Faculty

Our department has nineteen full-time faculty members. All of our faculty members conduct anthropology-centered interdisciplinary research. Together, they specialize within our three anthropology subfields: archaeology, biological anthropology, and sociocultural anthropology.

Faculty

Name Contact Research specialties
Michelle Brown
Associate Professor
Biological Anthropology
612-625-9496
brow7100@umn.edu
365 Hubert H. Humphrey Center
primate behavior and ecology; feeding competition; intergroup conflict; cooperation; hormones and energetics; movement ecology; animal communication; gastrointestinal parasites; social evolution; East Africa
Erin Durban
Associate Professor
Sociocultural Anthropology
612-625-9862
edurbana@umn.edu
383 Hubert H. Humphrey Center
queer and trans* studies, feminist studies, critical disability studies, transnational American studies, political anthropology, social movements, critical ecologies, Haiti/ Caribbean, U.S. imperialism
Aisha Ghani
Assistant Professor
Sociocultural Anthropology
aghani@umn.edu
369 Hubert H. Humphrey Center
religion & secularism; law, violence, sovereignty, Islam; psychoanalysis, poetry & poetics, political theory, literary theory, courtroom ethnography; Islam and Muslim communities in the United States
Katherine Hayes
Director of Graduate Studies
Associate Professor
Archaeology
612-626-7482
kathayes@umn.edu
386 Hubert H. Humphrey Center
historical archaeology, memory and forgetting, heritage studies, archaeologies and/of settler colonialism in North America, archaeological ethics and repatriation, ceramic analysis, material culture studies
Serra Hakyemez
Assistant Professor
Sociocultural Anthropology
612-625-9480
hakyemez@umn.edu
365 Hubert H. Humphrey Center
law, psychoanalysis, decolonization, incarceration, counterinsurgency warfare, social movements, armed resistance, media studies, Kurdish freedom movement, Turkey, Southwest Asia and North African (SWANA)
Karen Ho
Professor
Sociocultural Anthropology
612-626-1313
karenho@umn.edu
395 Hubert H. Humphrey Center
cultural studies of finance capital, finance, globalization, and capitalism, ethnography, feminist studies, political economy, United States, comparative race and ethnicity
David Lipset
Professor
Sociocultural Anthropology
612-626-8657
lipse001@umn.edu
395 Hubert H. Humphrey Center
masculinity, personhood and modernity, the state of the Pacific, symbolic, political-legal, and psychoanalytic anthropology, Bakhtinian dialogism, Papua New Guinea, Sepik River, the Pacific; romance, the body, non-Western people in mass media, class cross-culturally, climate change and culture, social theory, material culture, communications technology cross-culturally, social media
Stuart McLean
Professor
Sociocultural Anthropology
612-624-8944
mclea070@umn.edu
374 Hubert H. Humphrey Center
anthropology of modernity, social and cultural theory, historical anthropology, Ireland, European Union
Kieran McNulty
Department Chair
Professor
Biological Anthropology
612-625-0058
anthchair@umn.edu
kmcnulty@umn.edu
395 Hubert H. Humphrey Center
paleoanthropology, human and primate evolution, geometric morphometrics, cranial evolution and ontogeny, eastern Africa
Gilliane Monnier
Associate Professor
Archaeology
612-626-4846
monni003@umn.edu
368 Hubert H. Humphrey Center
stone tool analysis, lower and middle paleolithic Europe, Neanderthal behavior, microarchaeology
Maria Nieves-Colón
Assistant Professor
Biological Anthropology
612-625-4092
mnievesc@umn.edu
379 Hubert H. Humphrey Center
anthropological genetics and ancient DNA, the Caribbean and Latin America, human population history, migration and admixture, decolonizing genomics
Hoon Song
Associate Professor
Sociocultural Anthropology
612-624-8980
songx080@umn.edu
395 Hubert H. Humphrey Center
political sovereignty, history and memory, visual art, space-time, religion, psychoanalysis, North Korea/US
Martha Tappen
Associate Professor
Biological Anthropology
612-625-3087
tappe004@umn.edu
395 Hubert H. Humphrey Center
human evolution and adaptations, out of Africa, paleoenvironments, stone age archaeology, zooarchaeology, taphonomy
Karen-Sue Taussig
Associate Professor
Sociocultural Anthropology
612-625-3366
taussig@umn.edu
395 Hubert H. Humphrey Center
medical anthropology, social and cultural implications of genetic testing, new reproductive technologies, cloning and stem cell research, genetics, eugenics, anthropology of science, biotechnology
Gilbert Tostevin
Associate Professor
Archaeology
612-625-5542
toste003@umn.edu
372 Hubert H. Humphrey Center
human evolution, lithic technology, old world archaeology, paleolithic archaeology, cultural transmission theory, experimental archaeology, origins of modern humans, material culture
David Valentine
Director of Undergraduate Studies
Associate Professor
Sociocultural Anthropology
612-626-8692
valen076@umn.edu 
anthdus@umn.edu      364 Hubert H. Humphrey Center
cultural and linguistic anthropology, social justice movements, gender and sexuality, queer theory, futurity, anthropology of outer spaces
Peter Wells
Professor
Archaeology
612-624-6845
wells001@umn.edu
395 Hubert H. Humphrey Center
material culture, visual representation, central Europe, culture contact, European prehistory, frontiers, Iron Age, late prehistory, Roman and early medieval periods, Roman Europe, identity, ancient Germans, ancient Celts

Faculty Emeriti

Name Contact
William Beeman
Professor Emeritus
wbeeman@umn.edu
Timothy Dunnigan
Professor Emeritus
dunni001@umn.edu
Luther Gerlach
Professor Emeritus
gerla001@umn.edu
Stephen Gudeman
Professor Emeritus
gudeman@umn.edu
John Ingham
Professor Emeritus
ingha001@umn.edu
Jean Langford
Professor Emerita
langf001@umn.edu
Frank Miller
Professor Emeritus
mille005@umn.edu
Gloria Goodwin Raheja
Professor Emerita
raheja@umn.edu

Affiliated Researchers

Name Contact
Scott Anfinson
Research Associate
anfin001@umn.edu
Yasmeen Arif
Political Science
arifx003@umn.edu
Melissa Brown
Minnesota Population Center; Harvard University
melbrown@fas.harvard.edu
M. Bianet Castellanos
American Indian Studies
mbc@umn.edu
Ellen W. Demerath
Epidemology
ewd@umn.edu
Joanne B. Eicher
Design/Housing/Apparel
jeicher@umn.edu
Joshua M. Feinberg
Earth Sciences & Adjunct Asst. Professor in Anthropology
feinberg@umn.edu
Ed Fleming
Research Associate
flem0033@umn.edu   
G. Friedmann-Sanchez
Humphrey Institute
frie0013@umn.edu
Niki Garrett
Research Associate
garre125@umn.edu 
David Karjanen
American Studies
karjanen@umn.edu
Laura Kunreuther
Visiting Scholar
kunreuth@bard.edu
David Mather
Research Associate
math0216@umn.edu
John D. Nichols
American Indian Studies
jdn@umn.edu
Rebecca Nockerts
Research Associate
slepk002@umn.edu
Maureen O'Dougherty
Food Science & Nutrition
modoughe@umn.edu
Mark Pedelty
Journalism & Mass Communications
pedeltmh@umn.edu
Riv-Ellen Prell
American Studies
prell001@umn.edu
Joel D. Rudney
Dentistry
jrudney@umn.edu
Harvey B. Sarles
Cultural Studies
sarle001@umn.edu
Anna Schultz
Music
schul778@umn.edu
Sandro Simon
Research Fellow
simo1209@umn.edu
Chery Smith
Food Science & Nutrition
csmith@umn.edu
Elaine E. Tarone
Continuing Education; Sociolinguistics
etarone@umn.edu
Rachel Thompson
Research Associate
rthompson@g.harvard.edu
Bula Sirika Wayessa
African American & African Studies
bwayessa@umn.edu
Margaret Werry
Theatre Arts & Dance; Performance Studies
werry001@umn.edu
Joe Westermeyer
Psychiatry; Cross-Cultural Psychiatry
weste010@umn.edu
Lois Yellowthunder
Research Fellow
lois@anthrolaw.com

Instructional Staff

Name
Peter Johnson
Graduate Instructor
Risa Luther
Graduate Instructor