Anthropology is the comparative study of human diversity and distinctiveness through time and across the world.
At the University of Wisconsin-Madison, anthropology consists of several subfields, including: archaeology, biological anthropology and sociocultural anthropology.
Comic actor and writer Anders Holm (BA’03, History) will be the speaker for spring commencement ceremonies on May 17, 18 and 19. As a relatively recent graduate, Holm, 31, thinks he can deliver a relevant message to the new grads. “I can tell them about the first 10 years out of college, what I think I did [...]
The 2013 Academic Staff Excellence Awards honor staff members representing a broad spectrum of fields and duties at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Ten individuals have been selected to receive recognition for their achievements in leadership, public service, research, teaching and overall excellence. Two recipients are from the College of Letters & Science. This year, a [...]
Protecting Culture From Mines, Wars, Dams and Other Threats J. Mark Kenoyer stands on a windswept peak in Logar Province in eastern Afghanistan, his head wrapped in a traditional scarf against the harsh sun. As he chats in a mixture of Urdu and Pashto with an Afghan archaeologist, it’s easy to see why documentarian Brent [...]
You can toss away that paper; Twitter just became your study guide. To prepare for the first midterm in Shawn Peters‘ class, students tweeted their notes about utilitarianism, social justice and other themes addressed in the HBO series “The Wire.” #Wire275 is one of almost a dozen academic ventures into the “Twittersphere” on campus. Twitter is changing the way [...]
Two faculty members from the College of Letters & Science are at the forefront of the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s first steps into the world of Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs). UW-Madison announced on Wednesday that it will offer four pilot courses in partnership with the online learning company Coursera. Two of the courses are scheduled [...]
For decades, archaeologists have debated how farming spread to Stone Age Europe, setting the stage for the rise of Western civilization. Now, new data gleaned from the teeth of prehistoric farmers and the hunter-gatherers with whom they briefly overlapped shows that agriculture was introduced to Central Europe from the Near East by colonizers who brought [...]
Perched on a corner of a table in his biological anthropology lab, John Hawks is surrounded by an array of human skulls, jaws and skeletons – and a film crew complete with lights, camera and a microphone dangling over his head. Last spring a crew for the public television series NOVA visited Hawks, a University [...]
At first glance, the northern muriqui monkey is a prime conservation success story. These Brazilian primates are critically endangered, but in the past 30 years a population on a private reserve has grown from just 60 individuals to some 300, now comprising almost a third of the total remaining animals. As the population grows, though, [...]
Fishing in the Neighborhood has grown into a statewide program in its second summer, with five clubs across Wisconsin.
Anthropology Professor J. Mark Kenoyer’s Ancient Technology and Invention class is one of a kind.
It took a trip halfway around the world to bring two University of Wisconsin-Madison scientists together.
Five UW-Madison students and one recent graduate are spending five weeks at an archaeological dig in Israel this summer.
Each year, the College of Letters & Science recognizes outstanding faculty and staff in the college with various awards. We are proud to announce the 2012 recipients, listed below. Academic Advising Awards: L&S Academic Advising Award: Anna Tumarkin, Undergraduate Advisor in Slavic Languages L&S Faculty Advising Award: Professor Patricia Rosenmeyer, Undergrad and Graduate Advisor in [...]
Register now! Against a backdrop of extraordinary global economic, environmental and social challenges, the sixth annual Nelson Institute Earth Day Conference will examine issues related to consumption and growth, economic and environmental sustainability, quality of life and happiness. Envisioning a Fairer Future: Sustainability, Security and Happiness on a Finite [...]
The College of Letters & Science is proud to announce that eight L&S faculty members received 2012 Romnes Fellowships. The Romnes awards recognize exceptional faculty members who have earned tenure within the last four years. Selected by a Graduate School committee, winners receive an unrestricted $50,000 award for research, supported by the Wisconsin Alumni Research [...]
If you are a male human, nothing puts a damper on romantic success like having your mother in tow. If you are a male northern muriqui monkey, however, mom’s presence may be your best bet to find and successfully mate with just the right girl at the right time.
Eleven distinguished faculty members have received named professorships, some of the highest honors for established faculty. L&S is proud to count eight of the faculty members in the L&S community: Susan Coppersmith, Steven Durlauf, Gregg Mitman and Karen Strier have been named Vilas Professors Stephen Carpenter, Steve J. Stern, Dan Hausman were named Hilldale Professors. [...]
Congratulations to Professor Kirin Narayan of the Department of Anthropology, who was appointed to the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation Standing Committee responsible for the final selection of Guggenheim fellows each year.
In the News: Professor J. Mark Kenoyer Elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences – Some of the world’s most accomplished leaders from academia, business, public affairs, the humanities, and the arts have been elected members of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and joining them this year is UW-Madison professor Jonathan Mark Kenoyer.
Two UW-Madison faculty from the College of Letters & Science are among a list of pre-eminent scholars and leaders newly elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. The L&S honorees are archaeologist J. Mark Kenoyer and economics professor Steven N. Durlauf who are joined by two additional UW-Madison Professors Juan J. de Pablo (Engineering) and Marvin P. Wickens (Biochemistry).
UW-Madison prof disputes hype over “gay caveman” (Wisconsin State Journal) John Hawks, a UW-Madison associate professor of anthropology, was one of several scientists who disputed news reports that the “first homosexual caveman” was found in Prague.
Eleven outstanding faculty members from UW-Madison have been named winners of this year’s Kellett Mid-Career Awards — with six L&S faculty members winning the award.
The Wisconsin Alumni Association is proud to honor eight alumni in 2011 with the 75th Distinguished Alumni Award — the highest honor bestowed by the Wisconsin Alumni Association. Three alumni of the College of Letters & Science were among the eight recipients.
Science Pub organizer taps scientists for informal gatherings mixed with beers (March 6, 2011) – It’s not exactly a scientific formula but Skip Evans has discovered that if you combine a scientist, good beer, and a crowd of curious people, you come up with a very interesting Sunday afternoon … (Wisconsin State Journal). For more information visit: http://madsciencepub.org/
[2011poster1] Forget the finches and orchids. UW-Madison’s 2011 Darwin Day celebration is all about you, Homo sapiens. This year’s celebration of Charles Darwin’s Feb. 12 birthday and impact on our understanding of the world will jump from one to three days, expanding its workshop for teachers, adding a film and filling the Wisconsin Institutes for Discovery with a hands-on tree of life science activity.
Anthropology Professor Claire Wendland has won a post-PhD research grant from the Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research to support additional archive-based research for her current project on narratives of maternal death in Malawi.
Emiko Ohnuki-Tierney, William F. Vilas Professor, was chosen as Fellow of the newly created L’Institut d’Etudes Avancées-Paris (Institute for Advanced Study-Paris) in order to continue her work on “Aesthetic and Warfare in Comparative Perspective.” She began the project as The Distinguished Chair of Modern Culture at the Library of Congress which she served in 2009. [...]
Professor Claire Wendland (Anthropology, obstetrics & gynecology, and medical history and bioethics) has just published A Heart for the Work: Journeys through an African Medical School (University of Chicago Press, 2010). Anthropologists and other social scientists have published many valuable ethnographies of medical training over the past fifty yearsbut all of the major research was [...]
Karen B. Strier, Hilldale Professor & Irven DeVore Professor of Anthrpology, has been awarded the Distinguished Primatologist Award for 2010 from the American Society of Primatologists. This is the most important award conferred by the society.
What roles do our genes play in the future of mankind?
UW-Madison Anthropology Professor John Hawks weighs in on National Public Radio’s All Things Considered: ‘Un-Natural Selection: Human Evolution’s Next Steps’ (Sept. 6, 2010)
‘High in the Andes, Keeping an Incan Mystery Alive’ (New York Times) Features the collaborative research by UW-Madison Anthropologist Frank Salomon — and is a testimony to the great support from Latin American, Caribbean, and Iberian Studies Program.
This year, 10 alumni of the College of Letters & Science were named Forward Under 40 honorees. Of the twelve honorees this year, ten graduated with liberal arts degrees.
UW-Madison alumnus Dr. Nasser Abufarha (MA’03, Anthropology; PhD’06, Anthropology with a minor in Urban & Regional Planning) has been invited by President Obama to the Presidential Summit on Entrepreneurship April 26–27 in Washington.
Each year, the Committee on Distinguished Teaching Awards honors faculty for teaching excellence.
The University of Wisconsin Digital Collections (UWDC) is pleased to announce its recent collaboration with Emiko Ohnuki-Tierney…
Anthropologist John Hawks talks about recent human evolution, especially of our ability to digest lactose…
On Saturday, October 9, three faculty members from the University of Wisconsin-Madison — two from the College of Letters & Science — were inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
Recently, the Department of Anthropology initiated renovations to improve care and preservation of objects and archives.
