The Sociocultural Anthropology, Archaeology and Bio-archaeology Unit
The Sociocultural Anthropology, Archaeology and Bio-archaeology unit of the Department of Anthropology integrates anthropology’s traditional subdisciplinary fields in a holistic framework for understanding human evolution and diversity. We seek, as well, to foster intellectual linkages between sociocultural anthropology, archaeology and bioarchaeology. While all faculty maintain active research profiles in distinct areas, as a group we share several cross-cutting thematic interests that include: human-environment relations (including health implications, subsistence regimes and climate change), political economy and ecology, borderlands studies (past and present), cultural landscapes, and the anthropology of religion and ideology. We carry out field research in the Americas and the Caribbean, Europe, Africa and South and East Asia; we have built a special strength in California Studies, both its pre- and post-contact history and its current role in the dynamic Pacific Rim and US-Mexican political economies. We maintain a strong commitment to the applied and public interest dimensions of anthropology, thus our research incorporates attention to such issues as the human consequences of climate change, past and present; health and environmental justice; indigenous cultural autonomy; and immigration policy.
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