Research
Our department is built around three subdisciplines of anthropology -- archaeology, biological anthropology, and sociocultural anthropology. These are not conceptualized as semi-autonomous units, but they serve as the basis for generating intellectual synergies that cut across the three subdisciplines. Our research concentrations are an expression of these synergies, bringing together faculty research interests from the subdisciplines and catalyzing exciting collaborations within the department -- and beyond.
Current faculty research concentrations:
- Race, inequality, and social justice
- Evolution, environment, and cognition
- Health, development, and sustainability
- Technologies, ethics, and worldmaking
The diversity of our anthropological perspectives is understood as an important source of creative energy in the department and an expression of our holistic approach toward understanding what constitutes the human. Underpinned by a shared interest in critical, collaborative, and public anthropology, our research consistently yields novel approaches to broad questions about the conditions and possibilities of being human.
Research Facilities
Anthropology Theater Lab
Debra Vidali, Director
We use theatrical and performance modalities as forms of anthropological theorization and engagement. We develop original theater projects, based on ethnographic and participatory research. Our primary focus is theater for social change, verbatim documentary theater, physical theater, and ensemble projects. We also apply anthropological and ethnographic approaches to understand the crafts of theater making and theater experiences, including: theatrical production, performance, staging, acting, audiences, industries, and writing.
APE Lab
Marcela Benítez, Director
The APE Lab is the home of Anthropological Primatology at Emory. Our PI, Dr. Marcela Benite leads us in studies of primate social behavior, cognition, health and development. Our studies take place on capuchin monkeys at the Capuchins de Taboga field site and on chimpanzees at Gombe Stream Research Center in collaboration with the Jane Goodall Institute.
Global Development Studies
Peter Little, Director
"Development" is a keyword of the post-World War II era whose significance has become even more important as parts of the world grow closer in time and space. The growing hunger, poverty, and human rights abuses around the globe raise important challenges for faculty and students who wish to work internationally and present Emory with both an obligation and an opportunity. How can we understand and address growing inequality and approach development issues in a more humanistic, compassionate fashion that is respectful of cultural differences and the rights of the poor to a dignified, meaningful life?
Hominin Origins Lab
Laura van Holstein, Director
Research in the Hominin Origins Lab is concerned with understanding the evolution of our own lineage, hominins. We have a specific focus on hominin evolutionary processes. We principally study hominin evolution across macroevolutionary timescales, applying quantitative evolutionary modelling to ask why, when, and where hominin species first evolve and go extinct. However, macroevolutionary processes are ultimately the outcome of recurrent processes at ecological scales. We therefore study the exact same processes in extant ecosystems, including at our field site in the Nimba Mountains (Guinea), at which we study western chimpanzees, sooty mangabeys, suids, and other mammals.
Paleolithic Technology Laboratory
Dietrich Stout, Director
The Paleolithic Technology Laboratory studies the behavioral, cognitive, and neural bases of toolmaking in order to understand the evolutionary history of the human mind and brain. Research focuses mainly on Oldowan, Acheulean, and Levallois technologies, using a combination of lithic analysis of archaeological specimens, experimental production of stone tools, and measurements of motor action, neural activation, and brain anatomy related to toolmaking.
Social Cognition and Primate Behavior Laboratory
Marcela Benítez, Director
The Social Cognition and Primate Behavior Lab examines how primates make important social decisions, what underlying factors impact these choices, and why these decisions are adaptive. We tackle these questions from an evolutionary and comparative perspective while utilizing a mechanistic approach, through the integration of behavioral observations and experimental paradigms on wild monkeys at our field station, Capuchins de Taboga, in Costa Rica, and the assessment and manipulation of hormones, at our endocrine lab at Emory.
Visual Scholarship Initiative
Anna Grimshaw, Director
The Visual Scholarship Initiative (VSI) was started in 2006 by a small group of graduate students at Emory University. It quickly established itself on the Emory campus as a place where students from different departments could meet to share work and explore the creative possibilities of scholarly practice.