Recent Faculty Activities (2011–2013)
Renee Walker has
just published an introductory textbook entitled “Prehistoric World Cultures” (Cognella
Press). This text covers the significant events, developments and cultural
changes in world prehistory. The text provides students with an understanding
of changes through time from the evolution of our species to the development of
complex civilizations.
John Relethford’s recent paper in
the American
Journal of Physical Anthropology
on the population genetics of the Irish Travellers (see item below) was chosen
as a “Research Highlight” in the December 6 issue of the international science
journal Nature (492:10, 2012).
John Relethford is the senior author of a paper entitled
“Genetic drift and the population history of the Irish Travellers” published in
the American
Journal of Physical Anthropology (150:184–189, 2013), with Michael
Crawford of the University of Kansas as coauthor. This paper uses genetic data
from red blood cell markers collected by Crawford in the 1970s to address the
origins of the Irish Travellers, an itinerant group in Ireland. Some have
argued that the Travellers are of Irish origin, and others have proposed that
they are related to the Roma, based on superficial similarity of lifestyle.
Genetic distance analyses show that the Travellers are of Irish origin, and
genetic differences from the rest of Ireland have resulted from genetic drift
(random fluctuations in the frequencies of genetic markers due to small
population size).
Sallie Han has been
elected chair of the Council
on Anthropology and Reproduction, a professional organization of
researchers and practitioners working on issues of reproduction. CAR, founded
in 1979, is one of the largest Special Interest Groups of the Society for Medical Anthropology, with
more than 200 members from the United States and abroad. The group convenes at
the annual meetings of the American Anthropological Association, and sponsors a
graduate student paper award and a book prize to recognize emerging and
influential scholarship on reproduction. She will be serving as chair-elect
during 2013, then serve a two-year term as chair of
CAR.
Tracy Betsinger co-organized a symposium entitled, “Culture,
Morbidity, and Mortality in the Southeast: Current Research in Bioarchaeology” at the 69th annual meeting of the Southeastern Archaeological
Conference, Baton Rouge, Louisiana. As part of the symposium, Dr. Betsinger presented the paper “Transpositions, Talon Cusps,
and Supernumerary Teeth: Chewing Over the Meaning of
Anomalies of the Permanent Dentition in Late Prehistoric East Tennessee,” which
examined dental anomalies in a prehistoric population and their indication of
genetic relatedness of the group.
Tracy Betsinger coauthored two papers (“Designating the
Deviants: An Exploration of Mortuary Traditions at the Drawsko
1 Cemetery Site” and “3D Drawsko: The Possibilities
and Problems with Digitizing the Post-Medieval Crania in Poland”) that were
presented at the annual meeting of the Canadian
Association for Physical Anthropology in Victoria, British Columbia.
Sallie Han
presented a paper entitled “The Chemical Pregnancy: Technology and the Making
of a New Reproductive Experience” at a conference on “Mothering
and Reproduction” presented by the Motherhood Initiative for Research
and Community Involvement in Toronto, Canada, October 2012. The paper
examines the role of technology in the cultural and social making of women’s
reproductive experience. It discusses how the home pregnancy test has affected
the experience not only of pregnancy, but also its loss, especially as tests
now enable the earlier detection of hormonal pregnancies that might not be
physiologically viable
John Relethford was one of several scientists interviewed
for a news story for the August 25th issue of Science News. This story,
entitled “Tangled
Roots: Mingling among Stone Age peoples muddles humans’ evolutionary story,”
discusses implications of recent discoveries of ancient DNA for understanding
the origin of modern humans and their relationship to earlier human groups.
John Relethford has published the ninth edition of his
introductory biological anthropology text, The
Human Species: An Introduction to Biological Anthropology, published by
McGraw-Hill (2013).
John Relethford is the author of a new textbook, Human
Population Genetics, published by Wiley-Blackwell (2012). This book is
an introduction to the study of population genetics, the mathematical basis of
evolutionary theory, with specific reference to application to human
populations and anthropological questions.
John Relethford has been appointed to a three-year term on
the Editorial Board of American
Anthropologist, the flagship journal of the American Anthropological Association.
The New York
State Library, Manuscripts and Special Collections, has accepted for its archives
the collected papers of William A. Starna (Professor
Emeritus, Department of Anthropology, College at Oneonta; Adjunct Professor
Emeritus of Geography, Queen’s University, Kingston, ON) and Jack Campisi (formerly adjunct professor, anthropology, College
at Oneonta, and Wellesley College). The collection spans the period from 1974
to 2011 and reflects Campisi’s and Starna’s research on and duties as expert witnesses for
American Indian land claims, in particular those brought by each of the
Iroquois nations in New York State and Wisconsin, and the research for and
preparation of petitions submitted by over twenty native communities from
throughout the United States for federal acknowledgment as American Indian
tribes. In addition, the collection contains materials on Campisi’s
and Starna’s historical and legal consultancies
related to matters of federal taxation of American Indians and cultural
evaluations for environmental damages to native communities as determined by
federal courts, and on disputes over treaty rights in the United States and
Ontario, Canada.
John Relethford has been elected Chair-Elect of Section H
(Anthropology) of the American Association for
the Advancement of Science. He will serve one year as Chair-Elect, one year
as Chair, and one year as Retiring Chair. Click here
for more information from a SUCO news story.
Tracy Betsinger is coauthor on a paper entitled “Differential
visibility of treponemal disease in pre-Columbian
stratified societies: Does rank matter?” in the American
Journal of Physical Anthropology (144:185–195, 2011).
John Relethford published a book review of 99%
Ape: How Evolution adds Up (University of Chicago Press), edited by J Silvertown in the American
Journal of Physical Anthropology (144:331,
2011).
John Relethford is a coauthor of the second edition of the
textbook Human
Biological Variation, published by Oxford University Press (2011). The
other authors are James Mielke (lead author),
Department of Anthropology, University of Kansas, and Lyle Konigsberg,
Department of Anthropology, University of Illinois. The text focuses on the
data and methods used by anthropologists and geneticists to measure and analyze
biological diversity in living humans. Topics include an historical review of
studies of human variation, genetic models of variation, variation in genetic
markers of the blood, variation in DNA markers, other biochemical variations,
body and cranial measures, pigmentation, behavior genetics, and genetic studies
of human ancestry and history. The text is for upper-division courses in human
variation.
