Anthropology News
Associate Professor Tarek Elhaik appointed as co-director of CIFAR Research Program
Associate Professor Tarek Elhaik was appointed to co-direct a 5-year interdisciplinary research program composed of 16 international fellows: philosophers, historians, curators, artists, conservators, and anthropologists.
Distinguished Professor Emeritus Robert Bettinger elected a Fellow of the California Academy of Sciences in 2021
The Fellows of the California Academy of Sciences are a group of distinguished scientists, nominated and appointed in recognition of their outstanding contributions to the natural sciences.
Graduate student Patricio Cruz y Celis Peniche receives National Science Foundation (Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Grant).
RAPID: Coupled Contagion, Behavior-Change, and the Dynamics of Pro- and Anti-Social Behavior During the COVID-19 Pandemic
Graduate student Dana Al-Hindi receives National Science Foundation (Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Grant)
Doctoral Dissertation Research: Characterization and Functional Validation of the Genetic Architecture of Skin Pigmentation
Associate Professor Jeffrey Kahn selected to be a fellow at the Center for Advanced Studies in Behavioral Sciences at Stanford for 2022-23
CASBS Announces 2022-23 Fellows
New article shows social and ecological challenges to sleep in our primate relatives
A study of sleep in a troop of wild baboons reveals that catching up on lost sleep might be a luxury that wild animals cannot afford. (Carter Loftus/UC Davis/Max Planck Institute of Animal Behavior)
Distinguished Professor Suad Joseph receives ACLS grant for her project Decolonizing the Representation of Muslim Women in the Media: Training Next Generation Journalists
ACLS Announces the 2022 Luce/ACLS Program in Religion, Journalism & International Affairs Grantees
New article led by UC Davis archaeologists outlines paths for peopling of the Tibetan Plateau
Denisovans or Homo Sapiens: Who Were the First to Settle (Permanently) on the Tibetan Plateau? Extinct Denisovans Passed on Genes That Help Tibetans Survive High Altitudes by Kathleen Holder
Associate Professor, Brenna Henn receives grant for international projects.
UC Davis Global Affairs awarded grants to four College of Letters and Science faculty for international projects focused on renewable energy, biodesign, tuberculosis and democracy.
Professor Suzana Sawyer granted a Wenner-Gren Foundation Conference/Workshop Award
Workshop: "Mattering Matters" in the summer 2022.
Dr. John Darwent interview: ONGOING RESEARCH IS DIGGING INTO THE HISTORY of one of Alaska’s oldest archaeological sites. Take a look at an extraordinary artifact trove and the people that call it home.
Shaktoolik community and archeologist (Dr. John Darwent) collaboration uncovers the past.
National Academy of Sciences elects Distinguished Professor Emerita of Anthropology at UC Davis, Monique Borgerhoff Mulder in 2021
National Academy of Sciences Elects New Members — Including a Record Number of Women — and International Members
Jeffrey Kahn awarded the 2020 Herbert Jacob Book Prize
Islands of Sovereignty: Haitian Migration and the Borders of Empire (Chicago Series in Law and Society)
Gorilla family feuds: violent encounters between gorillas slow population growth - Dr. Damien Caillaud
Congratulations to Dr. Damien Caillaud and his colleagues with the Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund on their publication in Science Advances (11/4/2020).
Woman the hunter: Ancient Andean remains challenge old ideas of who speared big game - Dr. Randy Haas
Congratulations to Dr. Randy Haas, who is lead author on a new article (11/4/2020) that made the cover of Science Advances, "Female Hunters of the Early Americas."
Dr. Alan Klima awarded the 2020 Bateson Book Prize from the Society for Cultural Anthropology
Alan Klima, Miyarrka Media, and Savannah Shange were awarded the 2020 Gregory Batson Book Prizes from the Society for Cultural Anthropology. Dr. Klima’s award was for his Duke University Press (https://www.dukeupress.edu/ethnography-9) book Ethnography #9. As Alan Klima writes, “there are other possible starting places than the earnest realism of anthropological discourse as a method of critical thought.” In this experimental ethnography of capitalism, ghosts, and numbers in mid- and late-twentieth-century Thailand, Klima uses this provocation to deconstruct naive faith in the “real” and in the material in academic discourse that does not recognize that it is, itself, writing.
The UC Davis Majors Blog features Anthropology in their recent post!
With a major in anthropology, this article explores how students can go into user experience design, archaeology, research, marketing, forensic science, medicine, and so much more.
Dr. Teresa Steele awarded the Graduate Program Mentoring and Advising Award for 2020
Professor Teresa Steele was awarded the UC Davis Graduate Studies "Graduate Program Mentoring and Advising Award" for 2020 in recognition of her work to establish a professionalism seminar for first-year graduate students and her advocacy for diversity and inclusion:
Dr. Suad Joseph awarded the Edward A. Dickson Emeriti Professorship for 2020-21
Distinguished Professor Emeriti Suad Joseph was awarded the Edward A. Dickson Emeriti Professorship Award for 2020-2021. This endowed professorship will allow her to focus on a research project titled “Gendered and Cultural Framework for Refugee Mental Health: The Arab Crisis.”
Sara Watson Awarded an NSF Doctoral Dissertation Research Improvement Grant for 2020
Doctoral candidate Sara Watson awarded an NSF-DDRI for her research into the Middle and Later Stone Age through the analysis of stone technology in South Africa (co-advisor: Drs. Teresa Steele and Nicolas Zwyns)
Luis Flores-Blanco Awarded an IFEA Carlos Brignardello Research Grant for 2020
Doctoral student Luis Flores-Blanco awarded a "Carlos Brignardello" Research Grant from the Instituto Frances Estudios Andinos (IFEA) for his archaeological field work on the evolution of inequality and cooperation in the Peruvian Andes (advisor: Dr. Randy Haas)
Dr. Randy Haas Awarded UC Davis Hellman Fellowship for 2020
Dr. Haas awarded 2020 UC Davis Hellman Fellowship for his research project. "Human Adaptation to Extreme Environments: 9000-year-old DNA from the High Andes, Peru"
Dear UC Davis Anthropology Community Members:
We unequivocally condemn the murder of a Black man, George Floyd, by Minneapolis police officers, as well as other instances of racism and violence against people of color. We recognize that this murder isn’t an isolated event but instead reflects systematic racism that has deep roots in our society, including close to home in the 2018 shooting of Stephon Clark by officers from the Sacramento police department.
The "Immunity passport": new forms of biological citizenship post-COVID-19
Cristiana Giordano was awarded a seed grant from the COVID-19 Research Accelerator Funding Track Program for a project titled The "Immunity passport": new forms of biological citizenship post-COVID-19.
Dr. Naomi L. Martisius, who earned her Ph.D. in Anthropology in 2019, published dissertation research on Neandertal bone technology in Scientific Reports on May 8, 2020
Professor Teresa E. Steele and Dr. Mark N. Grote of the Department of Anthropology were co-authors on the research. Martisius and her colleagues used the technique of ZooMS, which analyzes tiny molecules of collagen from archaeological bones and can determine which animal the bone originated from. Importantly, this study did not destructively sample the bone tools, but the plastic surfaces of the bags and boxes that the bone tools were stored in, meaning that the technique was non-destructive. Martisius' research determined that Neandertals in southwest France were consistent in their choice of bison or aurochs ribs over reindeer ribs when making bone tools, even though reindeer were more available on the local landscape. This selectivity indicates that Neandertals understood the properties of the raw materials that they worked with.
Dr. Cristina Moya and Colleagues Awarded NSF RAPID Grant for Covid-19 Research
Congratulations to Dr, Moya and her colleagues (Jones, Kline, Smaldino, and Almquist) for their NSF-RAPID project: "Coupled Contagion, Behavior-Change, and the Dynamics of Pro- and Anti-Social Behavior During the COVID-19 Pandemic." This research will examine how people's health related behaviors (e.g., social distancing) change through the course of the pandemic, and how these in turn affect disease dynamics.
