Introduction

Anthropology is the study of humans and their primate relatives, both living and fossil forms. Anthropologists are concerned with past and present cultures—objects, behaviors, and ideas that characterize human populations; languages, both written and unwritten; and biological variability of past and present populations. The application of specialized knowledge to questions regarding variability within and between human populations and their cultures is the unifying goal of anthropology.

The University of Missouri-Columbia (MU) Department of Anthropology offers graduate work leading to the degrees of Master of Arts and Doctor of Philosophy. The M.A. degree is designed to provide broad training in anthropology. At the doctoral level, the student pursues individual, specialized study.

Graduate training is offered in the four traditional research areas of anthropology: cultural anthropology, physical/biological anthropology, archaeology, and linguistic anthropology. The doctoral candidate normally specializes in one of the four recognized subfields of anthropology or, in consultation with his/her doctoral program committee, chooses an area of specialization that either cuts across some of the four recognized divisions or includes some area outside traditional anthropology. Areas of specialization reflect the active research interests of the MU Anthropology faculty and currently include:

• Social/cultural anthropology;;ethnohistory, ecological and environmental anthropology, human behavioral ecology.
• Biological anthropology; forensic anthropology, skeletal biology, human osteology, human evolution, demography, epidemiology.
• Archaeology; chronology, materials research, sociocultural evolution, zooarchaeology, paleoethnobotany.
• Linguistic anthropology; historical linguistics, language and culture.

In addition, the Museum of Anthropology provides opportunities for museum-oriented studies. The department also participates in the graduate minor in Ancient Studies. All graduate training emphasizes the development of logical reasoning and the ability to write clearly and concisely.

Departmental research facilities/collections include a paleoethnobotany laboratory, a comparative faunal collection, a skeletal biology laboratory, extensive holdings of archaeological and skeletal materials from Missouri and ethnographic specimens from many parts of the world. The Museum Support Center, an archaeological research and curation facility managed by the American Archaeology Division of the department, is located on the edge of campus. The Archaeological Survey of Missouri and the University of Missouri Herbarium are also housed in this facility. (More about the departmental facilities). Resources in other departments or research units available by arrangement include the Archaeometrics Laboratory of the Research Reactor, the Electron Microscopy Facility, and the Stable Isotope Laboratory of the Department of Geological Sciences.

Regular faculty members of the department conduct research in the following geographical areas, beyond Missouri: the Northwest (archaeology), the Great Plains (biological anthropology), the Mississippi River Valley (archaeology), Canada (biological and cultural anthropology), Ecuador and Peru (archaeology), Indonesia, Malaysia, Borneo (cultural anthropology), and Dominica (biological anthropology). Refer to Faculty for interests of emeritus faculty.

Contact
Professor Craig Palmer
Director of Graduate Studies
882-0910
Swallow Hall
palmerct@missouri.edu