Cameron M. Smith - Anthropology For Dummies

Anthropology For Dummies

by Cameron M. Smith, PhD

with Evan T. Davies, PhD

Anthropology For Dummies

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Copyright 2008 by Wiley Publishing, Inc., Indianapolis, Indiana

Published simultaneously in Canada

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Library of Congress Control Number: 2008931633

ISBN: 9780470279663

Manufactured in the United States of America

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About the Authors

Cameron M. Smith s fascination with humanity was sparked on a 1984 trip to Mexicos Maya ruins; by 1987, he was a student of both Harvard Universitys early human archaeology field school at Kenyas Leakey research station and the University of Londons Institute of Archaeology. He then went to Durham University in northern England for a Joint Honours BA in Anthropology & Archaeology, followed by an MA in Anthropology at Portland State University (in Portland, Oregon) and a PhD from Canadas Simon Fraser University.

Since 2002, Dr. Smith has taught a wide variety of courses as an Adjunct Associate Professor at Portland State Universitys Department of Anthropology; he has also taught at Washington State University and Linfield College.

Dr. Smiths scientific works have been published in journals such as the American Journal of Physical Anthropology and the Journal of Field Archaeology and books published by International Monographs in Prehistory and Oxfords British Archaeology Reports. His research has been supported by the National Endowment for the Humanities and the National Science Foundation-funded Barrow Arctic Science Consortium.

Reaching out from the academic world, Dr. Smith has written popular-science articles for Scientific American MIND, Archaeology, Playboy, Spaceflight, Skeptical Inquirer, South American Explorer, The Next Step, Cultural Survival Quarterly, The Bulletin of Primitive Technology , and other magazines. Anthropology For Dummies is Dr. Smiths second book. His first, written with Charles Sullivan, was The Top Ten Myths About Evolution (Prometheus, 2006).

Outside his academic pursuits, Dr. Smith enjoys mountaineering, art, and arctic exploration. He is a Life Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society, a Fellow of The Explorers Club and a member of the Society for Human Performance in Extreme Environments. His Web site, www.cameronmsmith.com, covers his recent writing, academic, and expedition activities.

Evan T. Davies received his BA from Cornell University where he began his studies in anthropology. He earned a PhD in cultural anthropology from Rice University, and has conducted fieldwork throughout Europe, the South Pacific, and in many locations throughout sub-Saharan Africa. His doctoral dissertation reported on the land use patterns of the BaAka foragers of the central African rainforests whose subsistence and hunting strategies he studied while living with them through the seasons. He has recently become involved with the protection of archaeological sites in Iraq.

Dedications

From Cameron: I dedicate this book to all the anthropologists who have spent careers investigating fundamental questions about humanity, and to their hosts, the indigenous folk of everywhere from Africa to Australia.

From Evan: To my parents, and every good teacher I ever had.

Authors' Acknowledgments

From Cameron: Id like to thank my parents, professors Donald E. and Margit J. Posluschny Smith, for stimulating my interest in the human species in the first place and then supporting my education, worldwide, for many years.

I also thank all of my professors, from Britain to Canada and the United States, from physical anthropologists to cultural anthropologists to linguists and many, many archaeologists. There are too many to name, though I can highlight Professors Brian Hayden, Kenneth M. Ames, Anthony Harding, Anthony Bilsborough, and the late Jack Nance.

Although I wrote the bulk of this book, I turned to my friend Dr. Evan T. Davies to draft Chapter 12 on how cultural anthropologists do their fieldwork. Dr. Davies experience runs from field experiences in the Congo to New Guinea and the Near East, and I thank him for his work on this chapter.