Emeriti

Michael Siegel is a physical anthropologist interested in craniofacial biology, with a clinical specialty in cleft palate and other craniofacial anomalies.

He is also interested in functional anatomy, animal models, and physiological adaptation to stress.

Among others, he teaches anatomy and research design courses.

Research Description

Functional Anatomy

Evolutionary changes in brain growth patterns and resultant skull base morphologies from sharks through humans (yellow arrows denote orientation of spinal cord and the foramen magnum).

Midsagittal spatial relationships of the human skull base skeletal elements and articulations in the late fetal period. Anteroposterior growth of the skull base depends on three synchondroses:

The short-faced animal model. Palatal view of cleaned and dried adult skulls of a cat (left), monkey (middle), and chimpanzee (right). Note the U-shaped dental arches and the shortened premaxillae relative to the other palatal components.

The long-faced animal model. Palatal view of cleaned and dried adult skulls (from left to right) of the rat, rabbit, dog, and baboon. Note the elongated premaxillae relative to the other palatal components and the reduced incisive foramen (if) in the dog and baboon skulls.

The "generic" animal model. Palatal view of cleaned and dried skulls of an adult rabbit (left) and rat (right). Note the elongated premaxillae (pm), the large incisive foramen (if), small maxillary and palatine components, and the V-shaped dental arch.

The "phylogenetically-closer" animal model. Lateral (occlusal) view of cleaned and dried skulls of an adult cat (top), dog (middle), and rhesus monkey (bottom). Note the multiple tooth classes, reduced post-canine diastema, and the interlocking "canine complex" in the cat and dog skulls.

Fitting appropriate animal models. Palatal view of a cleaned and dried adult human (left) and chimpanzee (right) skulls. Note the reduced incisive foramen (if), the U-shaped dental arch and the similarities in relativeproportions of the three palatal-midfacial components.

Courses

Primate Anatomy

This course offers a detailed consideration of the anatomy of the primates. It will follow an integrated regional approach (i.e., the back, the upper extremities, the hand, etc.), however, the major focus will be on the musculoskeletal system. Students will dissect human material (cadavers) but emphasis will be on the comparative aspects within the order whenever possible. Other non-human primate skeletal material will also be used. There will be two exams, written and practical and oral and practical, each worth 50 percent of the final grade. The course will meet for four scheduled hours per week of laboratory and lecture, and the lab will be available for extra use. Instruments will be available in the laboratory. Dissecting gowns are required. This course is offered every other year. Dr. Siegel's permission is required to register for this course. Before students can receive permission to register for the class they must have completed the Bloodborne Pathogens training session (in person – not online module) and received a certification.

Introduction to Physical Anthropology

This is an introduction to the various disciplines that have been brought to bear in the study of humans and other primates. The course will have an evolutionary perspective as we review living primates (distribution, features of behavior and morphology) and their fossil histories. Particular attention will be paid to how humans have come to look the way we do.

Human Evolution and Variation

Undergraduate Seminar. This seminar will explore the literature of variation in "polytypic" humans. We will make use of other animal domesticants as models for our self-domesticated species. In addition to looking at present day variations and their history in this light, we will consider the social use of scientific findings as well as the implications for distribution of disease and pathology. No text book. Required readings will cover the "classics" as well as current literature. There are no exams or papers but a final class presentation and an annotated bibliography will be required. Dr. Siegel's permission is required to register for this course.

Structure and Function

Students will explore the literature of human biology and develop questions and hypotheses regarding undocumented concepts. Each student's goal will be to design a laboratory study which tests the hypothesis he/she has formulated. Areas which might be investigated might include locomotion, feeding adaptations, and adaptation to various environmental conditions. Students will learn techniques of experimental surgery used to investigate the relationship between structure and function. At the conclusion of this course, the student will have learned how to select a research topic and carry out a study from start to finish.

Richard Scaglion is a four-field anthropologist who specializes in the study of the Pacific Islands and has developing interests in Latin America. He is particularly interested in human migration and mobility in Oceania, in people’s relationships with their natural environments, and in the growth of social complexity. His applied work has involved the anthropology of law and sustainable development in island nations. He has a special relationship with the Abelam people of Papua New Guinea, with whom he has conducted long-term field research beginning in 1974.

Research Description

Professor Scaglion collaborates in a broad range of interdisciplinary projects aimed at unraveling questions about human adaptation in the Pacific Islands and beyond. An ongoing interest is in the prehistory, history, social development and contemporary life of the Abelam people of Papua New Guinea. Another recent project involves the dispersal of the sweet potato, a new world cultivar, throughout the Pacific Islands. This research has led him to consider the possibility of pre-Columbian human contact between Polynesia and South America, and has resulted in several new research projects in Ecuador. And recently he has worked collaboratively to produce a monograph about the Polynesian outliers, a group of small islands that lie outside the Polynesian triangle, to examine their relationships with their neighbors and with ancient Polynesia.

The Abelam People

Famous for their artwork and for their majestic, towering spirit houses that dominate village skylines, the Abelam people are also well-known for growing and exchanging huge ceremonial yams that often exceed 3 meters (10 feet) in length. Dr. Scaglion has written about how yam beliefs act to organize and synchronize many aspects of Abelam life, and about how food is used in non-nutritive, symbolic and expressive ways.

Abelam spirit house or temple in which many ritual activities take place.

Like many other peoples of New Guinea, the Abelam traditionally have an egalitarian social organization, lacking formal political offices and social hierarchies. How do they maintain social order with no police, courts, judges or jails? They have very rich ceremonial and social lives.  How do they organize their activities without formal political or religious leaders?

During elaborate male initiation ceremonies, costumed dancers with towering headdresses adorned with colorful feathers perform on the ceremonial ground in front of the temples.

Abelam “big man,” a political figure who leads by influence but has no formal authority.

In some parts of the Pacific islands, most notably in eastern Polynesia, there are complex chiefdoms with formal leaders who orchestrate public works. How and why did these chiefdoms arise? Why didn’t they develop in the mountains of New Guinea, which has dense populations based on agricultural intensification and other characteristics generally associated with the growth of social differentiation?

Dr. Scaglion has examined these and other questions in over forty years of work with the Abelam people. He has described their conflict management techniques in his PhD thesis, studied their social organization, worked on legal development projects to establish Village Courts (which blend together introduced and customary legal systems) in their territory, and has assisted in their efforts to achieve sustainable economic development.

Diffusion of the Sweet Potato in the Pacific Islands

The sweet potato (Ipomoea batatas) was important in many agricultural systems throughout the Pacific Islands long before Europeans arrived. Yet botanists have established that the cultivar was first domesticated in the New World, probably in South America.  How and when did it arrive in the Pacific Islands? Archaeological research indicates the presence of sweet potatoes in central Polynesia more than 1,000 years ago, and linguistic evidence suggests a human-mediated introduction. The word kumara is used throughout the Pacific islands and also in parts of South America, suggesting the introduction of the sweet potato into the Pacific could have been effected by Polynesian voyagers who sailed to the west coast of South America, collected the tuber, and brought it back to Polynesia. From there it may have spread more widely throughout the Pacific. Currently, DNA fingerprinting techniques are being applied to sweet potato samples to test hypotheses about the spread of sweet potatoes in Oceania and the influence of European-era introductions on modern diversity. The movement of sweet potatoes throughout the Pacific can teach us much about human migration and mobility in Oceania.

The Polynesian Outliers

Outside of Polynesia, in areas commonly designated Micronesia and Melanesia, lie about two dozen islands, most of them small and widely separated, whose inhabitants speak Polynesian languages and share other characteristics with triangle Polynesians. These islands are collectively termed the Polynesian outliers. While the great Polynesian centers endured major disruptions before trained observers had an opportunity to record their lifeways, many of the outliers, owing mainly to their remote locations, experienced much less social change, making them particularly interesting for anthropologists, and critical for the comparative study of Polynesia. Who are these peoples? Where did they originate, and how did they come to settle in these remote islands? What is their relationship to the better-known Polynesian societies? Can they, in some way, be thought of as representing Polynesian society before it became permanently altered by contact with Europeans? Dr. Scaglion has collaborated with many anthropologists who have worked in these islands to produce a new volume exploring these and other questions and to provide the first synthetic, comparative treatment of the Polynesian outliers. [Figure 6] The settlement and development of these remote outposts of Polynesia can also teach us much about human migration and mobility in Oceania.

Feinberg, Richard and Richard Scaglion (eds.) Polynesian Outliers: The State of the Art. Ethnology Monographs No. 21, 2012.

Courses

Professor Scaglion is no longer teaching courses.

Survey Courses

Introduction to Cultural Anthropology

Anthropology is the study of humanity through time and across the globe. Cultural anthropology concentrates on the comparative analysis of living and recent human societies. By examining the behavior and customs of peoples throughout the world, this course considers what it means to be human. We investigate patterns of language and learning, marriage and family organization, warfare and violence, political and economic systems, beliefs and ritual life, etc., of people throughout the world, and compare them with social patterns in the United States. We also explore themes that unite contemporary peoples in a transnational, globalizing world.

Cultures of the Pacific

The South Pacific has a certain romantic appeal in popular imagination: swaying palm trees, mild tropical breezes, unspoiled, uninhibited people. Is this true? What are the people of this region really like? How do they feel about these popular images of themselves? What can we learn about human nature by studying the cultures of the South Pacific?

This class uses information about the peoples and cultures of Oceania as a vehicle for exploring basic anthropological ideas and concepts. In examining the customs of traditional Pacific peoples, we probe the ranges of human diversity, and by comparing these with very different American social patterns, we increase our understanding of what it means to be human. Students in this class also gain a greater appreciation of anthropology as a profession as they read firsthand the "field experiences" of several anthropologists.

The course treats both the traditional and contemporary cultures of the three major areas of the Pacific: Polynesia, Melanesia and Micronesia. It includes a geographical and historical introduction to Oceania as well as an examination of its contemporary social and political status.

Undergraduate Seminar

Anthropological Theory

This course is an overview of the major social theories and debates that stimulate and inform anthropological analysis. We  investigate a range of theoretical directions in anthropology such as social evolution, historical particularism, functionalism, cultural ecology, ethnoscience and cognitive approaches, symbolic anthropology and postmodernism; and topics such as culture, social change, structure, agency, subjectivity, power, and the politics of representation. Requirements center around a close critical reading of primary texts in the history of anthropological thinking that are collected together in Anthropological Theory by McGee and Warms. The course provides an opportunity for students to learn about the development of central theoretical issues and assumptions in anthropology, gain familiarity with key writings of the major historical figures, understand essential aspects of the major theoretical paradigms that have inspired the discipline together with their historical contexts, and expand their critical thinking skills through evaluation of the strengths and weaknesses of different theoretical paradigms. Because contemporary anthropological theory is built upon earlier works, students are introduced both to the history of ideas and to current directions.

Graduate Seminars

Anthropology and Ecology

The course provides an overview of Ecological Anthropology tailored towards the interests of students who enroll. Ecological Anthropology focuses on the complex relations between people and their environments. It explores how culture influences the dynamic interactions between human populations and the ecosystems in their habitats through time. Ecological Anthropology is a relatively new field, having developed mainly since the 1950s. It is now a recognized topical specialization that crosscuts the traditional subfields of anthropology with its own separate unit within the American Anthropological Association called the Anthropology and Environment Section.

Special Topics in Pacific Islands Studies

The course uses the cultures of the Pacific Islands (including Polynesia, Melanesia, Micronesia, and Australia) as a framework for examining problems of general anthropological interest tailored to the interests of the students in the course. These may include such issues as the contributions of Pacific ethnology to anthropological theory; the interrelationships between people and the natural environment; the nature of gender; the origins of agriculture, the nature and development of social stratification, trade and exchange, and the nature of prestige-based economies; development issues such as health care delivery and educational services in a globalizing world, etc. The course will include an ethnographic survey of the Pacific area and an examination of contemporary problems in the region.

Pacific Prehistory

The course provides a basic survey of the prehistory of the Pacific Islands including an investigation of how they were settled, but its primary purpose is to use the cultures of the Pacific Islands (including Polynesia, Melanesia, Micronesia, and Australia) as a framework for examining problems of general interest to both prehistorians and ethnographers.  These may include such issues as the origins of agriculture, the nature and development of social stratification, the interrelationships between people and the natural environment, trade and exchange, the nature of prestige-based economies, etc.  These and other issues will be explored through lectures, class discussions, and readings

Robert Hayden (J.D., Ph.D.) is an anthropologist of law and politics. His primary research for more than three decades has focused on the Balkans, but has also done fieldwork in India (1970s, 1992, 2013) and among the Seneca Iroquois of New York State (1970s). Following ethnographic research on Yugoslav socialism from 1981-89, he did extensive work on issues of violence, nationalism, constitutionalism and state reconstruction in the formerly Yugoslav space, as well as on transitional justice issues stemming from the Yugoslav wars. From 2007-2013 Professor Hayden headed Antagonistic Tolerance: An International & Interdisciplinary Project on Competitive Sharing of Religious Sites, which developed and analyzed, variously, ethnographic, historical and archaeological data from Bosnia, Bulgaria, India, Mexico, Peru, Portugal and Turkey. His new research stemming from this project include studies of sufi/ dervish orders in post-imperial settings, and the (re)construction of religious sites to mark competing national territorial claims in Bosnia since the end of the war there.

Courses

Violence, Tolerance and Dominance at Shared Religious Sites

Undergraduate Seminar. This course analyzes “antagonistic tolerance,” or contested sharing of religious sites. Worldwide, and widely throughout history, sacred sites have been shared, and sometimes contested, by members of different religious communities. Long periods of peaceful interaction and even religious syncretism may be punctuated by periods of violence, and the physical transformation of the shared sites. This course examines this dynamic by looking at case studies drawn from Europe (Bulgaria, Portugal, Turkey), Asia (India) and Latin America (the Inka Empire). The approach draws on both cultural anthropology and archeology, and some of the case studies are based on recent ethnography, others on ethnohistorical data, others still on archeological data. The cases have been developed in the course of a large-scale comparative research project by the instructor and an international team of scholars, and the course will work through their initial efforts at drawing conclusions from this ongoing project. The course will thus be an introduction to an ongoing, complex project in anthropology, including both archeology and cultural anthropology. Students will be encouraged to think about how the general model might be applicable in other world regions. Requirements: There will be a midterm examination and a seminar paper, the latter due at the end of the term. Since this is a new area of research, class attendance and participation are very important. No prerequisites: There are no formal pre-requisites, but students should have had some basic courses in anthropology (cultural and/ or archeology), history, or other social sciences

Cultures and Societies of Eastern Europe

This course offers an introduction to the societies of Eastern Europe with an accent on the cultural history of the region during the modern epoch (Russian/USSR excluded). The course begins with an examination of the various intellectual inventions of Eastern Europe, as well as of the widely differing political consequences of such exercises in “philosophical geography” for various parts of the region. Local versions of the “processes of civilization” and their social consequences will be discussed, as well as the reception of modern ideas and ideologies (and various forms of counter-reaction to such influences). The rapidly diversifying strategies of principal social actors, the dynamics of such cultural processes, the new roles of ideologies like nationalism, and the resulting social divides, political cleavages and “culture wars” will be considered. Attention will also be given to issues of everyday-life, popular culture, and the diversification of individual lifestyles. The final grade will be based on mid-term and final exams and on class participation. Students will have the option of writing an essay on a theme or film presented in class, in place of the midterm exam.

Cultures & Society of India

This course focuses on contemporary Indian social and cultural formations, after reviewing some very basic cultural history and geography, and the development of the country and those formations since independence. Since independence in 1947, India has developed from an overwhelmingly agricultural and traditional society that was not able to grow enough food for its 325 million population, to an increasingly urban, developed society of 1.2 billion that exports food along with a wide range of products and services, including cutting-edge high-tech ones. The Indian middle class is growing rapidly. India is also the world’s largest democracy, and has dealt, very substantially though not in full measure (to cite first Prime Minister Nehru) with the complexities of a multi-religious, multi-ethnic, and in all other ways extraordinarily diverse societyTopics to be covered include the interactions of religious communities in a secular state; caste, class, gender and other principles of social distinction; regional identities; socio-economic development; and the intertwining of all of these factors in democratic (or at least electoral) politics.

Ethno-National Violence

Undergraduate seminar.  Violence between members of different ethnic and religious communities within what had been nation states is increasingly common: Syria, Afghanistan, Iraq, Ukraine, to name just a few current cases.  Yet such violence is not new – in the past century alone, it has occurred in many countries throughout the world.  This course examines the logic and frequent tactics of such violence in Europe (Greece/ Turkey 1923, Cyprus 1974, Yugoslavia 1941-45 and 1991-95), South Asia (India/ Pakistan 1947, India since then), and the Middle East (Israel/ Palestine; Syria) among others.  We will pay particular attention to links between religion and conflict, and to gendered patterns of violence.  Most readings are ethnographic, close analyses of cases; but comparative frameworks will also be developed.  I assume no special knowledge by students of any of the case studies before the course begins.  By the end of the course, students will have an understanding of contemporary cases of violence, and also of the common features of such violence in the modern period.

Kathleen Musante is a cultural anthropologist whose main research interests are in medical anthropology and the anthropology of food and nutrition. She draws on perspectives from both bio-cultural anthropology and political economy. She has a secondary appointment in the Department of Behavioral and Community Health Sciences in the Graduate School of Public Health, and currently serves as the Director of the Center for Latin American Studies.

In particular she has interests in the health and nutrition impacts of economic and agricultural development policies in Latin America; child survival and adult health in developing countries; nutrition and health of older adults and youth in rural settings in the United States; and health decision making in pluralistic settings. She is a qualitative methodologist and a specialist in the use of participant observation in ethnographic research.

She has carried out research in Mexico, Honduras, Brazil, Ecuador, and Kentucky.

Research Description

Her current research examines the health and nutrition of indigenous peoples of the Ecuadorian Amazon, and the impact of 20 years of income generating projects for women on the social power of women and the welfare of their children in Manabí Province, Ecuador.

Courses

Anthropology of Food

Undergraduate Seminar. This course will examine the social ecology of human nutrition. It will apply the concepts and principles of anthropology to the study of human diet and nutrition. Discussions will focus on the origins of the human diet; human dietary adaptation to diverse ecological and technological situations; behavioral and ecological factors that influence diet in technologically simple, modernizing and contemporary societies; and social/cultural meanings and implications of food behaviors.

Medical Anthropology 2

This course offers a survey of selected topics in contemporary medical anthropology. Topics to be covered may include cross-cultural and biocultural approaches to the study of sickness and healing, critical approaches to the study of biomedicine, interpretive approaches to ethnomedical systems, meaning-centered approaches to understanding the experience of suffering and pain, and the social construction of illness and healing. Special topics investigated include the anthropology of the body and sexuality, and physician-patient communication. Other topics can be added in accordance with student interests.