Department Homepage
The College of Arts & Sciences
Department of Anthropology in the news recently:Alumna shares career path with pre-vet students, A&S CommunicationsBulletin immerses readers in Southeast Asian cultures, Cornell ChronicleWhat's chocolate, and how does its chemistry inspire such cravings?, Chemical & Engineering News Lessons we can learn from an exchange of dolls,...
The Department of Anthropology is pleased to announce the 2016-17 recipients of the Freedman Awards for Undergraduate Research in Anthropology and our first Engaged Learning in Anthropology Scholarships. Mikaela Hamilton, Samantha Stern, Annika Tomson, and Eugenia Xiao received Freedman Awards, funded by an endowment established by Randy ‘75 and...
This fall, the Department of Anthropology will launch a new curriculum in engaged learning. Three new courses have been designed to help students make the most of off-campus experiences whether they are part of a program of study abroad, service learning, or engaged research and teaching. Students will engage with the diverse community on campus...
The Department of Anthropology at Cornell joined with more than 180 registered organizations from all over the world in celebrating Anthropology Day on February 16th. World Anthropology Day is organized by the American Anthropological Association, the largest professional organization of anthropologists dedicated to advancing human understanding...
I spent thirty-two months in Finland conducting anthropological fieldwork among experts developing what might become the world's first permanent underground dump for high-level nuclear waste. There I recorded around 120 open-ended interviews with geologists, managers, chemists, physicists, lawyers, activists, politicians, banking professionals,...
In the face of global ecological challenges such as climate change and mass extinction of species, preservation of plant genetic resources through ex-situ seed banking has become central to contemporary conservation efforts during the last decade. Operating at the intersections of environmental anthropology, science and technology studies, and...
Education as practice, process and possibility has always fascinated me. It is how people teach, learn and deliberate in everyday life and in diverse settings including schools, communities and families, and across borders. It involves continuity and change in the context of political, cultural and global transformations and inequalities. I...
Anthropology PhD Candidate Elena Guzman was awarded a Society for the Humanities Graduate Research Grant and an Einaudi Travel research grant for her project: Performances on the Fringes: Cross Border Bodies and Dialogues between Haiti and Dominican Republic. Please see Elena's update on this project below:Currently I am writing my...
About 300 students, faculty and staff came to Wee Stinky Glen near the Cornell Store Dec. 8 to plant 1,500 flower bulbs and paper notes about what they want to grow and care for in the coming months, in a community art project called Planting Futures.The Qualities of Life working group of the Mario Einaudi Center for International Studies, led...
In this historical moment, it is necessary to re-evaluate how humans are part of ecologies, both materially and discursively. “Political ecology” has often been synonymous with Marxian approaches to social theory around resource use, informing critiques of land use change and resource exploitation. However, as I've argued in my public scholarship...
Charis Boke, PhD candidate in the Department of Anthropology at Cornell, was awarded a grant from the Wood Institute at the Library of the College of Physicians of Philadelphia. Charis will use this grant, along with a grant from the American Studies Program at Cornell, to conduct archival research at The Wood Institute in January, 2017. While...
The Department of Anthropology's statement on diversity and freedom of expression:"Anthropology's mission is to foster global understanding and mutual respect by traversing barriers of culture, language, history, and social difference. Over the last year, such barriers have become more deeply entrenched in the U.S. and in other parts of the...
In the global campaign against female genital mutilation (FGM), many activists aggressively condemn cutting while depicting it as an intractable problem. Anthropologists have shown, however, that for many women FGM is a meaningful and valued practice.New research by anthropologist Saida Hodzic challenges the idea that cutting is intractable and...
Stacey Langwick, Associate Professor in the Department of Anthropology, leads an interdisciplinary group of anthropologists, artists, and global health studies scholars through the Mario Einaudi Center for International Studies, known as the Qualities of Life working group. They are organizing a community art project entitled "Planting Futures"...
In July 2016, Dr. Matthew Velasco joined the Department of Anthropology as a Mellon Diversity Postdoctoral Associate and next Fall he will take up the position of Assistant Professor of Anthropology. In this role, Velasco will help strengthen links among departmental research interests in archaeology, biological anthropology, and medical...
Professor Jonathan Boyarin was elected a Fellow of the American Academy for Jewish Research Anthropology Professors Awarded Internationalizing the Cornell Curriculum Grants Professor LaBennett Awarded Humanities Research Grant Anthropology received Engaged Curriculum Grant - Gateways to International Learning: An Anthropology...
Cornell Anthropology in the news...Smaller Nuclear Weapons And Power Plants Under Development Hold Promise And Peril , Forbes Magazine Beyond Stereotypes: CASA-Seville, Global Cornell On men and makeup: CoverGirl announces first ‘CoverBoy', The Christian Science Monitor Anthropologist Robert Smith, Japan scholar, dies at age 89, Cornell...
Professors Jane Fajans, David Holmberg, and Kathryn March are retiring. The Department of Anthropology gathered in May to celebrate their outstanding contributions to the department and to the discipline of anthropology.Professor Fajans arrived at Cornell in 1989 as an assistant professor, just a few years removed from her PhD at Stanford. Her...
Anthropology is the study of human races, origins, societies, and cultures. At Cornell, anthropology majors are preparing for many professions. Majors design their own program of study in consultation with their advisor. The major and minor in Anthropology can take you down myriad pathways, some planned, others surprising. The following are...
The American Anthropological Association Annual Meeting will be held at the Minneapolis Convention Center in Minneapolis, Minnesota from November 16–20, 2016. Many faculty and graduate students from the Department of Anthropology at Cornell are planning to attend. The theme for the conference is "Evidence, Accident, Discovery." The annual...
We are pleased to introduce the leadership team for Cornell Anthropology Exchange:President: Christian Brickhouse Vice President: Mikaela Hamilton Treasurer: Cesca LaPastaPublic Relations Chair: Gaela LaPasta CAE is a student organization that provides the Cornell community with an anthropological view of the world; enhances students’...
The Department of Anthropology was saddened to learn of the passing of Robert J. Smith. Our colleague, Robert J. Smith, Goldwin Smith Professor of Anthropology Emeritus, passed away last night. Bob began his career as an anthropologist in 1949 when he joined one of the first cohorts to enroll in what was then Cornell's Department of...
My research has long been shaped by an interest in how our material world—that vast array of landscapes and places, objects and things that shadow our every move—shapes our past, present, and future. Hence my interest in archaeology, as the discipline of things, was set within an abiding fascination with the forces that shape our social, and...
My previous research focused upon various forms of Tamil and Hindu displacement, revivalism, and identity politics in Malaysia, and to a lesser extent, India. Between 2003-2009, I conducted research upon Tamil plantation communities facing the uncertainties of retrenchment and relocation. This research subsequently led me to investigate...
My abiding research, writing and teaching obsessions arose in rural Farmingdale, New Jersey, where I spent my childhood among a community of Jewish chicken farmers. That community, made up of refugees, immigrants, their children and grandchildren, offered a warm if contentious haven, but it dissolved in the course of the post-World War II building...