Faculty
- APTER, ANDREW - aapter@history.ucla.edu (Ph.D in Anthropology, Yale University, 1987; Professor) West Africa (Yoruba, Nigeria) and the African Diaspora (Haiti, Dominican Republic, Cuba), History of Anthropology, Social Theory. Andrew Apter works on ritual, memory, and indigenous knowledge as well as colonial culture, commodity fetishism and state spectacle. His historical ethnography of Yoruba hermeneutics informs his research on “syncretism” and creolization in West Africa and the Americas.
- ARNOLD, JEANNE E. - jearnold@ucla.edu (Ph.D., Anthropology, University of California, Santa Barbara 1983; Professor) Archaeological theory, complex hunter-gatherers, craft specialization, political evolution, exchange systems, the prehistory and early contact era of the Pacific Coast of North America --- California and British Columbia.
- BARRETT, H. CLARK - barrett@anthro.ucla.edu (Ph.D., UC Santa Barbara 1999; Associate Professor) Evolutionary psychology, biological anthropology, cognitive development, hunter-gatherer ecology; South America.
- BOYD, ROBERT - rboyd@anthro.ucla.edu (Ph.D., UC Davis 1975 [Ecology]; Professor) Biological anthropology, mathematical models of cultural evolution, evolutionary theory. (Unlike other organisms, humans acquire a rich body of information from others by teaching, imitation, and other forms of social learning, and this culturally transmitted information strongly influences human behavior. Culture is an essential part of the human adaptation, and as much a part of human biology as bipedal locomotion or thick enamel on our molars. My research is focused on the evolutionary psychology of the mechanisms that give rise to and shape human culture, and how these mechanisms interact with population dynamic processes to shape human cultural variation. I have done much of this work in collaboration with Peter J. Richerson)
- BRANTINGHAM, P. JEFFREY - branting@ucla.edu (Ph.D., U. of Arizona 1999; Associate Professor) DEPARTMENT VICE CHAIR Paleoanthropology, simulation modeling, carnivore ecology, hunter-gatherers, stone technology, evolutionary theory; China, Mongolia, Tibet.
- BROWNER, CAROLE - browner@ucla.edu (Ph.D., UC Berkeley 1976; Professor In Residence) Social impact of decoding the human genome, reproductive politics; Latin America, urban U. S. (M.P.H., UC Berkeley 1977)
- CATTELINO, JESSICA R. - jesscatt@anthro.ucla.edu (Ph.D., NYU 2004; Associate Professor) Sociocultural anthropology, citizenship and sovereignty, indigeneity and settler colonialism, economy and value, gender, environment, American public culture, Indian gaming; United States, Native North America.
- DURANTI, ALESSANDRO - aduranti@anthro.ucla.edu (Ph.D., University of Southern California 1981 (Linguistics); Professor) Linguistic anthropology, ethnopragmatics, phenomenological and anthropological theories of intentionality and human agency, political discourse, literacy activities, improvisation in language and music; jazz aesthetics; history of US anthropology; Samoa, U.S., Italy.
- FESSLER, DANIEL M.T. - dfessler@anthro.ucla.edu (Ph.D., UC San Diego, 1995; Associate Professor) Evolutionary psychology, biological anthropology; emotions, social control, risk taking, ingestive and reproductive behaviors, morality, cultural evolution; Indonesia.
- FISKE, ALAN - afiske@ucla.edu (Ph.D. University of Chicago, 1985; Professor) Psychological anthropology, social theory, methodology; Africa
- GARRO, LINDA C - lgarro@anthro.ucla.edu (Ph.D., Duke 1982 [Psychology], UC Irvine 1983 [Social Sciences]; Professor) Cognitive anthropology, medical anthropology, research methods; Mesoamerica, northern North America.
- GOODWIN, MARJORIE H. - mgoodwin@anthro.ucla.edu (Ph.D., Pennsylvania 1978; Professor) Ethnography of communication, human interaction, conversation analysis, language and gender, workplace ethnography, children's social organization.
- GUPTA, AKHIL - akgupta@anthro.ucla.edu (Ph.D. Stanford University Dept. of Engineering-Economic Systems, 1988; Professor) Ethnography of information technology, the state and development, anthropology of food, environmental anthropology, space and place, history of anthropology, applied anthropology; India and South Asia. (2009: On leave Winter & Spring Quarters)
- HALE, SONDRA - sonhale@ucla.edu (Ph.D., UC Los Angeles, Anthropology, 1979; M.A. UC Los Angeles, African Studies 1967; B.A. UC Los Angeles, English Literature; Professor) Gender; political economy; social movements; postcolonial and cultural studies; nationalism and colonialism; diaspora; aesthetics; Islam/Islamism; Middle East and Africa (mainly Sudan and Eritrea).
- HOLLAN, DOUGLAS W - dhollan@anthro.ucla.edu (Ph.D., UC San Diego 1984; Professor) Psychological and cultural anthropology; ethnopsychology; cross-cultural psychiatry; person-centered ethnography; Indonesia, Oceania.
- KENNEDY, GAIL - kennedy@anthro.ucla.edu (Ph.D., St. Thomas's Hospital Medical School, London 1973; Associate Professor) Biological anthropology, Human evolution, Bioarchaeology, Evolutionary theory, Anthropological forensics, Paleopathology, Africa.
- KROSKRITY, PAUL V - paulvk@ucla.edu (Ph.D., Indiana 1977; Professor) Language and culture, language contact, language and identity, language ideologies, anthropology and verbal art, and the ethnography of communication; American Indian Languages (especially the Kiowa-Tanoan and Uto-Aztecan families); the Pueblo Southwest, Central California. (Chair, IDP in American Indian Studies (1986-2006))
- LESURE, RICHARD - lesure@ucla.edu (Ph.D. University of Michigan, 1995; Associate Professor) Archaeology of early village societies; sociopolitical dynamics and the origin of social inequality; Mesoamerica (The Origins of Social Inequality in Early Formative Mesoamerica is an investigation of sociopolitical dynamics in Mesoamerica's earliest settled villages, dated from 1600 to 1000 BC. Professor Lesure's field work has focused on the large village site of Paso de la Amada, on the coast of Chiapas, Mexico. Excavations revealed significant architectural elaboration, including the construction of earthen platforms, dating to 1450 BC. Analysis of household middens, as well as those associated with platforms, indicates that the high status activities and access to valued goods were not restricted during the time period of greatest architectural elaboration. Only after abandonment of the site's main platform and ceremonial precinct did economic differences between households emerge. The next stage will place the trajectory of development in a regional context in an attempt to resolve this puzzle.)
- LEVINE, NANCY E - nelevine@anthro.ucla.edu (Ph.D., Rochester 1978; Professor) Kinship and domestic economy, demography, social change, gender; Tibet and Central Asia. (Chair, General Campus Institutional Review Board of OPRS)
- MANSON, JOSEPH HOWARD - jmanson@anthro.ucla.edu (Ph.D., Michigan 1991; Professor) Primate behavioral ecology and social relationships; human face-to-face interaction
- MITCHELL-KERNAN, CLAUDIA - cmkernan@gdnet.ucla.edu (Ph.D., UC Berkeley 1969; Professor) Urban anthropology, sociolinguistics, Afro-American culture, Caribbean. (Not teaching, Dean/Vice-Chancellor Graduate Division)
- OCHS, ELINOR - eochs@anthro.ucla.edu (Ph.D. Pennsylvania 1974; Professor) Discourse structures, grammar in context, language and affect, spoken and written language. Language acquisition and language socialization (development/transmission of sociocultural knowledge through language, socialization of cognitive skills through language). Cross-cultural communication. Madagascar, Samoa, U.S., Italy. (Director, Center for Language, Interaction and Culture (CLIC))
- ORTNER, SHERRY B. - sortner@anthro.ucla.edu ((Ph.D., University of Chicago 1970); Professor) Critical cultural and social theory, including feminist theory; late capitalism in the US and globally; contemporary American culture in the wider world; theory and ethnography of media; Hollywood and the indie film scene.
- PARK, KYEYOUNG - kpark@anthro.ucla.edu (Ph.D., City University of New York 1990; Associate Professor) Urban anthropology, political economy, work, capitalism, class, gender, race/ethnicity, social justice, critical and multicultural theories, cultural transformation, migration, transnationalism/globalization; US and Korean/Asian Americans, Asians in the Americas, Asian diaspora, Korea.
- PERRY, SUSAN EMILY - sperry@anthro.ucla.edu (Ph.D., Michigan 1995; Professor) Primate social relationships, primate social cognition, communication; capuchins, macaques.
- READ, DWIGHT W - dread@anthro.ucla.edu (BA, Reed College 1964 [Mathematics]; MA, U. of Wisconsin 1965 [Mathematics]; Ph.D., UC Los Angeles 1970 [Mathematics]; Professor) Mathematical anthropology, kinship terminology, theory of social organization, hominid evolution, archaeological classification.
- SCELZA, BROOKE A - bscelza@anthro.ucla.edu (Ph.D., University of Washington, 2008; Assistant Professor) Human behavioral ecology, life history theory, reproductive ecology and maternal and child health; Australia, Namibia.
- SCHACHNER, GREGSON - gschachner@anthro.ucla.edu (Ph.D., Arizona State University 2007; Assistant Professor) North American archaeology, origins of villages and leadership in agricultural societies, settlement systems and analysis, ceramic analysis, social context of archaeological practice; American Southwest
- SILK, JOAN B - jsilk@anthro.ucla.edu (Ph.D., UC Davis 1981; Professor) Biological anthropology, primate behavior, evolutionary biology.
- SLYOMOVICS, SUSAN - ssly@anthro.ucla.edu (Ph.D., UC Berkeley 1985; Professor) Gender; human rights; folklore and material culture; visual anthropology; Middle East and North Africa (Director, G. E. Von Grunebaum Center for Near Eastern Studies, www.international.ucla.edu/cnes/)
- SMITH, MONICA L. - smith@anthro.ucla.edu (Ph.D., University of Michigan 1997 ; Associate Professor) Urbanism, economic networks, consumption and material culture, anthropology of food, comparative historical archaeology; South Asia, Mediterranean, Southwestern U.S.
- STANISH, CHARLES S - stanish@anthro.ucla.edu (Ph.D., Chicago 1985; Professor) Andean anthropology, settlement archaeology, and the evolution of social complexity. (Director, Cotsen Institute of Archaeology)
- TAMANOI, MARIKO - mtamanoi@ucla.edu (Ph.D., Northwestern 1982; Professor) Sociocultural anthropology, historical anthropology, political economy, gender studies; colonialism and nationalism; Japan and East Asia; Mexico and Spain (Catalonia) (Professor Mariko Tamanoi is also an affiliated faculty of the Center for the Study of Women at UCLA, member of the Center for Japanese Studies at UCLA, and member of the Council on the East Asian Studies at UCLA. )
- THORNTON, RUSSELL - rthornto@ucla.edu (Ph.D., Florida State University 1968 (Sociology); Postdoctoral, Harvard University 1968-69 (Social Relations); Postdoctoral, University of Southern California 1980 (Demography); Professor) American Indian historical demography, American Indian revitalization movements, American Indian winter counts, contemporary American Indian issues.
- THROOP, C. JASON - jthroop@ucla.edu (Ph.D. UCLA 2005; Assistant Professor) Psychological and medical anthropology, phenomenology, theories of experience in anthropology, self and subjective experience, empathy, pain/sensation/emotion, morality, temporality, anthropology of the will, Yap (Federated States of Micronesia)
- WEISNER, THOMAS S. - tweisner@ucla.edu (B.A., Reed College, 1965; Ph.D., Harvard 1973; Professor In Residence) Culture, human development and the family; children & families at risk; mixed methods; evidence-informed policy; Africa, United States.
- YAN, YUNXIANG - yan@anthro.ucla.edu (Ph.D., Harvard 1993; Professor) Economic anthropology, social change and development, family and kinship, exchange theory, peasant study, and cultural globalization.
Professor Emeritus
- BLURTON JONES, NICHOLAS G. - nickbj@.ucla.edu (Ph.D., Oxford 1962; Professor Emeritus) Biological anthropology, human ethology and ecology; evolutionary theory and cross-cultural patterns of mother-infant interaction. (Not teaching)
- BRODKIN, KAREN - kbrodkin@anthro.ucla.edu (Ph.D., Michigan 1971; Professor Emeritus) Social movements, Gender, work and kinship, political economy, theory, migration, race and contemporary North American cultures.
- DONNAN, CHRISTOPHER B - cdonnan@anthro.ucla.edu (Ph.D., UC Berkeley 1968; Professor Emeritus) South American archaeology, iconography, ancient technology (Moche civilization flourished on the north coast of Peru between AD 100 and 800. Although the Moche people had no writing system, they left a vivid artistic record of their beliefs and activities in beautifully sculpted and painted ceramic vessels, colorful wall murals, sumptuous textiles, and superbly crafted objects of gold, silver, and copper. Dos Cabezas is a spectacular early Moche settlement located at the delta of the Jequetepeque River. Consisting of pyramids, palaces and domestic areas, it is perhaps the largest early Moche settlement ever built. )
- GOLDSCHMIDT, WALTER R. - walterg@ucla.edu (Ph.D., UC Berkeley 1942; Professor Emeritus) Cultural theory, cultural ecology; East Africa. (Not teaching.)
- HAMMOND, PETER B. - phammond@ucla.edu (Ph.D., Northwestern 1962; Professor Emeritus) Social inequality, sexuality and gender, Africa, African Diaspora, whiteness
- JOHNSON, ALLEN - ajohnson@ucla.edu (Ph.D., Stanford 1968; Professor Emeritus) Cultural and political ecology, research design, psychological anthropology; native South America, Latin American communities.
- KENNEDY, JOHN G - (Ph.D., UC Los Angeles, 1962; Professor Emeritus) Theory of human behavior, cultural psychiatry, psychological anthropology; Middle East (Nubia, N. Yemen), Latin America (especially Tarahumara Indians). (Not in residence.)
- LANGNESS, LEWIS L - (Ph.D., Washington 1964; Professor Emeritus) Psychological and cultural anthropology, history of anthropology; Melanesia. (Not in residence.)
- MAQUET, JACQUES - (Ph.D., London 1952; Professor Emeritus) Social and cultural anthropology, aesthetic anthropology, symbolic systems, intentional communities; Africa, Sri Lanka. (Not teaching.)
- MOERMAN, MICHAEL - (Ph.D., Yale 1964; Professor Emeritus) Social interaction, conversational analysis, visual anthropology, ethnographic theory; Southeast Asia. (Not in residence.)
- NEWMAN, PHILIP L. - newman@anthro.ucla.edu (Ph.D., Washington 1962; Professor Emeritus) Culture theory, comparative religion, aesthetic systems; Oceania. (Not in residence.)
- OSWALT, WENDELL H. - (Ph.D., Arizona 1959; Professor Emeritus) Ethnology, technology; North America, Alaska. (Not in residence.)
- POSNANSKY, MERRICK - merrick@history.ucla.edu (Ph.D., Nottingham University, 1956; Professor Emeritus) The archaeology of state formation and urban growth in Ghana and Togo; archaeology of the African Diaspora; cultural conservation and archaeological education in tropical Africa; postage stamps and national cultural policy (The Hani ethnoarchaeological survey, initiated in 1970, involves monitoring daily and seasonal activities in a Ghanaian traditional community of around 2000 peasant cultivators some 270 miles northwest of the capital. This twenty-five year longitudinal study facilitated the observation of processes of change and the attitudes of the villagers to major environmental, economic, and political changes. Hani is the successor village to the medieval and early modern town of Begho (ca. AD 1100-1800) which with a probable population of over 10,000 was one of the largest towns in the southern part of West Africa at the time of the arrival of the Portuguese in 1471. Excavations were conducted at the site from 1970 to 1979. Conclusions have been drawn as to the effects of different types of change. The work, initiated while Dr. Posnansky was Professor of Archaeology at the University of Ghana, has continued in close cooperation with former colleagues and students of that university. The project is now in the writing up stage and a summary account appears in the African Archaeological review for 2002. <h3>Additional Links</h3> <a href="http://www.ioa.ucla.edu/staff/posnansky/jewelofthenile.pdf">Prof. Posnansky in Sunday Magazine: "Jewel of the Nile"</a>)
- PRICE-WILLIAMS, DOUGLASS R - dpw@ucla.edu (Ph.D., London 1963; Professor Emeritus) Psychological anthropology, cross-cultural cognitive studies, cross-cultural studies of dreams (Not in residence)
- SACKETT, JAMES R. - jsackett@ucla.edu (Ph.D. Harvard University, 1965; Professor Emeritus) Paleolithic (Old Stone Age) archaeology of France, history and theory of archaeology (My biggest field effort was at the site of Solvieux, which is without rival for size and complexity in Western Europe. From 1967 through 1974, Solvieux was intensively researched by a joint UCLA-University of Bordeaux project. In all, 2500 cubic meters of deposit were excavated, producing a kilometer of stratigraphic sections, 2000 square meters of horizontally exposed occupation surface, and some 5000 retouched stone tools representing eleven distinct archaeological levels. )
- WILBERT, JOHANNES - jwilbert@ucla.edu (Ph.D., Cologne University 1955; Professor Emeritus) Ethnology, cognitive anthropology; South America. (Not teaching)
- WILLIAMS, BOBBY J. - (Ph.D., Michigan 1965; Professor Emeritus) Biological anthropology, population and quantitative genetics, human ecology. (Not in residence.)