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Department News

University of Nevada, Reno Anthropology students and faculty alike are busy presenting and publishing their work, organizing and hosting public lectures by distinguished visitors, and bringing positive attention to our department. Here are just a few of our recent accomplishments; check back often for updates on upcoming department events.

June 2013

• Anna Camp (PhD student) and Danielle Felling (MA student) each awarded Liljeblad grants for their respective research on Great Basin textiles and Last Supper Cave, Nevada.

May 2013

• Rosemary Season, an Honors' student in Anthropology, receives a General Undergraduate Research Award for her ethnographic thesis project "Islamic Law and Muslim Marriage in Reno, Nevada."
• Emily Middleton awarded first place in the Nevada Rock Art Foundation's Student Paper Competition.
• Ph.D. candidate Francine Melia awarded a UNR College of Liberal Arts Russell J. and Dorothy S. Bilinski Fellowship for 2013-2014 to complete her dissertation.
• Donald Pattee receives the Jonathan O. Davis UNR Stipend for his research in Warner Valley, Oregon from the Desert Research Institute.

April 2013

• Dr. Geoffrey Smith receives the College of Liberal Arts Dean's Award for Teaching.
• Anthropology majors Dru Mcpherson and Rebecca Whistler present posters highlighting the results of their research at the 2013 Nevada Undergraduate Research Symposium.
• Graduate student Laura Wilhelm chairs the Anthropology of Religion session and presents at the round table discussion "Intersections between the Public and the Private" at the 93rd Annual Southwestern Social Science Association Conference in New Orleans, Louisiana. Laura has been asked to co-chair the anthropology program at next year's meetings in San Antonio, Texas.
• Graduate student Donald Pattee receives a research award from the UNR Graduate Student Association for his ongoing work in Warner Valley, Oregon.
• Graduate student Steven Holm wins first place in the UNR Graduate Student Association Poster Competition.
• Graduate students Ashley Younie, Lukas Trout, and Donald Pattee present the results of their research at the Annual Meetings of the Society for American Archaeology in Honolulu, Hawaii.
• Congratulations to graduate student Andrea "Ellie" Maniery for winning the Claude C. Albritton, Jr. Award from the Geological Society of America. The award will provide support for Ellie's proposed thesis research in Utah.
• Congratulations to Rebecca Whistler, who has won Outstanding Graduate in the Social Sciences at UNR!
• Dr. Susan Deeds, Professor Emerita at Northern Arizona University, will give a free public lecture on April 16th at 7 PM in MIKC 124 titled No Fear of Flying: Gender, Mischief, and Popular Religion on a Northern Mexican Frontier in the Eighteenth Century.
• Dr. K. Ann Hosburgh, Research Fellow in the Department of Anatomy at the University of Otago and Honorary Research Fellow in the School of Geography, Archaeology, and Enviromental Studies at the University of the Witwatersrand, will give a free lecture on Monday, April 29th at 7 PM in the Wells Fargo Auditorium (lower level of the MIKC) titled Becoming Farmers and Herders: The First Ancient DNA Evidence for the Origins of Southern Africa's Domestic Cattle.

March 2013

• Graduate students Emily Middleton and Donald Pattee (together with undergraduate student Danielle Felling) present the results of their research at an invited symposium at the Northwest Anthropological Conference in Portland, Oregon.
• Dr. G. Richard Scott publishes the edited volume Anthropological Perspectives on Tooth Morphology (Cambridge University Press).
• Dr. Debbie Boehm awarded a fellowship from the American Council of Learned Societies and will be working on a book manuscript titled Return(ed): Going and Coming in an Age of Deportation.
• Dr. Erin Stiles visits Thailand as part of the USAC Site Assessment Visit.
• Dr. Debbie Boehm will be teaching abroad in Alicante, Spain for USAC this summer.
• According to the National Research Council's assessment of PhD programs, UNR Anthropology's PhD Program's rank is 4 in Student High Ranking, which is derived from completion rates, financial support, and other criteria. This places our program on par with Princeton, the University of Texas at Austin, Washingon University in St. Louis, and other much larger programs. Way to go PhD Students!
• Dr. Richard Scott delivers the keynote speech titled "The Far Side of 40 Years: Reflections on an Academic Life in Alaska and Beyond" at the 2013 Arctic Anthropological Association Annual Conference in Anchorage, AK.
• Dr. Geoffrey Smith co-authors article on late Holocene obsidian use in northwest Nevada with UNR Master's student Stephen LaValley and Washington State University Master's student Kristina Wiggins.
• UNR Anthropology to offer three archaeological field schools this summer in Carson City, NV, Aurora, NV, and Warner Valley, OR.

January 2013

• National Academy of Science Member Don Grayson (University of Washington) to visit UNR campus on Monday, January 28th for a free public lecture on Pleistocene extinctions in the Great Basin.
• UNR Master's student Evan Pellegrini coauthors a paper in Quaternary International on communal large game hunting in the Great Basin with UNR alumni Bryan Hockett, Cliff Creger, D. Craig Young, and Beth Smith.
• Dr. Erin Stiles has been invited to Thailand with the USAC Site Assessment Visit to the study program in Chiang Mai. The trip will take place in mid-March.
• Dr. Geoffrey Smith co-authors article on climate change and its effects on human populations with University of Wyoming researchers Dr. Robert Kelly, Todd Surovell, and Bryan Shuman.
• Dr. Louis Forline to spend the spring semester in Brazil continuing his research with the Awá-Guajá with support from a Fullbright Grant.

December 2012

• Undergraduate student Kristen Renda named UNR Senior Scholar for the College of Liberal Arts.
• Undergraduate students Dru McPherson and Rebecca Whistler each awarded Honors Undergraduate Research Awards this semester.
• Recent University of Nevada, Reno graduate Dr. Jarod Hutson has accepted a postdoctoral position at the Monrepos Archaeological Research Center and Museum of Human Evolution in Neuwied, Germany. Jarod will be conducting an analysis of fauna from the well-known Schönigen Site.
• University of Nevada, Reno alumnus Dr. Kelly Dixon's book, An Archaeology of Desperation: Exploring the Donner Party's Alder Creek Camp, featuring contributions by Dr. Richard Scott, Dr. Donald Hardesty, and Dr. Sean McMurry, wins the Society for Historical Archaeology's James Deetz Book Award for 2013.
• Dr. Geoffrey Smith co-authors article with alumnus Linsie Lafayette on the function of Great Basin Stemmed projectile points in the Journal of California and Great Basin Anthropology.

November 2012

• Dr. Deborah Boehm receives the Center for a Public Anthropology's Ruth Benedict Global Citizenship Award. Named to honor one of the 20th century’s great anthropologists, this award recognizes Dr. Boehm's exceptionally effective participation in Public Anthropology’s Community Action Online Project as well her wider activities in the public sphere. Only a select few – less than 1% of the faculty teaching introductory anthropology courses across North America – receive this award!
• Dr. Sarah Cowie receives the Society for Historic Archaeology (SHA) John L. Cotter Award in Historic Archaeology. Established in 1998 this award is named in honor of John Lambert Cotter (1911-1999), a pioneer educator and advocate for the discipline. No more than one award is presented each year and it goes to an individual at the start of their career in historical archaeology for a single achievement which is truly outstanding in its respective category.
• Dr. Carolyn White receives a Wenner-Gren Hunt Postdoctoral Fellowship for her research entitled "Fashion the Changing Self: Clothing and Adornment in Trans-Atlantic Perspective".
• Dr. Chris Morgan publishes the results of his recent work in Wyoming's Wind River Range in North American Archaeologist.
• Dr. Geoffrey Smith and graduate students Peter Carey and Emily Middleton publish a paper on Cascade Points in the Northern Great Basin in North American Archaeologist.
• Dr. Chris Morgan publishes the results of a study on hunter-gatherer food storage in American Antiquity.