalit Wellbeing through Counter Ritual (forthcoming). In 2023, he organized the conference The Quest for Dignity. Dalit Rights and Dignity; Past, Present and Future at Wake Forest University. He is also co-organizer of the Global Dialogue for Dalit Studies in South Asia. Folmar has committed the last 2 1/2 decades of his career to Nepal’s Dalit people with the purpose of helping them move forward into a caste-free society.