Anthropology is the study of the human condition from the deep past to the emerging present. The field is unified by its commitment to engaged field research that seeks to enhance understanding across boundaries of culture, nation, language, tradition, history and identity. A holistic discipline, anthropology regards economy, politics, culture and society as inseparable elements of humanity’s complex long-term history. A bridge between the humanities, social, and natural sciences, anthropology documents the diversity of our communities and examines the consequences of our commonalities. Because it engages directly with communities around the world, anthropology has a unique capacity to bring the entire human experience to bear on vital questions of sustainability, equality, and mutual understanding that will shape the future of the planet.
Cornell’s Department of Anthropology is one of the most respected programs in the world with a long tradition of innovation and a legacy of leadership in the discipline. The work of its faculty traces the human career from the emergence of the species to the formation of 21st century post-colonialism. Our ethnographic, archaeological and biological research links empirical observations to critical theoretical approaches. Key themes in ongoing research projects and teaching profiles include: medicine and culture; politics, inequality and sovereignty; economy, finance, corporations and law; materiality and aesthetics; gender, personhood and identity; ethics and humanitarianism; humans and animals; colonialism and post-coloniality. Our students and faculty work around the globe from Ithaca, India and Indonesia to the Caribbean and Central America, from Japan, Africa and Nepal to China and the Caucasus, from the circumpolar North to the Global South. The Anthropology Collections, housed in McGraw Hall and used in a range of courses, include over 20,000 ethnographic and archaeological objects whose origins span the globe and represent over 500,000 years of human history.
Department websiteChaoyu Mao
Hannah Ali
Jess Marie Newman
Publications
2019. “‘There is a big question mark’: Managing Ambiguity in a Moroccan Maternity Ward.” Medical Anthropology Quarterly.
2018. “Aspirational Maternalism and the ‘Reconstitution’ of Single Mothers in Morocco.” Journal of Middle East Women’s Studies 14 1 : 45-67.
2018. “Deploying the Fetus: Constructing Pregnancy and Abortion in Morocco.” Anthropology of the Fetus: Biology, Culture, and Society. Han, Sallie, Tracy Betsinger, and Amy Scott, eds. Oxford: Berghahn Books, 200-226.
2016. “Sex Toys and the Politics of Pleasure in Morocco.” Abortion Pills, Test Tube Babies, and Sex Toys: Emerging Sexual Reproductive Health Technologies in the Middle East and North Africa. Wynn, L. L. and Angel Foster, eds. Nashville: Vanderbilt University Press.
2015. “Medical Anthropology in the Middle East and North Africa.” A Companion to the Anthropology of the Middle East. Soraya Altorki, ed. Boston: Wiley Blackwell Publishers, 207-232. With Marcia C. Inhorn.
Education
MPhil & PhD: Yale University
BA: UC Irvine
Departments and programs
Roderick Wijunamai
Meredith F. Small
Professor Emerita
Publications
Academic Articles
- 2003 How Many Fathers Are Best for a Child?. Discover 24(4):54-61.
- 2002 Mother's Little Helpers. New Scientist 176(2372):44-49.
- 2002 So Near and Yet So Far. Natural History 111(5):76-78.
- 2002 String Theory. Natural History 111(3):14-16.
- 2002 The Happy Fat. New Scientist 175(2357):34-39.
- 2002 What You Can Learn From Drunk Monkeys. Discover 23(7):40-46.
- 2001 Do Animals Have Culture?. Scientific American 284(4):104-106.
Books
- 2001 Kids: How Biology and Culture Shape the Way We Raise Our Children. New York: Doubleday.
Education
- Ph.D., University of California, Davis, 1980
Departments and programs
Amiel Bize
Assistant Professor
Publications
Peer-Reviewed Articles and Chapters:
2022 "On Fallen Wood." Etnofoor 34(2): 33-48.
2022 with Sophie Schramm. "Planning by Exception: The Regulation of Nairobi’s Margins." Planning Theory online first.
2020 “The Right to the Remainder: Gleaning and Fuel Economies along Kenya’s Northern Corridor.” Cultural Anthropology 35(3).
2019 with Basil Ibrahim. “Waiting Together: The Motorcycle Taxi Stand as Nairobi Infrastructure.” Africa Today 65(2): 72-91.
2017 “Jam-Space and Jam-Time: Traffic in Nairobi.” The Making of the African Road (K. Beck, G. Klaeger, M. Stasik, eds.), Leiden: Brill, 58-85.
2017 “Rhythm, Disruption and the Experience of African Roads,” review article, Mobility in History Vol. 8: 28-34.
Public Scholarship:
2019 with Basil Ibrahim. “Les « shimo », lieux de toutes les attentes des taxis-motos de Nairobi” [“Shimo: Where Motorcycle Taxis Wait.”], Le Monde Afrique website, May 7.
2019 “On Ethnographic Desire: A Response to Phantom Africa,” Syndicate website, April 1.
2019 “Gleaning,” Part of series on Temporary Possession. Theorizing the Contemporary, Cultural Anthropology website, March 29.
2018 with Soo-Young Kim. “Beyond Precarity.” Member Voices, Fieldsights, Cultural Anthropology website, March 21.
2016 with Wendell Marsh, Elliot Ross, Safia Aidid, Natasha Shivji, and Basil Ibrahim. “Reflections on #CadaanStudies.” CSAAME Borderlines, February 13.
2009-2011 Regular contributor to “Findings,” column in Anthropology Now Magazine.
Departments and programs
Keywords
Economic Anthropology, Science and Technology Studies, Value, Capitalism, Margins, Risk and Insurance
Marcos Ramos Valdés
Ph.D. Candidate in Anthropology
Departments and programs
Keywords
Archaeology, Mesoamerica, Paleoethnobotany, Religion
Ranya Perez
Departments and programs
Keywords
community gardens/farms, food sovereignty, solidarity, transnational place-making, healing
Karina Edouard
Departments and programs
Keywords
Caribbean, migration, identity, violence, healing, belief systems