Anthropology is the scientific study of humanity, concerned with human behavior, human biology, cultures, societies, and linguistics, in both the present and past, including past human species. Social anthropology studies patterns of behavior, while cultural anthropology studies cultural meaning, including norms and values. A portmanteau term sociocultural anthropology is commonly used today. Linguistic anthropology studies how language influences social life. Biological or physical anthropology studies the biological development of humans.
Penn Museum, formerly known as The University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, is an archaeology and anthropology museum at the University of Pennsylvania. It is located on Penn's campus in the University City neighborhood of Philadelphia, at the intersection of 33rd and South Streets. It also is close enough for Drexel University students to walk or take SEPTA transportation services. Housing over 1.3 million artifacts, the museum features one of the most comprehensive collections of Middle and Near-Eastern art in the world.
Bruce Graham Trigger was a Canadian archaeologist, anthropologist, and ethnohistorian. He was appointed the James McGill Professor at McGill University in 2001.
Saba Mahmood (1961–2018) was professor of anthropology at the University of California, Berkeley. At Berkeley, she was also affiliated with the Center for Middle Eastern Studies, Institute for South Asia Studies, and the Program in Critical Theory. Her scholarly work straddled debates in anthropology and political theory, with a focus on Muslim majority societies of the Middle East and South Asia. Mahmood made major theoretical contributions to rethinking the relationship between ethics and politics, religion and secularism, freedom and submission, and reason and embodiment. Influenced by the work of Talal Asad, she wrote on issues of gender, religious politics, secularism, and Muslim and non-Muslim relations in the Middle East.
Alison Wylie is a Canadian philosopher of archaeology. She is a professor of philosophy at the University of British Columbia and holds a Canada Research Chair in Philosophy of the Social and Historical Sciences.
Nancy Scheper-Hughes is an anthropologist, educator and author. She is the Chancellor's Professor Emerita of Anthropology and the director and co-founder of the PhD program in Critical Medical Anthropology at the University of California, Berkeley. She is known for her writing on the anthropology of the body, hunger, illness, medicine, motherhood, psychiatry, psychosis, social suffering, violence and genocide, death squads, and human trafficking.
The ancient Egyptian story of "King Neferkare and General Sasenet" survives only in fragments. With its atmosphere of nocturnal mystery and intrigue it is an early example of the literary cloak and dagger tradition. It is often cited by people interested in homosexuality and its history as being proof that a homosexual relationship existed between a pharaoh and one of his officers. On the other hand, literature often reflects social mores: the tale is censorious of the king's conduct which may well reflect the attitude of the people towards homosexuality. It purports to describe the nightly exploits of Pepi II Neferkare; some like R. S. Bianchi think that it is a work of archaizing literature and dates to the 25th Dynasty referring to Shabaka Neferkare, a Kushite pharaoh.
Dr. Regina Bendix is a professor of European Ethnology at the University of Göttingen, Germany.
Fekri Hassan is a geoarchaeologist. After studying geology and anthropology, Hassan commenced teaching at Washington State University department of Anthropology in 1974. From 1988 to 1990 he acted as advisor to the Ministry of Culture of Egypt. Currently professor emeritus, he had formerly held the chair of Petrie Professor of Archaeology (1994-2008) of the Institute of Archaeology and department of Egyptology of University College London. Program Director Master's of Cultural Heritage Management, French University of Egypt in partnership with the Paris-Sorbonne University. Editor of the African Archaeological Review journal, contributory editor of The Review of Archaeology he is also honorary president of the Egyptian Cultural Heritage Organisation.
Rosemary A. Joyce is an American anthropologist and social archaeologist who has specialized in research in Honduras. They were able to archeologically confirm that chocolate was a byproduct of fermenting beer. She is also an expert in evaluating the archaeological records of society and the implications that sexuality and gender play in culture.
Wendy Rosalind James, is a British retired social anthropologist and academic. She was Professor of Social Anthropology at the University of Oxford from 1996 to 2007, and President of the Royal Anthropological Institute from 2001 to 2004.
Pauline Wiessner is an American anthropologist who focused on cultural anthropology. She is currently a professor at University of Utah. Wiessner has held various professor positions at Universities in the United States, Denmark, and France and various positions in Universities and communities across the world. During her research she work with Ju/’hoansi Bushmen of the Kalahari in South Africa to learn about the social networks and Enga of Papua New Guinea to learn about their customs of exchange, ritual and warfare.
Joan Margaret Gero was an American archaeologist and pioneer of feminist archaeology. Her research focused on gender and power issues in prehistory, particularly in the Andean regions of Argentina and Peru.
Stephanie Moser is an archaeology professor and head of the department at the University of Southampton, England. Her work explores the exhibition and reception of the human past. Moser's research examines visual images from antiquity through the lens of modern anthropology.
Fumiko Ikawa-Smith is a Japanese Canadian archaeologist. She is an emeritus professor in the department of anthropology at McGill University, Montreal, Quebec, Canada. She trained as an anthropologist and prehistorian and specialises in the Early Palaeolithic cultures in East Asia, specifically Japan). She is married to Philip E. L. Smith, also an archaeologist, with one son.
Deborah A. Thomas is an American anthropologist and filmmaker, and is the R. Jean Brownlee Professor of Anthropology and Director of the Center for Experimental Ethnography at the University of Pennsylvania. She has published books and articles on the history, culture, and politics of Jamaica; and on human rights, sexuality, and globalization in the Caribbean arena. She has co-produced and co-directed two experimental films, and has co-curated a multimedia exhibit at the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology. In 2016, she began a four-year term as editor-in-chief of the journal American Anthropologist. Before pursuing her career as an anthropologist, Thomas performed as a professional dancer with Urban Bush Women, a New York dance company that used art to promote social equity by illuminating the experiences of disenfranchised people.
Akinwumi Ogundiran is the Cardiss Collins Professor of Arts and Sciences and Professor of History at Northwestern University. He is an archaeologist, anthropologist, and cultural historian, whose research focuses on the Yoruba world of western Africa, Atlantic Africa, and the African Diaspora. He was born in Ibadan, Nigeria, and migrated to the United States in 1993. He was Chancellor's Professor and Professor of Africana Studies, Anthropology & History at UNC Charlotte.
Raminder Kaur is a Professor of Anthropology and Cultural Studies in the Departments of Anthropology and International Development at the University of Sussex. She has conducted fieldwork in India and Britain researching topics such as migration, race/ethnicity/gender, the creative arts, heritage, public culture, aesthetics, censorship, human rights, religion and politics, public representations of, and the socio-political, health and environmental implications of nuclear developments, and 'cultures of sustainability'.
Anne Haour is an anthropologically trained archaeologist, academic and Africanist scholar. She is Professor in the Arts and Archaeology of Africa at the Sainsbury Research Unit for the Arts of Africa, Oceania and the Americas at the University of East Anglia, Norwich, United Kingdom. In July 2021 she was elected Fellow of the British Academy in recognition of her outstanding contributions to the social sciences, humanities and arts.
