Kathy Smith-Wenning

Applied Medical Anthropologist & Health Advocate

Kathy Smith-Wenning is an applied medical anthropologist and registered respiratory therapist whose work bridges bedside care and fieldwork in multicultural communities. She studies cross-cultural health practices between Oaxaca, Mexico and New Jersey, with a focus on linguistically isolated communities, unaccompanied minors, immigrant families, and justice-involved women.

Kathy’s fieldwork in Oaxaca City immerses her in indigenous Mixtec and Zapotec communities, where she collaborates closely with families to understand how culture shapes health, illness, and healing. In New Jersey, she extends this work to identify linguistically isolated communities, including a large Oaxacan diaspora, examining how language, migration, and access to care intersects.

She teaches cultural anthropology at Middlesex College (NJ) and Bristol Community College (MA), where she brings real-world ethnographic experience into the classroom and prepares students to work thoughtfully in diverse settings. Parallel to her academic work, Kathy practices as a per diem respiratory therapist at Children’s Specialized Hospital (NJ), drawing on a career that began in pediatric/neonatal respiratory care.

Kathy also advances advocacy beyond clinical and classroom settings. She serves as an Ambassador for the New Jersey Reentry Corporation’s Women’s Reentry Commission and as a Volunteer Child Advocate with the Young Center for Immigrant Children’s Rights, supporting some of the most vulnerable children in the immigration system. Across all of her roles, her work is anchored in the Social Determinants of Health, especially as they affect justice-involved women, unaccompanied minors, and New Jersey’s immigrant communities.