News

March 4, 2024


Aarti Sethi, a UC Berkeley anthropology professor, is also helping ditial-native students discover the importance of physical libraries. 

November 30, 2023

Andrew Kim announced as a recipient for UC Berkeley's "Outstanding Faculty Advisor" award

Congratulations to Professor Andrew Kim for receiving UC Berkeley's "Outstanding Faculty Advisor" award for 2023 for his impactful contributions on student learning, engagement, and belonging on the Berkeley campus.


April 20, 2023

Charles Brigg's Election to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences

Congratulations Professor Charles Briggs on his election to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. This academy honors excellence and convenes leaders from every field of human endeavor to examine new ideas, address issues of importance to the nation and the world.


January 25, 2023


UC Berkeley's Anthropology Professor Cori Hayden's recently published book, The Spectacular Generic, details how generic drugs have transformed public health politics and everyday experiences of pharmaceutical consumption in Latin America. 



December 8, 2022


Join the Elite Studies Working Group for a roundtable to celebrate the 50th anniversary of UC Berkeley's Anthropology Emeriti Professor Laura Nader's 'Up the Anthropologist', a seminal text for elite studies



November 18, 2022


Ph.D. Candidate Ángela Castillo-Ardila was one of the five finalists for the 2022 Rappaport Prize for her paper "Counting on Montane Birds: Animal Entanglements, Verticality, and Territorial Defense in Colombia," based on her dissertation. The award is offered by the Anthropology and Environment Section of the American Anthropological Association at its annual conference.



November 16, 2022


Department of Environmental Science, Policy and Management Professor Seth Holmes won Honorable mention for Best Short from the Society of Visual Anthropology for his film, First Time Home!



October 26, 2022


Anthropology Professor Andrew W Kim's research analyzes how stress experienced under political violence affects individuals through intergenerational stress observed through pre-natal health



All News

October 10, 2022


Faculty member, Professor Sabrina C. Agarwal, was featured on PBS News Hour to represent the Anthropology Department regarding UC Berkeley's repatriation of cultural artifacts. 



All News

February 2, 2023

January 31, 2023


"This essay offers a relational interpretation of global governance since the 1960s. I trace how interacting ideas, events, and worldviews shape global strategies for governing relationships
with the global South. Specifically, prescriptions of modernization via capitalism invariably involve a reimagination of Western civilization" (Ong, 2023) Click Here to Read the Full Essay


November 16, 2022

The Anthropology department congratulates our faculty member Sarah E. Vaughn for receiving the Julian Steward Award.

Engineering Vulnerability: In Pursuit of Climate Adaptation (Duke University Press) has won the 2022 Julian Steward Award.

The award is presented annually by the Anthropology & Environment Society of the American Anthropological Association for the best monograph in environmental and ecological anthropology.

CONGRATS PROFESSOR VAUGHN!

October 27, 2022

September 1, 2022


Assistant Professor Aarti Sethi, along with Ciriacy-Wantrup Fellow Tanya Matthan, was featured on the Social Science Matrix podcast. In the interview, Sethi and Matthan discuss the way that the contemporary agrarian crisis in India has reshaped lives of ordinary people, and the contemporary crisis' history in the Green Revolution and colonial production processes. 


August 1, 2022

The Honduran Institute for Anthropology and History (IHAH) has awarded Dr. Rosemary Joyce, along with her partner and collaborator, Dr. Russell Sheptak, the Jesús Núñez Chinchilla Prize, in the category of "Inclusive Investigation of the Cultural Patrimony of Honduras."

May 25, 2022

The Department of Anthropology announces the inaugural award of the Sam Dubal Fellowship in Critical Cultural and Medical Anthropology to Carolina Talavera


May 11, 2022


The Department of Anthropology wants to send a huge congratulations to Professor Sabrina C. Agarwal. Professor Agarwal has recieved recognition from the University of California, Berkeley. In addition, UC Berkeley is recognizing its outstanding Graduate Student Instructors of 2022 - GSIs are essential to ensuring our Anthropology undergrads are recieving the adequate support and teaching during their undergraduate years.

March 29, 2022

March 23, 2022


Register Here - Free 


"Afghanistan Then and Now: A Conversation with Former Afghan President Ashraf Ghani," scheduled for Thursday, March 31 at 2 p.m. ET.


March 21, 2022

March 17, 2022


The Anthropology Department wants to congratulate Sabrina Agawarl for receiving UC Berkeley's Distinguished Teaching Award. The Distinguished Teaching Award is UC Berkeley's highest honor for teaching. 

February 18, 2022

January 24, 2022

Leiden University has announced the intent to confer an honorary doctorate on Professor of Anthropology Rosemary Joyce. The degree will be awarded on February 8, 2022 at the university's Dies Natalis, the celebration of its 447th year since it was founded in 1575 as the first university in that country.

January 13, 2022


In this episode of the Matrix podcast, Julia Sizek interviews Clare Ibarra, a PhD candidate in history, and Naomi Shoenfeld, a public health nurse practitioner and recent PhD from the joint UC San Francisco/UC Berkeley medical anthropology program. Both Ibarra and Shoenfeld study the history and present of socialist science and medicine in Cuba. 
https://matrix.berkeley.edu/research-article/science-and-socialism-in-cuba/

November 29, 2021

November 4, 2021

UC Berkeley Anthropology PhD Graduate and Rice University Assistant Professor, Dr. Victoria Massie, was featured at Social Science Matrix on their podcast "Genetic Ancestry Testing and Reconnection: An Interview with Dr.

October 27, 2021

A special issue of the journal Public Anthropology focuses on the important contributions of our own Laura Nader. The volume titled  "Ethnography, Politics, Commitment: Engaging with the Work of Laura Nader" and is available on the Public Anthropologist website:

September 21, 2021

September 10, 2021

UC Berkeley Anthropology PhD Candidate Juliana Friend was recently featured on the Social Science Matrix Podcast!

UC Berkeley Anthropology PhD Candidate Valerie Black was recently featured on the Social Science Matrix Podcast!

September 7, 2021

We are extremely honored to announce the Sam Dubal Fellowship in Critical Cultural and Medical Anthropology in memory of Sam Dubal, his legacy, and his commitment to anthropology and medicine.

August 24, 2021

"Zombie Infrastructure: A legal geography of railroad monstrosity in the California desert" was recently published by Anthro PhD Candidate Julia Sizek on Environment and Planning D: Society and Space. 

You can read Julia's article of "Zombie Infrastructure" herehttps://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/02637758211023504.

Big congrats, Julia!

July 14, 2021

Professor Ruth E. Tringham (Department of Anthropology) has just been recognized by the Royal Anthropological Society of Great Britain and Ireland as the recipient of the 2021 Lifetime Achievement Award. This is an annual award to recognize an anthropologist for their "fundamental, sustained and outstanding contribution to the discipline of anthropology over the course of their career".The RAI is the oldest professional societyfor anthropology, founded in 1871.

June 14, 2021

UC Berkeley Anthropology Professor, and Director of the Archaeological Research Facility, Christine Hastorf is being celebrated by the Office of the Vice-Chancellor for Research. 

May 17, 2021

We wish to celebrate May N. Diaz's 100th Birthday

April 29, 2021

On Wed, April 28th, 2021, UC Berkeley Anthropology Professor Kent Lightfoot was awarded the David A. Fredrickson Lifetime Achievement Award of the Society for California Archaeology. Professor Lightfoot has been carrying out pioneering archaeological research in California since joining the Berkeley Anthropology faculty in 1987. Dr. Lightfoot’s research has emphasized the collaboration of working with Native Americans in the greater San Francisco Bay Area to bring the past to light, and to make it relevant to today’s indigenous populations and archaeologists.

April 2, 2021

David C. Thompson (PhD 2020 Anthropology) wins the Sérgio Buarque de Holanda Prize for the Best Dissertation in the Social Sciences from the Latin American Studies Association, Brazil Section, for his doctoral dissertation "Resocialize to Conquer the Future": Incarceration and Reform in Rio de Janeiro (dissertation chair, Professor James Holston)

Society for Cultural Anthropology Author's Page:

https://culanth.org/authors/david-thompson

February 23, 2021

Vivian Osborne was an alumna of the UC Berkeley Anthropology Masters program, having received her degree in 1922. Her master thesis was on "Types and Distribution of Negro Folklore in America".

In her time at Berkeley, and beyond, Vivian accomplished so much and was an activist and leader. Additionally, Vivian was one of the founders of the Kappa chapter, of the Delta Sigma Theta, one of the major African-American sororities. This year, Kappa celebrates its 100th anniversary!

February 17, 2021

UC Berkeley Anthropology Professor Lisa Maher and her research on "Hunter-gatherer mortuary behaviors in prehistoric Jordan" were recently featured internationally by http://sciencenews.org (https://sciencenews.org/article/ancient-body-burned-burial-jordan-death-views) and by

February 10, 2021

From Berkeley News, UC Berkeley Anthropology Professors Kent Lightfoot and Jun Sunseri, and Anthropology Students were featured in the article: "Indigenous archaeology plows forward, despite anthropology's checkered past" (linked to article).

January 15, 2021

Congratulations to Karla "Ranger" Trujillo, Anthropology Undergraduate of the class of 2022, for becoming a Ronald B. McNair Scholar! 

Read about Karla's amazing achievement here: https://enewspaper.delmartimes.net/infinity/article_share.aspx?guid=59668fd7-0752-4a49-9a35-827f4b19de56

December 28, 2020

Congratulations to UC Berkeley Anthropology PhD Lyle Fearnley on new book Virulent Zones: Animal Disease and Global Health at China’s Pandemic Epicenter through Duke University Press. 

December 22, 2020

Professor Emeritus Margaret Conkey is one of five Berkeley scholars to be elected this year as fellows of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), one of the world’s largest scientific societies. Our congratulations to Professor Conkey for this prestigious honor! She is recognized for her theoretical work on the role of art in ancient evolution and gender studies in archeology. In addition to gender representations, Professor Conkey studies early human visual culture, the prehistory of Europe, and archaeology and multimedia.

December 18, 2020

Professor White's article, in collaboration with Catherine Draycott, titled "Why the Whiteness of Archaeology Is a Problem" was featured in SAPIEN's Best of 2020! Congrats Professor! Check out his article below!

https://www.sapiens.org/archaeology/archaeology-diversity/

December 8, 2020

Recent 2020 UC Berkeley Anthropology and Near Eastern Languages & Literatures (Arabic) BA graduate, Nicholas Shafer,becomes one of 44 Marshall Scholars that will begin study in the United Kingdom in Fall 2021 and will pursue study at the University of Oxford and the University of Sussex.

November 23, 2020

 P/NP grades received during the period of the Covid-19 shutdown will not be considered in evaluating applications to our graduate program.

November 9, 2020

The anthropology department has held discussions around the unnaming of Kroeber Hall and around the university's lack of compliance with CalNAGPRA. Wanting to extend these discussions beyond the department, anthropology graduate students, in consultation with indigenous members of the campus community, drafted two resolutions that were introduced to the UC Berkeley Graduate Assembly. On November 5 the Graduate Assembly approved these resolutions and took the official position in support of unnaming Kroeber Hall based on his harmful legacy to local indigenous communities.

November 6, 2020

We want to congratulate one of Archaeology Graduate Students, Mario Alberto Castillo for being awarded the UC President's Pre-Professoriate Fellowship from The University of California's Hispanic Serving Institution Doctoral Diversity Initiative. 

This is what Mario had to say about why their Pre-Fellowship promotes diversity and inclusion in Academia. 

October 26, 2020

October 6, 2020


The Anthropology Department has created a “Virtual Front Desk” page on the website! Students and staff can find information and resources using the clickable links embedded in the virtual office. There is also the option to meet with our Student Assistants over Zoom to answer your specific questions.  We hope that this virtual office will provide clarity and support in an online space.

September 8, 2020

As chair of the UC Berkeley anthropology department, I write to express my department’s support for the initiative to un-name Kroeber Hall. The act of un-naming, as we see it, takes an important step in addressing and acknowledging a long history of violence toward Native Americans in which UC Berkeley and the anthropology department are implicated. This act gives momentum to the long-overdue work of repair for historical injury. 

June 18, 2020

Congratulations to Professor William White on receiving the Hellman Fellow Fund. 

A blurb about his Fellow award: 

June 9, 2020

From the UC Berkeley Anthropology Faculty:

May 29, 2020

Dr. Karen Lisa Greene has passed away at a hospital near her home in Kampala, Uganda, of cerebral malaria. Dr. Greene was a superb, rigorous, and passionate scholar whose impact both as a teacher and critical innovator in child rights has been international.  She leaves her daughter Whitney and close friends and family worldwide.  

Dr. Greene did her MA in folklore and PhD in medical anthropology at Berkeley.  She was learned, with additional training in education, in critical theory, in Khmer language, and in the governance of refugees and rights. 

May 4, 2020

Anthropology Commencement -The department has decided that the Class of 2020 will celebrate their milestones together with the Class of 2021. We will provide more details soon. Thank you for your understanding.  

April 29, 2020

Professor Sarah Vaughn was a guest speaker for a Berkeley Conversations: COVID-19 video titled "Understanding and seeking equity amid COVID-19". Professor Vaughn brings ethnography to this conversation, raising awareness to how communities in the Caribbean "approach disaster preparedness and climate adaptation". 

Check it out!

https://news.berkeley.edu/2020/04/21/understanding-and-seeking-equity-amid-covid-19/

April 24, 2020

Please register for this talk to receive the zoom link and password:
Narratives of Change, Reminders of Resilience: The Interconnections of Karuk Baskets, Environment, and the People
Monday April 27, 2-4 PM zoom
Dr. Carolyn Smith

April 14, 2020

UC Berkeley Anthropology Professor Aihwa Ong was invited to be the 2020 SSRC Research Council Fellow. She will hold seminars with faculty, graduate students in the NYC metropolitan area, and with the SSRC staff.
She plans to lecture on "Cloned Monkeys & Gene-edited Babies: Productive Uncertainty in China's Biosecurity."

April 10, 2020

Society of Ethnobiology

The 2020 Urban Ethnobiology Fellowship winner is Natasha Fernandez-Perez!

March 5, 2020

American Anthropology Association

"Since the 1990s, increasing numbers of Coptic Orthodox Christians have immigrated to the United States particularly through the Diversity Visa, or Green Card Lottery.

February 7, 2020

Conversations in Anthropology Today at Deakin University, Melbourne Australia

In this public lecture, visiting Macgeorge Fellow Professor Nancy Scheper-Hughes explores how we can end the history of child sexual abuse in the Catholic Church. Never one to shy away from controversy, her talk will be based on three decades of studying and intervening in the global 'traffic in children' for sexual gratification by Catholic priests, bishops and cardinals.

February 4, 2020

Due to her outstanding contributions to archaeology, Professor Hastorf was selected as the 2020 recipient of SAA's Book Award – Scholarly for The Social Archaeology of Food Thinking about Eating from Prehistory to the Present.  Professor Hastorf will recieve the award Friday, April 24, 2020 at the Annual Business Meeting and Awards Ceremony in the Austin Convention Center. Congrats Professor Hastorf!

January 16, 2020

Featured on UC Berkeley's site, Professor Rosemary Joyce speaks on her resignation from the Cultural Property Advisory Committee and advises to take action "when the U.S. threatens to abadnon the international consensus on protection of cultural sites...". Thank you to Professor Joyce on her wise words and her service. 

https://blogs.berkeley.edu/2020/01/06/when-the-us-abandons-protection-of-cultural-sites-we-must-act/

January 15, 2020

Dylan Fagan, Social Cultural Anthropology PhD student, was awarded the Fulbright Hays DDRA fellowship for his research in Indonesia! Congrats to Dylan!

January 1, 2020

Our new episode features a conversation with the renowned anthropologist Nancy Scheper-Hughes, Professor of Anthropology at the University of California, Berkeley. Across their illustrious career, Nancy has researched social suffering and structural violence in a variety of contexts, including Ireland, Brazil, South Africa and, internationally, through the global trade in kidneys and other organs. Most recently, she has written about the scandal of child sexual abuse in the Catholic Church.

December 17, 2019

At the annual meeting of the American Anthropological Association,  Professor Charles Briggs and Dr. Clara Mantini-Briggs received the Robert B. Textor and Family Prize for Excellence in Anticipatory Anthropology. 

At the annual meeting of the American Anthropological Association, Brittany Birberick, PhD student in our department, received the Bennetta Jules-Rosette Graduate Essay Award from the Association for Africanist Anthropology. Congratulations, Brittany!

November 21, 2019

(Post)Socialism as a Global Resource Interdisciplinary Conference will be held May 1–2, 2020 at UC Berkeley. 

November 19, 2019

UC Berkeley Anthropology Professor Stefania Pandolfo was awarded the Boyer Prize in psychoanalytic anthropology for her book, "Knot of the Soul: Madness, Psychoanalysis, Islam" which will be awarded at the AAA meetings in Vancouver.

Professor Mariane Ferme's book "Out of War: Violence, Trauma, and the Political Imagination in Sierra Leone" was selected as a finalist for the 2019 Elliott P. Skinner Book Prize from the Association for Africanist Anthropology.

November 8, 2019

Three new translations of Professor Alexei Yurchak's book "Everything Was Forever, Until It Was No More: The Last Soviet Generation" in Japan, Korea, and the Czech Republic.

From Princeton University Press - Blurb of "Everything Was Forever, Until It Was No More: The Last Soviet Generation" :

November 7, 2019

Featured on the BerkeleyNews, senior double major (in social welfare and anthropology) Ratu Orisi Lalabalavu talks about how he found his community and voice at UC Berkeley, as well as challenges he overcame before and during attending university. 

Article attached here: https://news.berkeley.edu/2019/11/05/daca-ratu-orisi-lalabalavu/

November 5, 2019

Attached is the link to view future and past Fall 2019 290 lectures. Dates, location, speakers, titles of the talk, and abstracts are viewable on this document.

Link here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1HY10MJkUKGqccnQ8BJ0nIxvWDwSvedO_1sjQ_djdh3o/edit?usp=sharing

October 29, 2019

Please check out Candace Lukasik's recent interview on her dissertation with the Coptic Canadian History Project. Candace Lukasik is a PhD student in our department, specializing in migration, religion, and politics with a focus on American geopolitical interest in Middle Eastern Christians. 

Link here: https://thecchp.com/2019/10/27/interview-with-candace-lukasik-transnational-anxieties/

October 25, 2019

Please check out this podcast featuring Professor Laura Nader on Cultures of Energy with Dominic Boyer & Cymene Howe!

Link here: http://culturesofenergy.com/200-laura-nader/

September 19, 2019

September 16, 2019

Assistant Professor - Indigenous Archaeology – Department of Anthropology

The Department of Anthropology at the University of California, Berkeley seeks applications for a tenure-track Assistant Professor position, in the area of indigenous archaeology, with an expected start date of July 1, 2020.

August 22, 2019

Join the Anthropology Department and the Phoebe A. Hearst Museum of Anthropology for a lecture from Professor Christine Hastorf on the history of beer through an archaeological lens!

The Archaeology of Beer

Date & Time: August 22, 2019, 6-7:30 pm

Location: Hearst Museum of Anthropology

Sponsor: Phoebe A. Hearst Museum of Anthropology

August 20, 2019

Dr. Seth Holmes, Professor of Medical Anthropology, was awarded the William T. Grant Mentoring Award, which will support his mentoring of Fabian Fernandez and Carlos Martinez, both PhD students in the Joint Medical Anthropology Program. The William T. Grant Mentoring Award aims to strengthen the mentoring of junior researchers of color and to position them for professional success. The award also seeks to support scholars in developing a stronger understanding of the career development issues facing junior colleagues of color. 

July 30, 2019

Heather Mellquist Lehto, recent sociocultural anthropology PhD graduate (2018), wrote, produced, and co-reported an upcoming radio series on "How American Evangelicalism is Changing", which will be airing on KQED next week.  The series will consist of 3 segments, and is part of a public scholarship opportunity created in partnership with PRI's The World.
 
Her stories will play on KQED (88.9) during the 2-3pm hour, Monday August 5th- Wednesday August 7th. 

July 24, 2019

Brittany Birberick, PhD student, has won the 2019 Bennetta Jules-Rosette Graduate Essay Award from the Association of Africanist Anthropology (AfAA).  Brittany will be awarded in a ceremony at the AAA meetings in Vancouver, in November 2019. Congratulations, Brittany!

July 23, 2019

2019 MACGEORGE LECTURE at the University of Melbourne
‘How to End the History of Clerical Child Sexual Abuse in the Catholic Church’ 

July 19, 2019

Professor Laura Nader was awarded The Law and Society Association Legacy Award. This award honors those who have made significant contributions to develop the Association, requiring both intellectual vision and commitment. This award also honors Professor Nader life's work in the field of socio-legal studies, shaping the field to what it is today. Congratulations, Professor Nader!

July 12, 2019

The Department of Anthropology announces an open Indigenous Archaeology faculty position for Fall 2020. More details on qualifications and how to apply will follow shortly. Thank you!

June 14, 2019

The American Anthropological Association awarded Dr. Charles Briggs and Dr. Clara Mantini-Briggs the Robert B. Textor and Family Prize for Excellence in
Anticipatory Anthropology. This award is given annually to reward an American Anthropological Association member’s excellent contributions to the use of anthropological perspectives, theories, models, and methods in an anticipatory mode.

June 13, 2019

We are thrilled to announce that Dr. Daena Funahashi will be joining our department in July 2019. Dr. Funahashi specializes in Medical Anthropology, Continental Philosophy, sacrifice, and addiction in both Finland and Thailand. She received her Ph.D in Anthropology from Cornell University and was formerly an Assistant Professor in Anthropology at Aarhus University. Welcome to Berkeley, Dr. Funahashi!

June 10, 2019

June 5, 2019

February 28, 2019

February 25, 2019

Michigan State University College of Social Science

Gabriel Sanchez

Four new research associates have been hired in the College of Social Science (CSS). The CSS Dean’s Research Associate Program at Michigan State University was established in 2018 as a major college initiative aimed at promoting an inclusive scholarly environment.

September 20, 2018

Congratulations to the new board members of the Anthropology Undergraduate Association for Fall 2018!

Co-Presidents: Anna Schiff + Nicholas Shafer

Secretary: Frederik Boumeester

Publicist: Ryann Hirt

Historian: Ashley Holt

Treasurer: Rosie Macon

Learn more about AUA here

September 12, 2018

Date/Time: Monday, September 12, 2016 - 12:30

Anthropology professor emerita Elizabeth Colson dies at 99 years old in Zambia at 99 years old. Refer to the article below for comments about Colson's work, life, and research from her colleagues and friends. You can also check out her biography below. 

June 19, 2018

William S. Simmons of Providence, 79, passed away on June 2 after a battle with cancer. 

Bill S. Simmons was born in Providence on September 10, 1938 to William and Lena (Roberts) Simmons. He attended Classical High School and Brown University and earned his Ph.D. in Anthropology from Harvard University.

Herbert P. Phillips passed away peacefully at home on May 22, 2018, surrounded by his family and several dear friends.

May 17, 2018

Their piece explores how some memes can be a means of resistance to disaster, specifically in the context of Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico.

Find it here

Prof. Laura Nader's new book looks for the unwritten rules that sometimes hinder transformative thinking in one field and stimulate boundary crossing in others.

Find out more about the book here. 

April 19, 2018

April 16, 2018

We are excited to see Professor Vranich's Peru class featured on the main page of Berkeley.edu! Learn more about the course, archaeological survey, and student, Natalea Schager, in the main article entitled, "Soaring through Peru: Berkeley Student Turns Summer Research Into Augmented Reality App."
Our next 290 speaker will be Professor Marilyn Strathern, who will be speaking twice for our campus. 
Dame Strathern will first present at our normal 290 hours, from 2-4pm next Monday, April 16th. Her abstract as follows:

"The prize recognizes students in the social sciences who incorporate visual analysis in their work.  It is named for Rachel Dorothy Tanur (1958–2002), an urban planner and lawyer who cared deeply about people and their lives and was an acute observer of living conditions and human relationships."

Read more about the prize here: https://www.racheltanurmemorialprize.org/computer-wiz/

April 5, 2018

Remembering  Emma Deboncoeur

Nancy Scheper-Hughes

March 22, 2018  

March 19, 2018

Seth Holmes will receive the Honorable Mention Premio Iberoamericano Book Award from the Latin American Studies Association (LASA) this summer (2018). He is receiving this honorable mention for the Spanish version of his book, Fruta Fresca, Cuerpos Marchitos: Trabajadores agricolas migrantes en Estados Unidos. 

March 12, 2018

February 7, 2018

Image of Lucy Gill

At the 7th Biennial Graduate Research Conference at the Cotsen Institute of Archaeology at UCLA, Lucy Gill, a second year UCB anthropology graduate student, received the  "Best of the Conference" award  for her paper, "Centering Borderlands: Mobility and Multiculturalism in Prehispanic Central America."

January 29, 2018

Skeletal Biology Lab Wins Safety Award

EH&S and Department Safety Coordinators have awarded the skeletal biology lab, run by Prof. Sabrina Agarwal, a UC Berkeley Excellence in Laboratory Safety Award in the Small Field Sciences category.

Berkeley News, The Daily Californian

Image of Margaret Conkey looking at cave paintings

Dr. Margaret Conkeyreceived the Royal Anthropological Institute’s 2017 Thomas J. Huxley Memorial Medal for her pioneering exploration of feminist perspectives and gender issues in archaeology as well as new interpretations of European cave paintings from the Paleolithic era.

January 10, 2018

Professor Ong's brilliant book Fungible Life is discussed in an extensive blog post on Inside Higher Ed on deep internalization and infrastructure.

Click here to read the post.

January 7, 2018

Date/Time: 
Thursday, January 7, 2016 - 18:30

Nancy Scheper-Hughes is a professor of medical anthropology in the Department of Anthropology at UC Berkeley, and director of Organs Watch. She advises the World Health Organization, the European Union and the United Nations.

December 5, 2017

Professors Charles L. Briggs and Clara Mantini-Briggs have won the 2017 New Millennium Award, the Society for Medical Anthropology's major book prize, for the book they jointly authored, Tell Me Why My Children Died: Rabies, Indigenous Knowledge, and Communicative Justice.

December 2, 2017

November 2, 2017

May 15, 2017

Image of Chioma A

UC Berkeley Senior Reflection: Chioma A.

Graduating senior and Los Angeles native Chioma talks about her time at Berkeley, her favorite professors and offers advice to new students.

What is your major, and why did you choose it?

May 2, 2017

April 6, 2017

Date/Time:  Thursday, April 6, 2017 - 12:30

Professor James Holston has been named a recipient of the Chancellor's Award for Public Service for his collaborative project with the City of Vallejo--AppCivist.

An excerpt of AppCivist from their project's website (linked below):

March 9, 2017

Date/Time: Thursday, March 9, 2017 - 11:30

February 10, 2017

Date/Time:  Friday, February 10, 2017 - 14:30

Quoted from the City of Vallejo's Press Release:
 

January 11, 2017

December 9, 2016

December 5, 2016

November 18, 2016

Image of nancy hughes
Date/Time: Friday, November 18, 2016 - 14:00

Nancy Scheper-Hughes was awarded Tikkun Magazine's award for Radical Medical Anthropology this year on their 20th anniversary celebration this past Sunday, November 13th. The talk is titled "Radical Hope Despite Present Difficulties." You can read her talk on Tikkun's website at the link below. 

November 16, 2016

Seth Holmes, co-chair of Berkeley's Center for Social Medicine has been awarded the Robert B. Textor award in Anticipatory Anthropology for his book, Fresh Fruit, Broken Bodies: Migrant Farmworkers in the United States. 

From the American Anthropological Association's website:

November 9, 2016

November 2016

To President Obama, the United States Department of Justice, Department of the Interior and the Army Corps of Engineers:

September 30, 2016

Book cover of a dandelion
Date/Time: Friday, September 30, 2016 - 11:30

The Book

September 12, 2016

Date/Time: 
Monday, September 12, 2016 - 12:30

Anthropology professor emerita Elizabeth Colson dies at 99 years old in Zambia at 99 years old. Refer to the article below for comments about Colson's work, life, and research from her colleagues and friends. You can also check out her biography below. 

September 9, 2016

August 5, 2016

Date/Time: Friday, August 5, 2016 - 13:30
Date/Time:  Friday, August 5, 2016 - 13:30

July 20, 2016

Date/Time: Wednesday, July 20, 2016 - 11:30

Daniel Fisher has been awarded a Global Urban Humanities - Townsend Fellowship for Spring 2017 for his project "Understanding Aboriginal Cities: Indigeneity, Urbanization, and Intervention in Northern Australia." 

Date/Time:  Wednesday, July 20, 2016 - 11:30

Laurie Wilkie has been appointed Department Chair effective July 1, 2016. 

Picture of aihwa ong
Date/Time: Wednesday, July 20, 2016 - 11:30

Aihwa Ong has been appointed as Director of the Graduate Group in Asian Studies for a three year term beginning July 1, 2016. 

From the Institute of East Asian Studies' web page:

June 14, 2016

Date/Time: Tuesday, June 14, 2016 - 15:00

Gainesville, Fla.—The University of Florida Press is pleased to announce that submissions are now being accepted for a new journal, Bioarchaeology International.

May 2, 2016

February 29, 2016

Date/Time: Monday, February 29, 2016 - 14:30
We are delighted to announce that our very own Professor Laurie Wilkie has been named the recipient of the 2014-2015 Distinguished Teaching Award from the Division of Social Sciences. 

February 11, 2016

Date/Time: Thursday, February 11, 2016 - 16:30

 Professor Wilkie’s work about Mardia Gras is featured in Forbes, the Atlantic, and Berkeley News this week.

Forbes / Science

February 9, 2016

February 8, 2016

Date/Time:  Monday, February 8, 2016 - 11:00

January 29, 2016

This month the American Ethnologist published a collection of articles about the refugee crisis in Europe, including an article by Professor Seth Holmes, the Martin Sisters Endowed Chair Assistant Professor in the UC Berkeley School of Public Health's Community Health and Human Development Division and the Graduate Program in Medical Anthropology. Seth is also the Co-Director of the MD/PhD Track in Medical Anthropology coordinated between UCSF and UC Berkeley. 

January 13, 2016

Date/Time:  Wednesday, January 6, 2016 - 03:30

January 7, 2016

Date/Time: 
Thursday, January 7, 2016 - 18:30

Nancy Scheper-Hughes is a professor of medical anthropology in the Department of Anthropology at UC Berkeley, and director of Organs Watch. She advises the World Health Organization, the European Union and the United Nations.

December 15, 2015

Date/Time: Tuesday, December 15, 2015 - 12:00

November 11, 2015

Date/Time: Wednesday, November 11, 2015 - 11:30

November 5, 2015

October 22, 2015

October 15, 2015

Blue and Orange book cover fot Religious Difference in a Secular Age, published by Princeton University Press, Professor Saba Mahmood

Date/Time: Thursday, October 15, 2015 - 02:00

Please take a look at recently published books by our faculty and emeritus faculty.

Date/Time: 
Friday, November 20, 2015 - 07:30
Berkeley Graduate Student Annie Malcolm recently installed an exhibition and gave a talk at the Shanghai Biennale, at the West Bund Art and Design Center. The Shanghai exhibition, "Art+Village+City," is a satellite of the exhibition of the same name here on the UC Berkeley campus, on display now in the Wurster Gallery through November 14th. The exhibition draws from a Spring 2015 interdisciplinary research studio sponsored by the Global Urban Humanities Initiative.

September 15, 2015

Date/Time: 
Tuesday, September 15, 2015 - 12:30

September 12, 2015

Date/Time: 
Friday, September 11, 2015 - 12:00

September 9, 2015

Date/Time: 
Thursday, October 15, 2015 - 09:00 to Saturday, October 17, 2015 - 20:00

August 28, 2015

Date/Time: 
Friday, August 28, 2015 - 10:00

The UC Berkeley Anthropology Department is happy to announce that our own Professor Emerita of Anthropology, Elizabeth Colson, has been awarded the 2015 Constantine Panunzio Distinguished Emeriti Award, along with Professor Emeritus of Psychology, Pavel Machotka of UC Santa Cruz. 

May 14, 2015

Jun Sunseri, Anthropology
Faculty Award for Community Engaged Scholarship, 2015

April 22, 2015

Alexei Yurchak's research and upcoming book about Lenin's preservation are featured in a Scientific American story for Lenin's 145th anniversary. 

March 27, 2015

March 9, 2015

Symposium for The Unexpected From the Field (STUFF)

July 11, 2014

Ethan Watters ("Crazy like Us") has published a  long and contentious profile on Anthropology Professor Nancy Scheper-Hughes and her heretical methods in Pacific Standard Magazine . A rejoinder will appear soon on the same website and in the hard copy of the Magazine.

June 18, 2014

January 9, 2014

The RTE Irish public TV series "What in the World"  featured a documentary on December 23, 2013 looking at the global  business of illegally brokered and trafficked organs for transplants between the USA and Isreal. Professor Nancy Scheper-Hughes is interviewed about the first person, Izak Rosenbaum, to be convicted of human organ trafficking in the US. [This video clip will only remain accessible until January 12, 2014]

Click here to view the documentary.

August 11, 2013

Proceedings of the May 2013 workshop are now available.

July 31, 2013

The Department of Anthropology at the University of California, Berkeley invites
applications for a full-time, tenure-track position at the rank of assistant professor
focusing on the anthropology of race and racialization - the processes, practices, and power
relations that produce "race" as a social fact and a lived reality. The approach and
research specialization are open. Appointment will begin July 1, 2014, by which date the
Ph.D. or equivalent is required.

September 8, 2011

Professor Holston is co-director of a new Social Apps Lab that aims to "harness the participatory and creative energies of game-play to address social issues." It has already produced apps aimed at helping to track and prevent Dengue Fever and chase down Athsma-inducing pollution. See the CITRIS news release. 

Berkeley Anthropology Professor Rosemary Joyce was appointed to President Obama's Cultural Advisory Committee in July. The committee's purpose is to advise the president on issues concerning the protection of cultural heritage. See The Daily Californian news item at:

September 7, 2011

Professor Christine Hastorf is the recipient of the 2012 Fryxell Prize of the Society for American Archaeology. This is the premier award for interdisciplinary research in Archaeology. This year's competition focused on excellence, accomplishment and exemplary contributions in the botanical sciences. She will receive a medal at the 2012 annual meetings of the Society for American Archaeology and there will be a symposium organized in honor of her work that will take place at those 2012 meetings.

Jun Sunseri joins the U C Berkeley Anthropology Faculty starting Fall 2011. He was formerly a Chancellor's Postdoctoral Fellow in the department and was appointed as Assistant Professor to teach and do research in archaeology. His specialties are zooarchaeology, and GIS. He will be teaching Anthropology 2AC this Fall 2011.

September 1, 2011

The Department of Anthropology at U. C. Berkeley was founded on September 10, 1901.

August 29, 2011

Patrick V. Kirch, a UC Berkeley professor of anthropology and integrative biology and an authority on the archaeology of the Pacific Islands, has been awarded the 2011 Herbert E. Gregory Medal for Distinguished Service to Science in the Pacific Region.

August 18, 2011

To learn about Study Abroad Programs at Berkeley see:
http://studyabroad.berkeley.edu/

To find a Program that fits your interest see:
http://studyabroad.berkeley.edu/Programs/

August 10, 2011