Humans doi: 10.3390/humans6040035

Authors: Bliss Madrid Sydney Reid Elena Sierra-Serrano Clare Sholdice John Albanese

Accurate sex estimation is a key part of constructing biological profiles in forensic anthropology and bioarchaeology, yet traditional binary approaches often oversimplify human variation. This study evaluates the accuracy, sex ratio outcomes, and utility of four established methods: Albanese’s 2003 non-group-specific pelvic and femoral and 2013 upper-limb metric methods, Albanese et al.’s 2005 sample-specific limb method, and Sutherland and Suchey’s 1991 ventral arc morphoscopic standard. Using a documented sample from the Robert J. Terry Anatomical Collection (n = 122), the results show that Albanese’s 2003 pelvic and femoral method yielded the highest overall accuracy (95.9%) and a balanced sex ratio, outperforming the upper-limb method (95.1%), which exhibited a male accuracy bias. While articular joints provided more stable estimations than diaphyseal midshafts, visual scoring proved limited, as 19.7% of the documented males exhibited ridges resembling a female ventral arc. Notably, applying a probabilistic “grey zone” (p-values of 0.2–0.8) demonstrated that sex exists on a continuum rather than a strict binary. Ultimately, sex estimation varies by the skeletal elements and criteria utilized. Implementing a probabilistic framework reduces the risk of misclassification, accounts for biological complexity, and provides a more reliable, ethically grounded approach to forensic analysis.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans6030034

Authors: Rhian R. Dunn Joseph T. Hefner

Documented skeletal collections provide many of the samples necessary for forensic anthropological research, including the creation and validation of skeletal analytical methods. Although modern collections are considered more representative of the current living population, they often differ significantly from each other by geographic location, organization, and procurement strategies. As these factors influence which donors are included in a particular collection, they also create collection-specific sample bias. This research aims to identify how that bias impacts skeletal variation across collections and whether it obscures normal patterns of human skeletal variation. Craniometric and demographic data were collected from a sample of individuals from eight modern United States-based documented skeletal collections (n = 1161). The results indicate that collection-specific sample bias influences average cranial morphology, but to a lesser extent than sex or population. Across analyses, samples consistently and preferentially clustered with individuals from similar population and sex groups rather than with individuals from the same collection of origin. These analyses suggest that normal patterns of human variation are not obscured by collection origin and that documented skeletal collections therefore remain valid and reliable sources of data for understanding population diversity and sex differences, even when some level of collection-specific bias is present.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans6030033

Authors: Rodrigo Portero Ana Mª Niveau-de-Villedary y Mariñas Juan Jesús Cantillo Rosana Cerezo-Fernández Ricard Marlasca Maxime Rageot Elena Revert Francés Anna Rufà Marcos A. Martelo Fernández

Faunal remains constitute one of the main sources of evidence for reconstructing foodways and economic practices in Phoenician societies. Archaeological research conducted over recent decades in the Iberian Peninsula has highlighted their importance for understanding food production processes, maintenance activities, and animal consumption patterns linked to livestock management, fishing, shellfish gathering, and the use of bone for tool making. In this paper, we present the results of zooarchaeological and taphonomic analyses of mammal, bird, fish, and mollusc remains recovered from the archaeological excavation at the corner of Sagasta and Tinte Streets in Cádiz, Spain. These data are integrated with biomolecular analyses, specifically ancient DNA of bovine specimens, and organic residue analysis of two storage vessels. Radiocarbon dating places these remains at the end of the 9th and the beginning of the 8th century BC, providing a key reference point for understanding archaic Phoenician occupation in the region. The archaeofaunal evidence highlights the central role of livestock, particularly sheep, goats and cattle, alongside the intensive use of marine resources such as fish and molluscs, and the exploitation of wetland environments for duck hunting. The archaeogenomics analysis of two bovine remains yielded <1% endogenous DNA content, consistent with poor DNA preservation at this site, although it allowed for sex determination of one female individual. Additionally, lipid residue analysis from the storage ceramics enabled the identification of foodstuffs once contained within them. Finally, evidence for the use of bone in the production of bone tools has also been documented. All biotic remains from the Sagasta–Tinte site have been compared with those from other regional sites to contextualise the findings.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans6030032

Authors: Kathleen Galvin Zoey Walder-Hoge Melinda Laituri

This study examines social media communication in Kenya to assess how dryland pastoral concerns are represented in national climate policy dialogues. Approximately 80% of Kenya’s land area consists of drylands that support pastoral livelihoods, yet recurring droughts and increasingly variable rainfall threaten these social-ecological systems. Although Sustainable Development Goal 13 (Climate Action) emphasizes adaptation, progress is typically measured using national indicators that may overlook local priorities. We analyzed digital communications from pastoral nongovernmental organizations, civil society organizations, newspapers, and government agencies using an adaptation pathways framework to examine links among climate risks, governance, and decision-making. Five themes emerged: water security, rangeland degradation and mobility, climate communication, gender and social inclusion, and climate finance. Kenya has developed relatively strong national climate policies, but social media reveals a persistent implementation gap between national policy and local pastoral priorities. Pastoral communities consistently emphasize Indigenous and local knowledge, women’s leadership, community participation, and locally appropriate adaptation strategies. Social media provides a novel source of evidence for identifying these local priorities and informing more participatory, place-based climate adaptation.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans6030031

Authors: Gareth Thomas Louise Steel Luci Attala

This paper examines how the designation of coracle net fishing in southwest Wales as intangible cultural heritage is reshaping the ontology of the fishery. Drawing on two years of ethnographic research with the Carmarthen Coracle and Netsmen Association, the study approaches river fishing not simply as an economic activity but as a culturally embedded practice through which relationships with river environments, kinship, ecological memory, and seasonal time are enacted and sustained. Coracle fishers on the River Towy possess detailed ecological knowledge developed through repeated engagement with water conditions, fish behaviour, and shifting river rhythms across generations. In the context of salmonid decline, polluted catchments, and regulatory tightening, heritage licensing now permits continued practice while restricting the sale and retention of migratory fish. The paper argues that this shift operates as an indirect form of displacement. While affirming cultural value, it reclassifies a working fishery as heritage display and constrains the material rights and adaptive capacity that sustain it as livelihood practice. By analysing how fishers interpret and respond to this reclassification, the paper shows how bureaucratic heritage frameworks transform what the fishery is understood to be, from reciprocal labour and livelihood to curated cultural artefact. The Welsh case contributes to anthropological debates on heritage governance, bureaucratic classification, and the regulation of small scale resource practices under environmental change.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans6030030

Authors: Yongpeng Xu

Pastoral imagery in Han dynasty mural tombs of China’s northern frontier may offer unique visual evidence for examining subsistence patterns, ethnic interactions, and the processes of elite identity construction in imperial borderlands. Existing scholarship has predominantly interpreted this motif through three frameworks—livelihood reflection, Hu-Han ethnic integration, and the origins of Chinese landscape painting—yet has not fully addressed its functional transformation within mortuary contexts and the underlying spatial logic of identity construction. Drawing on seven systematically documented mural tombs from the Ordos Plateau and Hetao Plain, this study combines archaeological typology, formal iconographic analysis, and spatial contextual analysis to trace the full evolutionary trajectory of pastoral imagery. This study suggests that the motif may be interpreted as undergoing a transition away from explicitly sacred contexts toward a closer association with material representation from the late Western Han to the late Eastern Han: early stylized renditions, derived from the Central Plains xian (immortal) mountain iconographic paradigm, appear to have served the construction of a sacred cosmic space for post-mortem ascension, while later realistic depictions were increasingly repositioned in storage side chambers, potentially functioning as visual representations of manorial livestock assets. Spatially, pastoral imagery gradually formed a stable “Inner Manor/Outer Wilderness” sequential narrative, which visually domesticated the heterogeneous frontier wilderness and enabled local magnates to construct a transcultural elite identity integrating Han ritual orthodoxy and control over diverse frontier resources. This study recalibrates the regional position of pastoral imagery in the secularization of Han mortuary art, and is consistent with a perspective for understanding the northern frontier as a dynamic transcultural frontier zone of cultural negotiation and integration.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans6030029

Authors: Imelda Adhi Yanti Hamka Naping Ansar Arifin Tasrifin Tahara Darmawan Salman

Event-based tourism in coastal communities has primarily been studied through economic indicators such as visitor numbers, tourist spending, and multiplier effects, while research on small-scale recurring events driven by non-economic motivations remains limited. This study aims to uncover the meanings behind tourism event practices in coastal fishing communities in Polewali Mandar Regency, West Sulawesi, Indonesia. A qualitative approach with an interpretive ethnographic design was employed, with data collected through participant observation, in-depth interviews, and documentation of four annual events, namely Sandeq Race, Malauyung, Pammunuang, and Mallampei, held across three coastal villages. The findings reveal that event-based tourism in Polewali Mandar takes two primary forms: competition-based and religious-activity-based tourism. Neither form is driven by economic calculation; both are sustained by communal pride in maritime cultural heritage, institutionalized spiritual obligations, and binding social norms. These events function simultaneously as arenas for affirming maritime cultural identity, mechanisms for reproducing social solidarity, spaces for intergenerational knowledge transmission, and vehicles for safeguarding intangible cultural heritage (ICH), most notably through the close interdependence between the Sandeq Race and its underlying traditional boat-building practice. The study further finds that these events attract a distinct typology of visitors, ranging from local residents and domestic tourists with kinship ties to the host villages, to a modest but consistent stream of international tourists, and that their sustainability reflects a form of informal Community-Based Tourism (CBT) rooted in intrinsic social capital rather than institutional or industry-driven development. This study proposes the concept of pride-driven small-scale event tourism, referring to small-scale event tourism sustained by communal pride in cultural heritage and religious tradition rather than economic orientation, thereby expanding event tourism, religious tourism, and the CBT literature by foregrounding non-material dimensions as central to understanding coastal community-based tourism practices.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans6030028

Authors: Tamara L. Lottering Desiré Brits Ann H. Ross Candice Small

The freely available software program 3D-ID estimates sex and population affinity using geometric morphometric methods and a large reference database (N > 2000). However, the 2018 version lacked representation of South African populations. This study evaluated the accuracy of 3D-ID (2018 version) for sex estimation in the three largest South African samples. A total of 450 crania (75 males and 75 females per population) from South Africans of African descent (SAA), South Africans of Multi-populations (SAM), and South Africans of European descent (SAE) were digitized using a Microscribe 3DX digitizer. Landmark data were analysed in 3D-ID using both Full (all landmarks) and Reduced (five landmarks excluded) configurations, with assessments using both shape and form (shape + size) variables. When populations were combined, females consistently yielded higher classification accuracies than males. Using the Reduced configuration, sex estimation accuracies for shape and form were higher for SAA females (82.7% and 89.3%) and SAE females (88.0% and 89.3%), and moderate to high for SAE males (76.0% and 85.3%). In contrast, SAA males showed lower accuracies (44.0–69.3%), while SAM individuals generally fell below 75%. Overall, 3D-ID (2018 version) demonstrated moderate to high sex estimation accuracy. However, validation of the newly incorporated South African reference data (3D-ID 2024 version) is recommended before forensic application.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans6030027

Authors: Rute Gomes Inês Morais Caldas

Chronological age estimation is used in legal contexts to determine the transition between minor and adult status, with the third molar (3M) being a primary biological indicator. This retrospective study aimed to analyze the relationship between the topographic position of impacted mandibular 3Ms and their mineralization stages, evaluating how specific angulations influence developmental chronology. Using a database of digital panoramic radiographs from 731 individuals aged 16 to 20 years, 3M development was assessed via Demirjian’s stages and impaction was classified by Winter’s angulation. Results demonstrated that non-impacted teeth consistently show more advanced mineralization compared to impacted teeth, with an average maturational delay of 0.35 stages in the latter. Furthermore, horizontal impactions exhibited significantly accelerated maturation, with 88.2% reaching the terminal Stage H, while mesioangular impactions were associated with marked developmental delay and were significantly underrepresented in Stage H. In conclusion, both eruption status and topographic orientation significantly modulate 3M mineralization. These findings suggest that applying uniform reference standards without considering tooth angulation may cause systematic bias in forensic age estimation, potentially leading to the underestimation or overestimation of age around critical legal thresholds.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans6030026

Authors: Heather M. Garvin Alexis L. VanBaarle Lauren N. Butaric

Comparative medical imaging is a well-established scientific method of personal identification that utilizes concordant anatomical features observed in antemortem and postmortem medical images. As access to antemortem medical imaging and digital image archives has expanded, radiographic comparison has become an increasingly important component of medicolegal death investigations. Despite its widespread use, many medicolegal practitioners receive limited formal training in comparative medical imaging. This paper provides a practical primer on radiographic comparison for personal identification. Common imaging modalities encountered in forensic casework, including conventional radiography, dental radiography, computed tomography (CT), cone beam computed tomography (CBCT), and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), are reviewed with emphasis on image acquisition and characteristics, limitations, and comparative considerations. Frequently utilized anatomical regions, common comparative features, and methodological considerations are also discussed. Accurate radiographic identification requires not only the recognition of concordant anatomical features but also the appropriate interpretation of explainable differences arising from biological, radiographic, and postmortem factors. This paper provides foundational guidance intended to assist practitioners in conducting scientifically defensible radiographic comparisons and highlights the need for greater incorporation of comparative medical imaging training within forensic curricula.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans6030025

Authors: Rachael Anyim Zhiqiao Huang Anna Nicotra Joshua Reno

Maternal capital (e.g., anthropometrics, hormones, bioactives) enables investment in infant somatic growth during lactation. We draw from the maternal capital hypothesis to contextualize the associations between human milk cortisol variation and infant height-for-age z-score (HAZ) and weight-for-height z-score (WHZ). We hypothesize stable conditions (e.g., low perceived stress, high socioeconomic status/SES including income and education attained) will be associated with greater milk cortisol declines (i.e., steeper slopes), signaling increased capital to invest in larger infant anthropometrics, while stressful conditions (e.g., illness within the dyad, low SES, poor maternal sleep quality) may be associated with flatter slopes and subsequent reduced investment. We measured milk cortisol (N = 110) in U.S. mother–infant dyads using enzyme immunoassay. We collected milk 30–45 min after waking and at the last evening infant feeding, and provided questionnaires (e.g., demographics, perceived stress, Pittsburgh sleep quality index) for mothers to complete. We calculated milk cortisol slope (%Δ) (AM-PM/AM) to assess variation between collections. Larger %Δ indicated steeper slopes; smaller %Δ indicated flatter slopes. We employed an information-theoretic approach to estimate associations between maternal stress and %Δ, and %Δ and infant anthropometrics using multivariable linear regressions. The %Δ best-fit model suggested maternal postgraduate education and poor sleep quality was associated with steep %Δ. The HAZ best-fit model suggested the combined effect of steeper %Δ and milk intake was associated with increased HAZ. Additionally, the combined effect of steeper %Δ and infant milk intake was associated with increased HAZ among mothers with postgraduate degrees and who woke up three or more times to night-feed. %Δ was not associated with WHZ. We speculate %Δ exposure calibrates infant development to their shared environment, with implications for lifelong fitness.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans6030024

Authors: Yara Vieira Lemos Camila Carrillo Furlan Ricardo Moreira Araújo Felippe Bevilacqua Prado Alexandre Rodrigues Freire Ana Cláudia Rossi

Physical fit analysis has become an important complementary approach in forensic anthropology, particularly in cases involving fragmented human remains, where fragment reassociation is often critical to human identification. This review examines the role of physical fit analysis in fragment reassociation and its contribution to identification in forensic contexts, including disaster victim identification. To this end, the available literature was critically reviewed, with emphasis on physical fit, fracture matching, fracture morphology, and the interpretation of skeletal discontinuities in fragmented remains. The reviewed studies indicate that physical fit analysis can support the recognition of corresponding fragments, the reconstruction of disrupted skeletal regions, and the integration of anthropological findings with other identification methods, especially in cases involving highly fragmented or commingled remains. At the same time, the literature reveals important limitations, including methodological heterogeneity, limited validation studies, and interpretive challenges related to preservation and fracture complexity. Overall, physical fit analysis represents a promising adjunct in forensic anthropology for fragment reassociation and human identification, although further standardization and validation remain necessary to strengthen its forensic applicability.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans6030023

Authors: Yongpeng Xu

This study investigates the mechanism of “reverse spatial production” in contemporary urban China by examining the transformation of the Hangou Dawang Temple in Yangzhou. Utilizing a multidimensional framework that integrates Henri Lefebvre’s spatial triad with Michel de Certeau’s theory of everyday practice, the research explores how a state-constructed, secular “cultural landscape” was reclaimed as a living field of popular belief. Data were collected through intensive fieldwork (2025–2026), including participant observation, semi-structured interviews, and digital ethnography. The findings reveal that following the temple’s entrustment to the Taoist Association in 2017, grassroots actors—centered around a Taoist cleric and the local congregation—successfully resacralized the site through the introduction of material media, ritual performances, and social networking. This process dissolved the official spatial discipline of the “landscape island,” transforming it into a substantive religious hub. The study identifies a “Non-Antagonistic Symbiotic Model” of spatial production, characterized by a cycle of top-down construction, bottom-up reconstruction, and mutual negotiation. It argues that the state’s heritagization strategy inadvertently provides a legitimate vessel for religious resilience, while grassroots tactical appropriations allow for the survival of popular religion within modern urban landscapes. This research offers a prototypical case for understanding the resilience of popular belief and the reconstruction of heritage authenticity in the post-secular urban context of China.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans6030022

Authors: Louise Deglin

While skeletal imagery appears across various ancient Andean traditions, the Wari Empire (c. 600–1000 CE) developed a uniquely standardized and widespread skull motif—the uma tullu—distributed throughout its former territory. Through an analysis of 63 artifacts spanning ceramic, textile, and metal, this study identifies key diagnostic markers of the motif: the representation of the metopic suture and the application of red pigment. By cross-referencing these stylistic features with bioarchaeological data, the research posits that the uma tullu served as a central communicative device. In the absence of a formal script, this motif may have encoded imperial values and ancestral cult practices, facilitating ideological expansion and state identity. Ultimately, this work demonstrates how standardized iconography functioned as a system of graphic communication and ideological cohesion in the Middle Horizon Andes.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans6030021

Authors: Yuze Sun

This study focuses on 91 human individuals from the Western Zhou period excavated from the Jucun cemetery in Jiang County, southern Shanxi Province, and examines their dietary structure and its changes within the context of population movements in early China. Stable carbon and nitrogen isotope analysis was employed, combined with archaeological phase divisions, to compare dietary patterns across different periods. The results show that the Jucun population exhibits a diet dominated by C4 resources, with a mean δ13C value of −8.0 ± 0.7‰ and a mean δ15N value of 8.6 ± 0.9‰, indicating a relatively low level of animal protein intake. Diachronic analysis indicates that δ13C values remain generally stable throughout the Western Zhou period, whereas δ15N values show a decreasing trend. Regional comparison further shows that populations of different origins all fall within the isotopic range characterized by millet-based agriculture in southern Shanxi. Overall, the dietary structure of this population exhibits a convergence toward an agriculture-based pattern centered on millet. This study provides bioarchaeological evidence for subsistence transformation and cultural integration among mobile populations in the Central Plains during the Western Zhou period.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans6020020

Authors: Amber M. Plemons Rhian R. Dunn Micayla C. Spiros Kelly R. Kamnikar Nicole Geske Joseph T. Hefner

Unprovenanced skeletal remains housed in anatomy laboratories, medical schools, and museums present a persistent ethical challenge when the human skeletal remains potentially represent historically marginalized or legally protected populations. Reliance on a single line of evidence, like epitaphonomic indicators or population affinity estimates, may result in incomplete or misleading assessments. Herein, we present a structured, non-destructive protocol integrating epitaphonomic signatures and an estimation of population affinity (including assessing biocultural indicators of affinity) to support ethical decision-making regarding unprovenanced crania in institutional collections. Our proposed protocol was applied to 16 unprovenanced crania curated in a university anatomy collection. Epitaphonomic signatures associated with anatomical preparation were assessed using categorical scores; craniometric data were analyzed using FORDISC 3.1 following the standard approach therein and using a custom reference dataset imported into the program. Additional exploratory analyses were conducted using a Factor Analysis of Mixed Data (FAMD) to visualize concordance and discordance between epitaphonomic and craniometric variables. Results indicate most individuals exhibit epitaphonomic signatures consistent with anatomical preparation; however, when those data are integrated with craniometric analysis, we identified individuals warranting removal from teaching collections based on elevated ethical concerns. Case examples demonstrate how our protocol supports transparent ethical triage distinguishing between likely anatomically prepared human remains, human remains requiring repatriation, and indeterminate cases requiring further evaluation. This protocol provides a practical, nondestructive framework for the responsible stewardship of unprovenanced skeletal collections.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans6020019

Authors: Aurora Pețan

Large-scale landscape transformation in mountainous regions during the Late Iron Age remains insufficiently integrated into broader debates on European urbanism. In southwestern Transylvania, extensive slope terracing came to define the spatial core of the Dacian political centre. This study examines the scale, organization, and social implications of this engineered landscape using high-resolution LiDAR data and spatial modelling. Over 4000 anthropogenic terraces were identified, and their spatial patterning was analysed through Kernel Density Estimation (300 m and 800 m radii) in order to evaluate intensity gradients and territorial articulation. The results indicate compact nuclei of high terrace concentration embedded within a broader, yet continuous, system structured along ridge corridors and circulation routes. The spatial correlation between terrace density and elevated architectural features suggests differentiated building practices and hierarchical organization within a territorially extensive settlement pattern. Rather than representing isolated fortified sites, the Dacian mountain core emerges as an integrated and infrastructurally connected landscape. These findings support the interpretation of the area as a form of Late Iron Age low-density urbanism, in which habitation, mobility, and social differentiation were materially embedded in large-scale topographic modification.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans6020018

Authors: Eliseo Zeballos Zevallos Jesús Eduardo Carpio Obando Katherine del Rosario López Vásquez Pablo A. Garcia-Chevesich John E. McCray

Water-related ritual practices constitute a central axis through which many Andean communities articulate cosmology, social organization, and collective identity. This study examines the Fiesta del Agua (Layimama), an ancestral ritual cycle celebrated in the inter-Andean valley of Ticsani (Moquegua, southern Peru), focusing on its symbolic structure, social roles, and implications for water governance and cultural continuity. Using a qualitative, interpretive research design based on documentary analysis of ethnographic, historical, and anthropological sources, the study analyzes how ritual practices surrounding water function as mechanisms of social cohesion, moral regulation, and symbolic management of a shared natural resource. The findings show that the Fiesta del Agua operates as a cyclical system composed of four interrelated stages (preparation, ritual performance, festive redistribution, and communal closure) through which water is sacralized as an axis mundi linking cosmology, agricultural production, and social prestige. Far from being a residual tradition, the festival actively reproduces collective identity, regulates communal access to water, and integrates Andean cosmology with Catholic symbolism through dynamic forms of religious syncretism. The article argues that the ritual management of water in Ticsani represents a culturally embedded governance system whose documentation and protection are essential in contexts of increasing hydrosocial stress and cultural erosion, indicating social, ecological, and political relevance of the findings and contributing to broader debates on human–environment relations, intangible cultural heritage, and the role of ritual in sustaining communal resource management.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans6020017

Authors: Sergio Da Silva Sergio Bonini

Prime numbers are central to mathematics, yet popular discourse often treats particular primes as if they carried intrinsic messages, personalities, or moral charge. This study asks how that shift from legitimate curiosity to superstition-adjacent pattern making occurs and why it feels persuasive. Using qualitative content analysis of three widely circulated media examples, this paper maps how culturally specific number meanings are produced and transmitted, and how predictable cognitive biases support their plausibility. The analysis pairs anthropological mechanisms of symbolic association, prestige borrowing, community boundary marking, and meme-based diffusion with psychological mechanisms that include Type I error, apophenia, confirmation bias, availability, narrative fallacy, selection effects, survivorship, cultural priming, and authority or celebrity cueing. Across the cases, the results show a recurrent coupling: cultural schemas supply ready-made interpretive templates, while cognitive biases turn salience and coincidence into perceived significance, concentrating attention on narratively convenient primes and obscuring the many alternative patterns that could have been selected. This paper concludes that meanings such as 666 as evil are culture dependent rather than mathematical properties, and that improving public communication about primes requires making selection processes and interpretive frames explicit while preserving legitimate mathematical wonder.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans6020016

Authors: Julia Meyers Laure Spake Hugo F. V. Cardoso

Secular changes in the physical growth of children in the 20th century have been examined largely between cohorts of boys or men, with fewer studies examining changes among girls/women or both sexes. Sex-specific growth trajectories and differential cultural treatment of the sexes can affect how girls and boys respond to changes in the ontogenetic environment. This study examined secular change in height (cm) and weight (kg) in affluent Portuguese school children from three periods over the 20th century: an early (1913–1916), middle (1929–1943), and late (1992–2012) period. Anthropometric data was taken from medical records and archives of two boarding schools located in or near Lisbon: the Colégio Militar for boys and the Instituto de Odivelas for girls. Height and weight data were collated from over 1349 children (over 825 boys and 524 girls), aged to 10 to 17 years. Height and weight were plotted against age for the three periods to assess secular changes and sex differences in the secular trend. Results indicate a similar pattern of secular change across boys and girls, wherein children measured in the late period demonstrated an increase in height and weight, with the greatest increase occurring between the middle and late periods. The increase in height and weight can be attributed to changes to the socioeconomic environment in Portugal after the 1960s, but particularly after the democratic transition of 1974. This includes population-wide improvements in living standards, sanitation, decreased disease load, access to medical care and improved quantity and quality of nutrition. Cultural-based preferential treatment of boys may have taken place, as boys increased more in relative and absolute height and weight.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans6020015

Authors: Hillary A. DelPrete

School-collected data on height, weight, and body mass index (BMI) offers tremendous potential for examining differences in the growth and development of students in varying environments. This study examines data on height, weight, and BMI of 1858 students, in kindergarten through eighth grade, from two school districts in central New Jersey that are geographically close, but that are distinct in composition regarding their self-identified primary ethnicity and socioeconomic environments. In one district, 78.6% of the students identify as Hispanic or Latino, and in the second district, 88.9% of the students identify as White. Mann–Whitney U tests and a Kruskal–Wallis test were run on height, weight, and BMI, comparing median values of the students from the two districts by grade and ethnicity, respectively. These results, combined with results from a Dunn post hoc pairwise test, indicate that the significant differences could be attributed to socioeconomic status or self-identified primary ethnicity. Upon further testing, however, comparing students of different self-identified primary ethnicities within districts and comparing students within the same self-identified primary ethnicity across districts reveals a stronger association with socioeconomic status. Overall, the students in the less affluent population were shorter and heavier than the students in the more affluent population.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans6020014

Authors: Claire Galloni d’Istria

This article examines how bordering is experienced in alpine environments undergoing rapid ecological change. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork conducted between 2024 and 2025 in the transboundary region of the Aosta Valley (Italy), Haute-Savoie (France), and the Canton of Valais (Switzerland), it explores how more-than-human relations become strained, suspended, or reconfigured through infrastructural instability, environmental rupture, and sanitary regulation. Based on a photo-ethnography, the analysis focuses on three empirical cases: infrastructural disruptions in the Val de Bagnes; the collapse of the Birch Glacier in the Lötschental Valley; and the effects of the Lumpy Skin Disease on pastoral practices across transboundary valleys. The article shows that alpine spaces are continuously co-produced by more-than-human assemblages through dynamics, in which bordering emerges not as fixed spatial line but as a conditional relational process unfolding across elevations and over time. By foregrounding interruption, waiting, constrained access, regulated proximity, suspension and exposure, it contributes to posthuman border studies by approaching bordering as a relational dynamic grounded in the material and temporal conditions under which more-than-human relations become practicable or impracticable.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans6020013

Authors: Lav Kanoi Yufang Gao Michael R. Dove

Perhaps one of the most defining ‘techniques of the body’ for human beings is bi-pedal walking. This study brings together studies in socio-cultural anthropology to reflect on the nature of walking as a field method in different social-environmental contexts. The study offers an account of walking in relation to natural history, urban studies and contemporary conservation science. How has walking served as a field method in different knowledge-making contexts, and how does it afford an experiential way of being and belonging (or not) in urban and rural settings? By reflecting on such themes, this paper sheds light on the many ways that people walk, and the places, physical and metaphorical, that it takes them and allows them to discover, reveal, and understand.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans6020012

Authors: Tesla A. Monson Andrew P. Weitz Marianne F. Brasil

Humans, and most other late Homo species, are characterized by large brains and bodies. However, the discovery of two small-brained Homo species—H. floresiensis and Homo naledi—has cast doubts on large brain size as a defining feature of our genus. We reevaluated brain and body size scaling using data for 225 extant primates and 16 fossil hominid taxa, including one of the most diminutive species in genus Homo, H. floresiensis. Brain and body size are tightly correlated in genus Homo, varying along a positively allometric slope (R2 = 0.84, F(1,5) = 33, p < 0.01) that is significantly different from the slope characterizing extant primates (R2 = 0.94, F(1,222) = 3294, p < 0.001). Both small-bodied Homo floresiensis and Homo naledi have endocranial volumes (ECVs) that are consistent with their body size given the scaling relationship that characterizes genus Homo. Paired ECV and body mass estimates demonstrate considerable overlap of brain:body size proportions across fossil hominid taxa. Earlier hominids, Ardipithecus ramidus and Australopithecus anamensis, are characterized by ancestral brain:body size scaling; we discuss the hypothesis that a fundamental biological shift ca. 3 Ma altered the trajectory of encephalization—potentially linked to changes in fetal growth and gestation in Pleistocene fossil hominids—and may be directly implicated in the evolution of complex symbolic behavior in our lineage.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans6010011

Authors: Ajanet S. Rountree

Zora Neale Hurston describes herself as “a crow in a pigeon’s nest” in her autobiography, Dust Tracks on a Road. For Hurston, the metaphor illustrates her singular perspective as an atypical presence in what she considered a stereotypical environment—or, put differently, the difference her presence made in a dominant space. Katherine McKittrick describes metaphors as “observational scaffolding.” Observational scaffolding functions as both a signal and a map, highlighting sites of struggle and liberation along the continuum of life’s experiences. Therefore, this article engages with discourses on decolonization and Black feminist epistemologies, acknowledges the differences between Hurston’s and today’s anthropology, and challenges other disciplines and fields to reconsider how values such as democracy and justice might influence engagement with Black knowledge production, specifically from Black women.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans6010010

Authors: Óscar Salguero Montaño

This article analyses the Museo de los Desplazados (Museum of the Displaced), a collaborative platform conceived by the Left Hand Rotation collective to foster shared reflection on gentrification processes. This project takes the form of a collective and decentralised digital archive, functioning as an open, ‘in-process’ collaborative tool. Within the context of the proliferation of self-organised digital archives, this study explores how the Museum acts as a dynamic social object that articulates dispersed narratives. Drawing on Derrida’s concept of the ‘anarchive’, the research validates the hypothesis that there is a direct relationship between the profiles of autonomous collectives and their specific epistemic practices. The findings reveal that activists utilise the archive as a tool for legal defence, ‘heat-of-the-moment’ ethnography, and networking, thereby resisting ‘archival violence’ and constructing collective counter-memory. Ultimately, the Museum demonstrates that memory is not a guarded site, but a living network built through horizontal and rhizomatic collaboration.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans6010009

Authors: Alexandra Figueiredo Cláudio Monteiro

The article presents the preliminary data from the excavation of the Azurrague 1 Dolmen (Ourém), carried out within the MEDICE II project, highlighting the importance of its location in a karstic landscape marked by a strong tradition of funerary cults in natural cavities. The dolmen structure features a heptagonal chamber and a short passage, with ritual deposits that include macrolithic tools, polished axes, ceramics, and human remains dated between the beginning of the Late Neolithic and the Middle Chalcolithic. The data indicates practices of secondary burial, continuity of regional lithic traditions, and a symbolic integration between exogenous architectural forms and endogenous ritual content established in caves. The proximity to caves with contemporary chronologies, such as Lapa da Furada, reinforces the coexistence of differentiated yet interconnected ritual spaces. Analogies with the Rego da Murta Megalithic Complex, caves and other sites in the Alto Nabão region support the hypothesis of a hybrid, long-lasting cultural system in which megalithic monumentalization is associated with ancestral symbolic practices.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans6010008

Authors: Alexandra Sánchez Rolón

Through theorists like M. Jacqui Alexander, Édouard Glissant, Saidiya Hartman, Carolyn Cooper, and Michelle Wright, this project reconsiders the “vulgarity” attributed to Caribbean musical genres, like dancehall, dembow, and reguetón, as a pedagogical practice: an embodied, sensorial way of knowing that challenges colonial and racialized modes of aesthetics, morality, and order. Through an examination of Vybz Kartel’s “Fever,” Tokischa’s “Sistema de Patio,” and Bad Bunny’s “El Apagón,” I examine how sound, image, and movement converge to create what Alexander calls “pedagogies,” which simultaneously disturb and instruct. These pedagogies of the vulgar illuminate the ongoing impact of colonialism and plantation slavery in the Caribbean, particularly the gendered extraction of labor and capital that continues to shape daily life. In this context, vulgarity is not simply performed but inverted, prompting us to ask what is truly vulgar: Caribbean music and dance, or the systemic violence of Western modernity? These pedagogies foreground the paradoxical beauty of violence and survival, revealing how Caribbean peoples reconfigure “vulgarity” to craft pleasure and freedom amidst constraint. Embracing Michelle Wright’s concept of “epiphenomenal time,” this study invites readers to watch, listen, and feel, reminding us that the pedagogy of the vulgar must be embodied to be understood.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans6010007

Authors: Raymond Pierotti

There have been numerous attempts to examine Indigenous cultures from a scientific and evolutionary perspective. In this work, however, there has been little acknowledgment of how the study of biological evolution is changing. I examine evidence of the way Indigenous cultures think about nonhumans and examine concepts of creation and creator figures in relation to Niche Construction, a 21st century evolutionary concept that examines how organisms shape both their own environments and those of other species by studying how Natural Selection can act upon how most organisms impact the survival and existence of other species. I focus this comparison on how many Indigenous Plains cultures of North America regard wolves as being creator figures within the context of the way they experience their environments. Ecological studies revealed that in 30 years since wolf reintroduction to Yellowstone, this species has reshaped the ecology of many other species in the park ecosystem. I argue that in the belief systems of Indigenous peoples, this restructuring is tantamount to an Act of Creation, and that Indigenous Americans recognized that wolves filled both this role, as well as a role in helping Indigenous cultures adjust to the environments of North America as they arrived on this continent over the last 20,000 years. I also consider the relationship from the wolves’ perspective. This concept of creation is rooted in ecology and evolutionary biology, and does not involve supernatural anthropomorphic beings the way Western stories of creation do.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans6010006

Authors: Alfred Montoya

This article is an introduction to the issues faced by the unhoused and those with substance use issues in San Antonio, TX, and an analysis of the mis-fits and misrecognitions that lead to failures. It focuses on three areas: aspects of civil rights and full citizenship tied to real estate, neurodiversity as a lens for understanding the needs of many unhoused persons, and the running partner relationship as potential object of analysis and intervention.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans6010005

Authors: Mohammed Bensharada Alex Finlay Ben Stern Richard Telford Vincent Gaffney

The exploration of Doggerland, the prehistoric landscape that once connected Britain to the continent, remains one of Europe’s most significant archeological challenges. This paper presents a study into the palaeolandscape and the paleoenvironmental development of Doggerland, through the geochemical analyses of a core (ELF019) taken from the southern North Sea. The thermal properties divided the core into three sedimentary zones based on the variations in organic matter and carbonate content. Organic biomarkers were used to distinguish between terrestrial and aquatic vegetation inputs, revealing alternating freshwater, terrestrial, and marine input influences. Chemostratigraphy defined six depositional zones that corresponded with the identified thermal and biomarker data. Radiocarbon dating of peat-derived humic fractions anchored the key environmental transition between freshwater and saline deposition to the Greenlandian period of the Lower Holocene (10,243–10,199 Cal BP). The integrated geochemical evidence suggests a transformation from freshwater silts, low organic content, and sandy clay deposit to saline clay marine deposit. The progressive transformation may reflect the inundation sequence that led to the final submergence of Doggerland.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans6010004

Authors: Federico Divino

This article examines the cognitive theory expressed in early Buddhist Pāli sources by situating their analyses of perception, language, and meditative experience within a psychosemiotic framework. It argues that Buddhist thinkers conceived cognition as a stratified process emerging from the dynamic interaction between sensory and effectual domains, culminating in the semiotic determinations of nāmarūpa and the proliferative activity of conceptual constructs. Drawing on parallels with Peircean pansemioticism, the study highlights how both traditions interpret phenomena as sign-constituted events and how contemplative practice can intervene in the habitual chains of semiosis that ordinarily shape human experience. By bridging Buddhist phenomenology with contemporary cognitive science and semiotics, this work proposes that the Buddhist model—precise in its technical vocabulary and rich in its analyses of attention, perception, and conceptualization—offers valuable tools for understanding and modulating cognitive processes in both theoretical and practical domains.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans6010003

Authors: Rylan Tegtmeyer Hawke Phoenix Farnham Sarajane Smith-Escudero Rachel Coppock Jesse Goliath

Traditionally, the field of forensic anthropology has built its foundation on being an objective observer of human behavior to answer questions of medicolegal significance. With the publication of the NAS report in 2009, the field continues to fulfill scientific criteria by analyzing data and providing statistical validation for methods of identification, yet may often fall short in offering interpretations of the patterns that exist and the underlying factors influencing these observations. Conversely, biocultural anthropology excels at theorizing and interpreting social patterns by recognizing that biology and culture interact to impact an individual’s lived experience, but its foundation often lacks a robust statistical lens. However, if we combine the analytics of forensic anthropology with the interpretive power of biocultural anthropology—specifically, social theories of behavior—we have the opportunity to explore the intersection between personhood, the body, and society. One such example can be seen through examining the prolonged (and often generational) effects of structural, physical, and cultural violence, social injustices, inequities, and inequalities that may affect an individual’s propensity to be both a perpetrator AND a victim of circumstance. This paper examines previous work discussing the theoretical foundations of forensic anthropology and existing social theory research to bridge the gap between the “who,” the “why,” and the “when” as they exist in the forensic record. Ultimately, the goal is to provide meaningful steps for understanding, interpreting, and potentially influencing change in the field of forensic anthropology.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans6010002

Authors: Cathy Buerger

As online spaces have become increasingly hostile, some internet users have begun to organize collectively to counter hatred through what is known as counterspeech. This article explores how loosely affiliated individuals come to feel a strong sense of community in such efforts, even when they have never met in person. Using digital ethnographic data collected on the international counterspeaking group #iamhere, I argue that participants build imagined rhetorical communities: affective bonds forged through shared moral language and collective communicative action. Although members are geographically dispersed and largely unknown to one another offline, they nonetheless experience a sense of solidarity rooted in their common linguistic and ethical framework. This article shows how rhetorical practices, particularly those focused on empathy and civil discourse, become the glue that holds these activist formations together. By examining the ways moral discourse enables both individual agency and collective identity in counterspeech, this work offers new insight into how human groups form online to resist hatred and assert shared values.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans6010001

Authors: Amy R. Michael Samantha H. Blatt Jennifer D. Bengtson Ashanti Maronie Samantha Unwin Jose Sanchez

The 1992 cold case homicide of “Ina Jane Doe” illustrates how an interdisciplinary team worked to identify the decedent using a combined approach of skeletal re-analysis, updated forensic art informed by anthropologists’ input, archival research, and forensic investigative genetic genealogy. The original forensic art for “Ina Jane Doe” showed an over-pathologization of skeletal features and an inaccurate hairstyle; however, the case gained notoriety on internet true crime forums leading to speculation about the decedent’s intellectual capacity and physical appearance. The “Ina Jane Doe” case demonstrates the importance of advocating for skeletal re-analysis as more robust methods and technologies emerge in forensic science, as well as the impact of sustained public interest in cold cases. In this case, continuous public interest and online speculation led to anthropologists constructing a team of experts to correct and revise narratives about the decedent. Forensic anthropologists’ role in cold cases may include offering skeletal re-analysis, recognizing and correcting errors in the original estimations of the biological profile, searching for missing person matches, and/or working collaboratively with subject matter experts in forensic art, odontology and forensic investigative genetic genealogy.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans5040034

Authors: Julia Zea Pablo A. Garcia-Chevesich Carlos Zevallos Madeleine Guillen Francisco Alejo Eliseo Zeballos Johan Vanneste Henry Polanco John E. McCray Christopher Bellona David C. Vuono

Gold mining has played a central role in shaping Peruvian society from pre-Inca civilizations to the present. However, existing literature offers fragmented perspectives, often focusing on isolated themes such as metallurgy, colonial mercury use, or environmental degradation, without integrating these across time and territory. This review addresses that gap by offering a place-based synthesis that combines archaeological, historical, legal, environmental, and comparative insights. Drawing on both Spanish-language sources and international literature, the paper reconstructs Peru’s gold mining trajectory through five historical phases—pre-Inca, Inca, colonial, republican, and contemporary—highlighting continuities and ruptures in governance, labor systems, and environmental impacts. The analysis reveals persistent challenges in Peru’s gold sector, including informality, mercury pollution, and weak institutional capacity. Compared to other mining economies such as Chile, Ghana, and South Africa, Peru exhibits greater fragmentation and limited integration of mining into national development strategies. The review also explores the role of gold in the global energy transition, emphasizing its relevance in clean technologies and green finance, and identifies policy gaps that hinder Peru’s alignment with sustainability goals. By bridging linguistic and disciplinary divides, this synthesis contributes to a more inclusive historiography of extractive industries and underscores the need for interdisciplinary approaches to mining governance. Ultimately, the paper calls for a reimagining of Peru’s gold sector, one that prioritizes environmental justice, social equity, and long-term resilience.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans5040033

Authors: Guy Lanoue

In this article I analyze the symbolic role of the hospital in its social context, from its creation in Rome in the 2nd century BCE to contemporary Montreal hospitals. I trace the change from its original role as a site to isolate the sick to limit the symbolic pollution of the allegedly perfect social body of the Roman state, a trope that became an important vector of unity as Rome expanded and incorporated greater numbers of foreigners and slaves. Today, however, western hospitals have become a semiotic engine where patients construct a new biography to counter the depersonalisation of contemporary medical practices. I propose that today patients use the hospital as raw material to construct a temporal framework that substitutes the rhythms of everyday life that illness and the institutional culture of the hospital have interrupted. These narratives adhere to the same basic structure: the entrance scenario is always admission to the hospital; the plot structure is built with the non-medical details of the daily hospital routine. Surrounded by a neoliberal ethos that insists on the autonomy of the self but silenced by the mechanisation of illness, contemporary patients transform hospitals into semiotic engines where patients use their immediate environment to re-engineer new voices of the self.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans5040032

Authors: Edward Mark Schortman Patricia Ann Urban

Higher education inculcates in students an enduring curiosity about the world. Accomplishing this goal requires helping undergraduates recognize that learning is a social process occurring within multiple communities of practice. Each of these collectives provides different lenses through which aspects of reality are illuminated, none encompassing all there is to know about a subject. Students thus appreciate that learning is an open-ended processes driven by a curiosity that is never satisfied. Knowledge resulting from that process is forever being refined, a project to which undergraduates can contribute. Appreciating the many ways of knowing the world requires engaging meaningfully with these distinct communities. This is best achieved by participating directly in the work and lives of multiple such collectives. Field schools provide excellent opportunities in which students come to perceive, think about, and act in worlds constituted by the community of archeologists and that comprise people hosting and participating in the investigations. We use our experiences directing an archeological field school in northwest Honduras from 1983-2008 to illustrate how we used this learning environment to help undergraduates make original contributions to knowledge of the area’s past while rethinking who they are and what they are capable of achieving.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans5040031

Authors: Sylvie Genest

The objective of this Special Issue is to highlight the efforts of contemporary anthropologists to integrate the theoretical framework and methods of systems thinking into their research [...]

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans5040030

Authors: Alison Louise Kahn

This article examines how ethnographic methodology and literary theory can advance research engines and artificial intelligence systems beyond the reductive computational approaches that dominate contemporary AI development. Drawing on recent Stanford research revealing fundamental gaps in large language models’ ability to distinguish factual knowledge from belief, I argue that contemporary AI systems enact what I term “abducted semantics”—appropriating the inferential logic of human meaning-making while systematically attenuating the culturally embedded, phenomenologically grounded capacities that generate authentic understanding. Through close analysis of Clifford Geertz’s thick description, Charles Sanders Peirce’s triadic semiotics, and canonical literary works—Miguel de Cervantes’ Don Quixote and Gabriel García Márquez’s One Hundred Years of Solitude—I demonstrate that human understanding operates through complex semiotic processes irreducible to pattern-matching and statistical prediction. The article proposes concrete interventions to transform research engines from tools of semantic extraction into technologies that preserve and enhance interpretive richness, arguing that ethnographic and literary methodologies offer essential correctives to the epistemological impoverishment inherent in current AI architectures.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans5040029

Authors: Menelaos Apostolou

Several people in contemporary postindustrial societies experience difficulties retaining intimate partners. This paper investigates the proximate reasons (the immediate causes of reduced capacity) and the ultimate reasons (the evolutionary causes behind those proximate mechanisms) that lead to such difficulties. I argue that the mechanisms or adaptations involved in partner retention evolved in ancestral preindustrial contexts and may not be effective in contemporary postindustrial settings. Relevant mismatches include the protection of human rights, dependence on intimate partners, freedom in mate choice, and access to parenting resources. I further argue that these mismatches have affected adaptations involved in partner retention, including the expression of undesirable traits, such as aggression and jealousy, insufficient mating effort, poor initial mate choice, and an impaired ability to meet the demands of parenting. As a consequence, many individuals today experience reduced mate-retention capacity, with implications that I explore.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans5040028

Authors: Sharon K. Moses

This article highlights the phenomenon of marginalized populations and minorities who espouse white supremacist ideology despite their own ethnic and cultural backgrounds within the USA. This study focusses on how non-Caucasian individuals are attracted to this ideology, its organizations, and how this contradiction is reconciled. Of particular interest is the rise in gun violence or the advocacy of gun violence by non-white individuals in the United States harboring white supremacist ideals and identifying with those principles. Statistical data for national violence is limited to general categories by state and federal law enforcement. This article examines public comments made by high-profile individuals as examples reflecting current attitudes under examination as well as violent acts resulting in deaths perpetrated by minorities motivated by supremacist ideals. Findings suggest that non-Caucasian or minority individuals from multivariant ethnic groups who espouse Nazi ideals are not following a singular objective or unified under one rubric but have mixed motivations rooted in establishing legitimacy and “white proximity”. White supremacist ideology is redefined to suit personal grievances unique to an individuals’ cultural group and/or needs.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans5040027

Authors: Federico Divino

With an emphasis on the adaptation and mediation of Buddhist meditation within Western societies, this study explores the transformative interaction of traditional contemplative practices and modern technologies. By means of an extensive ethnographic investigation carried out in multiple European locations, this study sheds light on the significant influence that digital devices—specifically, smartphone applications—have on the accessibility, practice, and conception of meditation. These digital tools become guides that not only democratize access to meditation but also fundamentally change its nature, making it more individualized, commodified, and integrated into the field of self-care and therapeutic modalities from a deeply philosophical and communal practice. This inquiry critically looks at the two outcomes of this shift: the good that meditation is now more widely available and the bad that it is losing its conventional discipline and philosophical profundity. This paper raises concerns about the integrity of spiritual practices in the digital age and their evolution under the influence of Western epistemologies by arguing that the digital facilitation of meditation practices parallels broader societal tendencies towards personalization and digitization.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans5040026

Authors: Julia Budka

In recent decades, the concept of a so-called Dark Age in ancient Sudan at the beginning of the first millennium BCE has been called into question within the field of Nubian archaeology. This is primarily due to new archaeological findings at urban sites such as Tombos and Amara West, as well as new theoretical approaches developed during the postcolonial turn. This study aims to show that new remote sensing, surveys and excavations in the Attab to Ferka region of Sudan have also revealed important evidence of continued occupation after the end of Egypt’s colonial rule over Nubia. In particular, studies of settlement patterns and ceramics enrich our understanding of people’s lives during the period between 1070 and 750 BCE and allow us to expand on dynamic processes, local forms of resilience and innovation. This new understanding of the persistence of communities after the fall of colonial Nubia under Egyptian rule facilitates a more nuanced interpretation of the evolution of the Napatan Empire, thereby challenging the conventional concept of secondary states. The Attab to Ferka case study demonstrates that previously marginalised regions and communities are significant contributors to cultural dynamics and achievements during the first millennium BCE in Sudan.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans5040025

Authors: Sebastian Wang Gaouette

Throughout the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, slavery was a central element of life in colonial and early national New York. The places where the enslaved buried their dead, referred to today as African Burial Grounds, remain important sites of reflection and remembrance for many New Yorkers. However, little literature exists discussing New York’s African Burial Ground sites from a broad, comparative perspective. This study examines seven African Burial Grounds in New York City and the Hudson Valley, two historically significant regions of New York State. GIS data from all seven sites, considered alongside GIS data from nearby coeval white Christian cemeteries, reveal that while the individuals interred in New York’s African Burial Grounds represent a variety of lived experiences, certain unifying patterns nonetheless emerge in the spatial dialectics of their final resting places. The findings have implications for the preservation of Black cultural heritage throughout southeastern New York State.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans5030024

Authors: Jose Abásolo-Llaría Francisco Vergara-Perucich

This study interrogates the interplay between architectural practice and ethnographic inquiry to elucidate human spatial experience across time and culture. Employing a mixed-methods design that integrates computational bibliometric analysis with thematic coding of international academic literature, the research identifies six thematic domains—memory, pedagogy, urban injustice, institutional care, domesticity, and vernacular epistemes. These domains reveal how ethnographic methods, though increasingly incorporated in architectural discourse, are frequently relegated to an instrumental role focused on design optimisation rather than the critical examination of cultural practices and power structures. The findings underscore that architecture functions as both a technical and cultural medium, simultaneously shaping and reflecting human behaviour and social relations. By foregrounding ethnography as a tool for capturing situated, embodied knowledge, the study advocates for a reconceptualisation of architectural practice that embraces reflexivity, inclusiveness, and contextual sensitivity. In doing so, it contributes to interdisciplinary debates central to anthropology, challenging established epistemological hierarchies and highlighting the potential for transformative, culturally informed spatial design.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans5030023

Authors: Daniel K. Thompson Juweria Ali Mohammed Hassan Dable

Segmentary lineage theory fell out of favor in cultural anthropology during the 1980s. However, the core ideas of segmentary lineage have continued to shape political mobilization as well as political analysis in Africa long after the theory’s supposed death. This article analyzes how and why the framework of segmentary lineage has endured as a potent means of describing and experiencing politics in the Somali-inhabited Horn of Africa. It theorizes Somali clanship, a classic example of a “pure” segmentary lineage structure, as a framework for managing the near-term future rather than as an objective description of existing social structures. We show how segmentary lineage has been politicized during the colonial and postcolonial eras as a tool for pre-emptive action by governments. We link this broader dynamic of politicization to the functions of clanship in everyday life as a mode of anticipating other people’s likely behavior based on clan-framed narratives about the past. Based on archival research, ethnographic fieldwork, and analysis of media and social media, we argue that Somali clanship operates in politics less as a network of shared interests or mobilization based on anticipated collective gains, and more as a framework for anticipating and attempting to pre-empt other people’s likely behavior.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans5030022

Authors: Giulia Sinatti Julie G. Salvador Jennifer Creese

Anthropologists increasingly engage with healthcare systems, using ethnographic research as a critical tool for understanding and improving healthcare practices. The resulting interactions and collaborations between ethnographers, healthcare practitioners, and administrators often give rise to ‘frictions’—moments of tension, frustrations, misalignments, and misunderstandings. In physics, friction is the force that one object’s surface exerts over another’s to slow its motion, push back against its inherent energy and movement, and is a constant at all touchpoints between the objects, from both sides. While friction often evokes negative connotations, in this article, we look beyond frictions as obstacles, and instead explore them as productive forces that can drive transformation in the healthcare improvement field. Drawing both on the authors’ own experiences and on the work of other anthropologists, we reflect on how friction helps shed light on the dynamics of interdisciplinary work and improve collaboration. We unpack how conceptual and ethical frictions in applied ethnographic work reveal deeper structural and relational insights that would otherwise remain obscured. This article contributes to anthropological discussions on interdisciplinary collaboration and applied practice, and it offers concrete strategies for handling different kinds of friction in health-related ethnographic research.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans5030021

Authors: Ezra N. S. Lockhart

This theoretical article explores the contrasting ontologies, axiologies, and political economies of transhumanism and posthumanism. Transhumanism envisions the human as an enhanced, autonomous agent shaped by neoliberal and Enlightenment ideals. Posthumanism challenges this by emphasizing relationality, ecological entanglement, and critiques of commodification. Both engage with technology’s role in reshaping humanity. Drawing on Braidotti’s posthumanism, Haraway’s cyborg figuration, Ahmed’s politics of emotion, Berlant’s cruel optimism, Massumi’s affective modulation, Seigworth and Gregg’s affective intensities, Zuboff’s surveillance capitalism, Fisher’s capitalist realism, Cooper’s surplus life, Sadowski’s digital capitalism, Lupton’s quantified self, Schafheitle et al.’s datafied subject, Pasquale’s black box society, Terranova’s network culture, Bratton’s platform sovereignty, Dean’s communicative capitalism, and Morozov’s technological solutionism, the article elucidates how subjectivity, data, and infrastructure are reorganized by corporate systems. Introducing technogensis as the co-creation of human and technological subjectivities, it links corporate-platform practices to future trajectories governed by Apple, Meta, and Google. These branded technologies function not only as enhancements but as infrastructures of governance that commodify subjectivity, regulate affect and behavior, and reproduce socio-economic stratification. A future is extrapolated where humans are not liberated by technology but incubated, intubated, and ventilated by techno-conglomerate governments. These attention-monopolizing, affective-capturing, behavior-modulating, and profit-extracting platforms do more than enhance; they brand subjectivity, rendering existence subscription-based under the guise of personal optimization and freedom. This reframes transhumanism as a cybernetic intensification of liberal subjectivity, offering tools to interrogate governance, equity, agency, and democratic participation, and resist techno-utopian narratives. Building on this, a posthumanist alternative emphasizes relational, multispecies subjectivities, collective agency, and ecological accountability, outlining pathways for ethical design and participatory governance to resist neoliberal commodification and foster emergent, open-ended techno-social futures.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans5030020

Authors: Walter E. A. van Beek

Humans are a curious mix of biology and culture, and one interaction area between these two that has recently come into focus is located in the senses, our biological apparatus to connect with the world. In this essay, I address the variation in appreciation of the senses in various cultures, both historical and contemporaneous, in order to explore the extent to which culture steers not only our observations, but also our appreciation of the epistemological weight of those senses. I concentrate on three senses—vision, hearing, and smell—and show how the relative weight attributed to each of them shifts in different cultures or historical periods. Using data from anthropology, history, literature, psychology, and linguistics, I argue that vision, sound, and smell occupy different positions in various cultures, and that our sensory balance shifts with culture. Thus, our present epistemological dominance of sight over all other senses is neither a biological given nor a cultural necessity.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans5030019

Authors: Sergio Da Silva Raul Matsushita Sergio Bonini

This study examines the impact of reproductive inequality on the long-term survival of Homo sapiens by comparing two reproductive models: the Pareto (power-law) distribution of unequal reproduction and the Gaussian (normal) distribution of equal reproduction. We conducted simulations to explore how genetic diversity, measured by heterozygosity, evolves over time. The results predict population crashes due to genetic bottlenecks under both models, but with large differences in timing. We refer to Pareto reproductive inequality as the Genghis Khan effect. This effect accelerates the loss of genetic diversity, increasing the species’ vulnerability to environmental stressors, resource depletion, and genetic drift, and thereby raising the risk of an earlier population collapse. Our findings showcase the importance of reproductive balance for the prolonged presence of Homo sapiens on this planet.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans5030018

Authors: Shawn M. Phillips Joanna R. Phillips

This review essay proposes that the influence of individualism, the tendency to prefer individual freedoms over collective obligations, in American society impacted the manner in which the US population responded to the recent global COVID-19 pandemic. During the pandemic, societal rifts were exposed that questioned the infringement on personal freedoms by governmental authority in the effort to protect public health. The essay traces the development of individualism from the Enlightenment through the emergence of the United States, during which individualism entwined with American identity. A review of social science research in the fields sociology, psychology, and anthropology demonstrates the ways in which individualism, in varying degrees from self-centered to collectivist tendencies, can be observed to affect social interaction and perception. With that background, it is possible to use individualism as a lens to investigate cultural responses to affliction. Societal responses to leprosy, syphilis, and COVID-19 are examined, and it is argued that the influence of degrees of individualism greatly impacted the social responses, and the extent to which individual freedoms were lost was notably varied in each case.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans5030017

Authors: Gregory A. Thompson Soren Pearce

In this article, we employ a Batesonian systems thinking approach to analyze politically polarized and politically polarizing encounters in the contemporary United States. We bring together Bateson’s concepts of schismogenesis, double binds, metacommunication, and transcontextualism with recent work on recognition and resonance in order to show how these encounters create moments of transcontextual double binds that produce mutual dysrecognition. We show how these moments of mutual dysrecognition become both animating forces of political polarization in the moment while also becoming constitutive poetic resonances for making sense of future events. When these moments of dysrecognition are considered alongside the removal of mechanisms that restrain schismogenesis, the United States body politic is becoming increasingly schizophrenic—split in two with both parts incommunicado with the other such that the whole system is veering towards collapse. We close by briefly considering the kind of deutero-learning, to use Bateson’s term, that might help to stave off such a collapse.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans5020016

Authors: Alessia Leggio

The following work is based on the historical–anthropological analysis of 93 skeletal remains belonging to post-war casualties who died in 1946 and remained missing for years. In 2019, 93 metal boxes containing skeletal remains of Slavic origin, belonging to civilians and soldiers who perished in the immediate postwar period following World War II, were found inside the ossuary of the Monumental Cemetery in Bari (Italy). At the beginning of the search, these people were thought to have died in prison camps in Apulia, such as Torre Tresca and Grumo Appula, in the province of Bari. Later, thanks to the discovery of war badges and years of extensive historical research, it was discovered that these remains had been missing for 75 years and belonged to soldiers of the Royal Yugoslav Army and civilians, probably their relatives, who died in 1946 in the refugee camp of Eboli, in the province of Salerno, Campania (Italy). To unveil this truth that remained hidden for over 75 years, a multidisciplinary study divided into two phases was applied. The first phase, grounded in historical research study, aimed to determine the historical and temporal context in which they lived and confirm the life they actually lived in the Eboli refugee camp. The second phase, grounded in anthropological research, aimed to reconstruct the biological profile of each individual, identify the presence of antemortem, perimortem, and postmortem lesions, assess potential pathological conditions, and determine, where possible, the cause of death. Finally, a correlation of the collected data was conducted to ascertain and corroborate, with reasonable certainty, the living conditions to which they were subjected in the refugee camp where they resided. Italy after 1943 became the scene of intense fighting and a dramatic situation for prisoners of war, including many Yugoslav soldiers. This work brought to light a history that had been lost for as many as 75 years, highlighted the importance, specifically, of the role of the Eboli refugee camp, a context little known and forgotten by many, and above all made it possible to remember and restore dignity to the victims of the Great War.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans5020015

Authors: Dada Docot

The landmark Philippine Supreme Court case Llorente vs. Llorente illuminates the complex intersections of transnational migration, inheritance law, and colonial legacies in the Philippines. The case centers on Lorenzo Llorente, a Filipino US Navy serviceman whose estate became the subject of a fifteen-year legal battle between his first wife Paula and his second wife Alicia. Lorenzo returned from the battles of World War II to find his wife in Nabua living with his brother and pregnant with his brother’s child. Lorenzo obtained a divorce in California in 1952. He later returned to the Philippines and married Alicia, naming her and their three adopted children as heirs in his will. Upon his death in 1985, Paula challenged the validity of the US divorce and claimed rights to Lorenzo’s estate under Philippine succession laws. While lower courts initially favored Paula’s claims by rigidly applying Philippine laws that are rooted in the colonial era and privileged blood relations, the Supreme Court ultimately upheld Lorenzo’s will in 2000, recognizing his right to divorce as a US citizen. This case reveals how postcolonial Philippine legal frameworks, still heavily influenced by Spanish colonial law, often fail to accommodate the complex realities of transnational families and diverse kinship practices, instead imposing rigid interpretations that fracture rather than heal family relations. Inheritance, previously a highly shared and negotiated process mediated by the elders, can now escalate to family disputes which play out in the impersonal space of the courtroom.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans5020014

Authors: Zhaokui Wang Huiping Li Ziqiang Zhang Qiang Guo Yanfeng Hou Roderick B. Campbell

In zooarchaeological research, animal bone fractures can result from various processes including slaughtering, dismemberment, marrow/grease extraction, craft processing, carnivore gnawing/trampling, sediment compression, bioturbation, and recovery bias. These fractures are further influenced by bone freshness/dryness and environmental temperature. The animal bones analysed in this study, excavated from Han dynasty tombs in the Xinxiang Plain New District, China, represent ritual offerings. These specimens exhibit distinct truncation features—chop surfaces, rough planes, and fracture traces—created by ancient iron tools for culinary purposes such as stewing preparation or consumption facilitation. These characteristics differ significantly, from the V-shaped butchery marks produced by stone/bronze tools and fracture patterns from marrow/grease extraction to post-depositional breakage formed during burial processes. In this study, steel tools were employed in the rocking slicing and rolling slicing of animal bones, complemented by techniques such as breaking to sever bone shafts. Subsequently, the marks on the cross-sections were observed using a stereomicroscope, and the results were compared and analysed with the materials from Han dynasty tombs unearthed at Xinxiang city, Henan Province. From the comparison between experimental observation results and archaeological materials, it is evident that the fine processing of meat-bearing bone materials mainly involved the use of rocking and rolling slicing methods. The cross-sections of the slices revealed shearing surfaces, rough patches, bone splinters, and sliced ends. The shearing surfaces in particular exhibited numerous visible trace characteristics, with the types and quantities of these traces varying with different cutting tools. This study holds significant reference value for exploring cutting tools and techniques in antiquity.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans5020013

Authors: Emma Long Emma Piasecki Jeanelle Uy Natalie Laudicina

The human pelvis is adapted to accommodate bipedal locomotion while retaining a wide enough pelvic canal to birth large babies. Many forces act on the pubic bone, with the pelvis being in charge of supporting the organs of the abdominopelvic cavity. In this research, we investigate whether increases in gut volume (GV) and number of births (parity) impact the skeletal morphology of the pubic bone at two regions: the pubic symphysis and the pubic arch. Our results indicate that in our female sample, the pubic symphysis width increased with increased GV and parity, while the pubic arch width decreased with increased GV and parity, although not significantly. In the male sample, there was almost no effect of increased GV on the pubic symphysis, while the pubic arch width increased in response to increased GV. We hypothesize that while significance is not present for this entire data set, these pelvic structures are impacted by GV and parity, and these changes should be investigated further. These changes in the structure can impact the function of the pelvic girdle and result in pain and changes to mobility. Pelvic girdle pain may be one result of these structural changes due to increased forces, and thus it is vital to investigate what factors may or may not contribute to these bone morphology changes.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans5020012

Authors: Daniel Côté Amelia León Ai-Thuy Huynh Jessica Dubé Ellen MacEachen Pamela Hopwood Marie Laberge Samantha Meyer Shannon Majowicz Meghan K. Crouch Joyceline Amoako

The urgency of managing the COVID-19 health crisis in workplaces led to tensions, work overload, and confusion about preventive measures. This study presents a secondary analysis of qualitative data on paradoxes and double binds (PDBs) experienced by precarious essential workers in Canada who interacted with the public and their supervisors. Based on 13 interviews from a larger qualitative dataset, we examine how workers navigated public health recommendations and organisational demands during the pandemic. Findings reveal multiple organisational and managerial PDBs—both COVID-19-related and pre-existing—that contributed to psychological distress and compromised well-being. We argue that PDBs represent a significant occupational health hazard for precarious workers. Addressing these structural contradictions through proactive management strategies could help mitigate workplace tensions, reduce stress, and enhance resilience in both crisis situations and regular organisational contexts. Our study contributes to occupational health and safety (OHS) by underscoring the risks posed by PDBs and advocating for strategies to support vulnerable workers in navigating conflicting demands.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans5020011

Authors: Barbara Miller

Accepting the premise that sociocultural anthropology is colonialist and Audre Lorde’s maxim that the master’s tools cannot remake the master’s house, I consider the value of a tool from outside the master’s house to reconstruct sociocultural anthropology. Intersectionality, variously known as a theory, a lens, or a metaphor, is rooted in U.S. Black women’s abolitionism of the mid-nineteenth century, which argued that rights-seeking efforts framed out Black women. The 1970s and 1980s brought increased attention, especially from Black American feminists, to the multiplying effects of the intersections of race, gender, and class. In 1989, the term intersectionality first appeared in print, and a theory was named. Since then, many fields of study and activism have embraced intersectionality. Edward Said posited that radical theories lose their edge when they travel outside their original context. I explore intersectionality’s travels to sociocultural anthropology—its chronology, advocates, and transformations. Although barely visible in much of sociocultural anthropology’s Whitestream, intersectionality has gained not only in numbers but also a stronger voice since its first published appearance in 2001. Nearly two centuries have passed since intersectionality’s origins in U.S. enslavement, but interlocking conditions of inequality pervade the world today, nurturing intersectionality’s radical ethos in sociocultural anthropology.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans5020010

Authors: Óscar Fernández-Álvarez Miguel González-González Sara Ouali-Fernández

Sustainability is currently seen as the central unifying idea necessary to mobilize collective responsibility to address the set of serious problems and challenges facing humanity, appealing to cooperation and the defense of the general interest. This article analyzes the social sustainability of the rural environment, in order to enhance its value beyond the traditional agricultural activities of the territory. Methodologically, it is based on ethnographic fieldwork through participant observation and in-depth interviews, carried out in the rural environment of Castilla y León. This has allowed us to reflect on the strategies that we have tried to articulate, combine, and relate to achieve rural social sustainability. The conclusions show the need to give political content to the rural space and the elements that derive from it. Political, economic, and social problems cannot be solved only from the local level; they need to create alliances beyond the communities to deal with economic structures that seek continuous growth.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans5010009

Authors: Christine A. Kray

This paper explores the co-constitution of systems of social distinction, culinary habits, and political economies. During the Depression in British Honduras (Belize), unemployment, hunger, and malnutrition ignited panic, unrest, and uprising. At the same time, agents of a mahogany company and the colonial government displaced an entire Maya farming community. Why was Maya farming not considered a pillar of the colony’s economy? For more than a century, colonial administrators had made scarce attempts to stimulate domestic food production and distribution, and stimulating corn production was not even considered. Corn had become racialized, called “Indian corn”, and was considered disgusting, unhealthy, and the cause of high Indian mortality rates. A visceral disgust for corn was hard to disentangle from British disgust for Indians more generally. The racialization of corn emerged alongside and reinforced colonial economic policies of structural underdevelopment, all of which ensured that when Belize City residents were standing in food lines, the abundant harvests of Indian corn were nowhere within reach.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans5010008

Authors: Catriona Pickard Elizabeth Greenberg Emma Smith Andy Barlow Clive Bonsall

In this paper, we revisit the Mesolithic–Neolithic transition in western Scotland and the links between early European farmers and middens in light of new aDNA, radiocarbon, and stable isotopic evidence. New carbon and nitrogen stable isotopic data for food sources (plant and animal remains) from a Mesolithic site are presented, and dietary FRUITS models are recalculated based on these data. We also respond to recent criticisms of the Bayesian approach to diet reconstruction. Results support the view that Neolithic people had at most a minimal contribution of marine foods in their diet and also point to a dual population model of transition in western Scotland. A significant aspect of the transition in coastal western Scotland is the co-occurrence of Neolithic human remains with shell-midden deposits, which appears to contradict stable isotopic evidence indicating a minimal contribution of marine resources to the diet of early farming communities in the region. Finally, we highlight the need for further research to fully address these issues, including (1) targeted isotopic analyses of potential plant and animal resources, (2) single-entity radiocarbon and ZooMS analyses of animal bones and artefacts from shell middens, and (3) further aDNA analyses of the remains of Late Mesolithic and Neolithic people.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans5010007

Authors: Ariane Le Moing

This article, based on systems thinking, explores how community organizations in Montreal providing newcomers support through the various stages of their settlement process operate within a local municipal system and a broader provincial system, both promoting integration and intercultural relations. On a local scale, the City of Montreal has set itself the goal of raising public awareness of the benefits of cultural diversity and wishes to encourage positive interactions in the public space. For those interviewed during our research, this municipal model of integration does not necessarily align with Quebec’s unique and unofficial integration model, interculturalism, which can be perceived as a political project supporting the French-speaking majority’s interests and which may seem incompatible with the social justice values espoused by community organizations. This article is based on verbatim excerpts gathered from individual and group in-depth interviews conducted with 37 community workers in the spring of 2023.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans5010006

Authors: Ivo Vieira Maria Lurdes Pereira Inês Morais Caldas

This study evaluates the applicability of Demirjian and Willems’ methods for age estimation in Portuguese children aged 6–9 years based on orthopantomographs (OPGs). The main objective was to compare the precision of both methods in estimating chronological age (CA). This study analyzed 160 OPGs, equally distributed by sex, and the dental age (DA) was calculated twice, using both methodologies. The findings reveal that Demirjian’s method consistently overestimated the chronological age by an average of 1.47 years for males and 1.45 years for females. Similarly, the Willems method also overestimated the age but to a lesser extent, with mean differences of 1.18 years for males and 0.91 years for females. Statistical analysis confirmed that both methods significantly overestimate age, with the most considerable discrepancies observed in 8-year-old individuals. Despite the Willems method providing slightly more accurate results, neither method was reliable, particularly for male subjects. This study highlights the need for further refinement of these methods, considering their tendency to overestimate age, especially in specific age groups. This research improves age estimation techniques in forensic and clinical settings, especially within the Portuguese pediatric population.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans5010005

Authors: Teresa Bejarano

Is there a qualitative difference between apes’ and humans ‘ability to estimate others’ mental states’, a.k.a. ‘Theory-of-Mind’? After opting for the idea that expectations are empty profiles that recognize a particular content when it arrives, I apply the same description to ‘vicarious expectations’—very probably present in apes. Thus, (empty) vicarious expectations and one’s (full) contents are distinguished without needing meta-representation. Then, I propose: First, vicarious expectations are enough to support apes’ Theory-of-Mind (including ‘spontaneous altruism’). Second, since vicarious expectations require a profile previously built in the subject that activates them, this subject cannot activate any vicarious expectation of mental states that are intrinsically impossible for him. Third, your mental states that think of me as a distal individual are intrinsically impossible states for me, and therefore, to estimate them, I must estimate your mental contents. This ability (the original nucleus of the human Theory-of-Mind) is essential in the human lifestyle. It is involved in unpleasant and pleasant self-conscious emotions, which respectively contribute to ‘social order’ and to cultural innovations. More basically, it makes possible human (prelinguistic or linguistic) communication, since it originally made possible the understanding of others’ mental states as states that are addressed to me, and that are therefore impossible for me.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans5010004

Authors: Pedro Jiménez-Castillo José Luis Simón García José María Moreno-Narganes

The development of transhumant livestock farming in the Iberian Peninsula from the Late Middle Ages onward is one of the most thoroughly studied aspects of economic history, as it laid the foundation for the prosperity of the Kingdom of Castile throughout the Early Modern period. In contrast, there is very little information about livestock activity in the earlier period of al-Andalus, the part of the peninsula under Islamic rule from the eighth to the fifteenth centuries. This lack of information is due to epistemological reasons, as the absence of written sources makes archaeological data on pastoralism highly elusive. Additionally, historiographical reasons have led to the belief that livestock farming played a secondary role in the Andalusi economy. Given the current state of research, this work is significant as it presents convincing archaeological evidence of Andalusi livestock farming as early as the 11th century, linked to rural communities where sheep herding for wool production was the primary activity.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans5010003

Authors: Donna J. Nash

The excavation of residential areas is a growing focus of research in Andean archaeology. Studies reveal that interpreting household remains from some prehispanic societies can be complex because of the nature of abandonment ritual, which may involve burnt offerings, the placement of valuables on floors, or the purposeful destruction of ceramic vessels that are distributed in patterned ways. The goods that constitute these offering practices can be confused with post-occupation refuse, especially when excavation units are relatively small. In this paper, I discuss the importance of assessing site formation processes in residential spaces and illustrate how different modes of household abandonment can make comparative analysis a complex exercise. I describe and compare several examples from Wari-affiliated residences at the sites of Cerro Baúl and Cerro Mejía, located in the department of Moquegua, Peru, to show how ritual depositions corresponding to house abandonment might affect the interpretation of daily domestic life. In particular, I examine how ritual assemblages have been interpreted as evidence of feasting to support propositions regarding the Wari political economy. I advocate that archaeologists interested in domestic areas, lifeways, and the political economy engage in large-scale horizontal excavations to ensure they can correctly distinguish between the remains of quotidian practices, the goods associated with ritual depositions, and refuse resulting from feasting, which is best substantiated with features and facilities to host empowering events.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans5010002

Authors: Rhys Williams Tim Thompson Caroline Orr Gillian Taylor

Understanding the composition and diagenetic processes of the deposition environment is pivotal to understanding why bone undergoes preservation or diagenesis. This research explores the complex nexus of diagenesis at the extremes of preservation, via the interdependent chemical, and short- and long-term microbial processes that influence diagenesis. These processes include dissolution, ion exchange, hydrolysis, recrystallisation, waterlogging, acidity and alkalinity, soil composition, redox potential, bacterial activity, and microbiome composition. Diagenetic processes are discussed in relation to typical sites and sites with extremes of preservation. Understanding site conditions that impact diagenetic processes is critical to understanding the visual features presented in recovered skeletal material, ensuring an appropriate post-mortem interval is assigned, and for subsequent post hoc analysis of bone.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans5010001

Authors: Julia Budka Hassan Aglan Chloë Ward

Traditional models of interaction in northern Sudan have innate Egyptological, elite, and urban biases which have relegated certain areas to mere peripheries of more ‘established’ and ‘central’ sites. In order to reach a higher resolution understanding of cultural dynamics and diversity of ancient Nilotic groups, the DiverseNile project has established the bespoke concept of Contact Space Biography which we present in the following article. We challenge existing approaches to cultural contact in the region by adopting a bottom-up approach which moves away from well-established categorisation of sites in our study area. In particular by reconstructing landscape biographies of the Bronze Age in the Middle Nile beyond established cultural categories in order to provide new insights into the ancient dynamics of social spaces, which include landscape features and non-human activities. In the following we instead consider such areas as complex social spaces intertwined with, an often changing, landscape by presenting our findings from the study of cemetery and settlement sites. Overall, the concept of Contact Space Biography effectively combines models of contact spaces, the idiosyncrasies of a changing landscape and the technological and industrial prerogatives of those living in and accessing this region.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans4040027

Authors: Maurizio Forte

This research project is aimed at exploring the cognitive and emotional processes involved in perceiving Etruscan artifacts. The case study is the Sarcophagus of the Spouses at the National Etruscan Museum in Rome, one of the most important masterpieces in pre-Roman art. The study utilized AI and eye-tracking technology to analyze how viewers engaged with the Etruscan Sarcophagus of the Spouses, revealing key patterns of visual attention and engagement. OpenAI, ChatGPT-4 (accessed on 12 October 2024) was used in conjunction with Colab–Python in order to elaborate all the spreadsheets and data arising from the eye-tracking recording. The results showed that viewers primarily focused on the central figures, especially on their faces and hands, indicating a high level of interest in the human elements of the artifact. The longer fixation duration on these features suggest that viewers find them particularly engaging, which is likely due to their detailed craftsmanship and symbolic significance. The eye-tracking data also highlighted specific gaze patterns, such as diagonal scanning across the sarcophagus, which reflects the composition’s ability to guide viewer attention strategically. The results indicate that viewer focus centers on human elements, especially on faces and hands, suggesting that these features hold both esthetic and symbolic significance.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans4040026

Authors: Sylviane Ngandu-Kalenga Greensword

This essay considers the abolitionist narrative, The Life of Olaudah Equiano, through the anthropological lens of ethnography. Equiano’s account, though not without controversy, contributes to the evolution of an African cultural consciousness that would span across multiple continents. In that sense, while this autobiography seems to follow the literary pattern of its contemporary slave narratives, it is also countercultural and qualifies as “anti-ethnography”. The review presented here focuses on two sections of Equiano’s work: (1) the Afrocentric account of Ibo culture and (2) the cultural commentary regarding enslavement in the Americas. For each section, Equiano’s deviation from the traditional slave narrative is highlighted and analyzed.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans4040025

Authors: Danny Rosenberg Shira Gur-Arieh Motti Pearl Hadar Ahituv

The Late Chalcolithic period in the southern Levant saw notable changes in almost every aspect of daily life. Some of the most significant shifts during this time seem to have been anchored in the subsistence economy and involved food and its cooking, processing, storage, serving, and handling with vessels and tools. The paper offers a comprehensive overview and analysis of one utensil that is likely to have been caught up in these developments—the Late Chalcolithic spoon. While spoons first appeared in the region during the Pottery Neolithic period, the Chalcolithic period witnessed a rise in their frequency and distribution. Nonetheless, they were few in number. While their functions remain unclear, we have presupposed their association with food and kitchenware and have explored them in this vein. This paper delves into their morphological characteristics and distribution and ponders their significance in light of other changes that occurred during the Late Chalcolithic period in the southern Levant.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans4040024

Authors: Raymond Pierotti

In this study, I discuss recent studies of human/wildlife mutualisms and suggest that several cases considered to represent domestication that has arisen through commensalism would be better considered as examples of mutualism between humans and various wild species. Species discussed include the only domesticated carnivores: cats (Felis sylvestris) and wolves (Canis lupus and C. dingo). I also discuss species over which there is considerable debate about whether they are domesticated or not: African (Loxodonta) and Asiatic elephants (Elphas). All of these species’ interactions include niche construction on the part of both species and influence human evolution at least a cultural level. I further argue that most contemporary domestic species currently exist in mutualistic relationships with humans because even though all of these species have been selected to benefit humans, all domestica species have also benefitted in terms of increased global and local population sizes and from more secure living conditions than can be found in their wild ancestors.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans4040023

Authors: Salinda Hess Francine Tremblay

This paper examines our collective exploratory research on Anthropology and Sociology students at Concordia University. As teaching faculty members at Concordia, we have all observed a significant shift in our student population over the past fifteen years. They appear to be more detached and less involved in their studies, a phenomenon that has piqued our collective curiosity. Our first insight into the possible reasons behind this shift came from Rob Beamish’s The Promise of Sociology (2010), where he explored the relationship between technology and knowledge. Inspired by Beamish, we sought to understand the relationship between technology and students’ performance. At the beginning of this research, we never imagined that the world would be under lockdown because of a pandemic (2020–2022) and forced to rely on technology; anyone teaching at the height of COVID-19 was obligated to use technology, which makes Beamish’s argument an even more relevant place to start. Lastly, we delved into the potential impact of technology on students’ health.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans4040022

Authors: Geoff Kushnick

When assessing potential mates is costly, there will be selection for copying others. Mate choice copying, which is the increased chance of mating with another individual after observing them mating with someone else (i.e., individual-based copying), has been documented in several species, including humans. It is touted as an example of the influence of culture on animal and human mating, but alone it is unlikely to lead the cultural evolution of mating. Rather, it requires mate choice copying with generalization (i.e., trait-based copying), which is the effect of immediate observations on future mating. This sort of mate choice copying has been documented in six species, including humans. Here, I extend an existing game theory model of mate choice copying to include generalization (Extension 1), a cost to immediate copying (Extension 2), and both previous extensions (Extension 3). The results show that Extensions 1 and 2 decrease the adaptive value of mate choice copying when compared to the original model. Extension 3 suggests that adding generalization to mate choice copying with a cost to immediate copying is a more likely evolutionary trajectory than adding it to mate choice copying without this cost. These results have implications for illuminating the emergence of the cultural evolution of mating preferences.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans4040021

Authors: Elizabeth Bingham Thomas Nicolette M. Edwards Jaxson D. Haug K. Ann Horsburgh

This paper outlines advances in biocultural approaches to anthropology by discussing anthropological approaches to understanding stress, how anthropologists have typically measured stress, and why it matters for anthropology and beyond. We discuss the application of common quantification techniques such as the Perceived Stress Scale (PSS) and biomarkers of psychosocial stress from abnormal hypothalamic–pituitary–adrenal (HPA) axis activity. We highlight case studies that demonstrate the utility of a biocultural approach to stress across a range of topics—(i) childhood effects, (ii) non-human animals, (iii) depression and anxiety, (iv) migration, and (v) religion—as well as the complexities in the relationship between perceived and biological stress. We conclude by highlighting several areas where we have seen significant advances and point to approaches in other disciplines that anthropology might incorporate to its benefit.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans4040020

Authors: Jeanelle Uy Gabrielė Beresnevičiūtė Vyvy Nguyen

Organ–skeleton relationships are understudied in biological anthropology. The torso skeleton is often used to infer the organ size and evolution in hominins; ribcage “types”, in particular, are used to infer the abdominal organ size in hominins. This study is a quantitative examination of the relationship between the lower ribcage and two organs: the liver and the intestines (“gut”) in humans. Specifically, we test whether the ribcage breadth, shape, and “flare”, at the level of rib 10, covaries with the liver volume and gut volume in Homo sapiens. Liver size, gut size, and ribcage measurements are taken from CT scans (N = 61). The results show sex differences in the gut–ribcage relationship. The gut volume is associated with ribcage breadth and flare in both sexes. The liver volume is not associated with any ribcage measurements. We conclude that sex differences in the organ–skeleton relationship complicate the previous simplistic view that the size of the liver or the gut could be inferred through a fossil’s ribcage type. Biological anthropologists should continue to explore sex differences in organ–skeleton relationships, when attempting to understand the evolution of visceral organs and the torso.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans4040019

Authors: Michelle Pascale Hassler Alexandre Fabre Valérie Moulin Lucie Faccin Julie Gullstrand Alexia Cermolacce Pierre Frémondière

Lactation in humans is complex. Understanding the cultural and biological patterns of human breastfeeding requires a global evolutionary analysis that includes observations of other primates. Human breastfeeding may have several specificities, but some features could be shared with other non-human primates. The purpose of this work is to determine what makes human breastfeeding unique from an evolutionary perspective. We consider behavioral as well as biological variables. Human and non-human primates share behavioral characteristics, such as the need to learn breastfeeding skills, and they display an adaptation of the energy density of the milk according to the type of mothering. However, despite having slow-growing, secondarily altricial offspring and rather diluted milk, modern humans spend less time breastfeeding than the great apes, and consequently have shorter interbirth intervals. Milk composition in macro- and micro-constituents changes during lactation, demonstrating evolutionary and ecological adaptation. Among the great apes, the milk of modern humans contains a higher proportion of fats, an equivalent proportion of carbohydrates and proteins, and a greater variety of oligosaccharides involved in brain and immune system development. The microbiome of modern man is less diverse than those of non-human primates, but the presence of HMOs and immunoglobulin A suggests that human milk is particularly adapted to prevent neonatal infections.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans4030018

Authors: Marluci Menezes Carlos Smaniotto Costa

This article discusses collaborative ethnography as a meaningful source for spatial research, in particular, for participatory methodologies in urban planning and placemaking processes. It investigates the experiences with co-creation and co-research in different research projects to gain insight into the performance of collaborative ethnography as a technique to explore and enrich local knowledge. To better understand the possible causal relationships between the experience gained in the projects and the learnt lessons, we also identify recommendations for improving research methodologies to be applied in placemaking. This article concludes that collaborative ethnography is an effective tool for adding value to spatial co-research and co-creation processes. It opens opportunities for the co-production of space, ideas and knowledge, contributing at the same time to better informed decision-making. It also helps improve ideas and gather insights into the spatial needs of focus groups.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans4030017

Authors: Steven Vertovec Sylvie Genest

We contacted Steven Vertovec in the fall of 2023 to invite him to participate in this Special Issue on systemic approaches when adopted by researchers, particularly anthropologists, in the context of their work on migration issues in the era of super-diversity [...]

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans4030016

Authors: Paolo Abondio

Contemporary biopolitical discourse around fundamental rights and societal representations has increasingly weaponized moral-based attitudes and personal feelings, eschewing informed, factual opinions grounded in observation, data analysis, and scientific research. This trend is evident in the treatment of the queer community—used here as an umbrella term for non-cisgender, non-heterosexual individuals. Over recent years, the group has become the primary target of negationist critiques aimed at undermining the very existence of the community and challenging its rights. This article argues that the rise of depersonalized interactions and individualism, particularly through social media (where superficial and sensationalist content thrives, often at the expense of nuanced, data-driven discourse), the cult of the self and power (which prioritizes individual success, sidelining the collective struggles and rights of marginalized groups), and misinformation, is strategically employed by those in power and reverberated through the general public. These elements serve as a translucent veil, enabling the conscious choice to avoid engaging in structured, complex, and informed discussions about queer people’s rights and their existence. Consequently, the strategic deployment of these tactics, with the aim of shaping public opinion based on falsehoods and emotional appeals, undermines the capacity for informed dialog and perpetuates the marginalization of the queer community.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans4030015

Authors: Tina Jongsma-Greenfield Angelo Di Michele Fatima Husain Sébastien Rey

Girsu, the modern site of Tello (southern Iraq), represents one of the earliest known urban centres of the ancient world, along with Uruk, Eridu, and Ur. During the 3rd millennium BCE (3000–2000 BCE), Girsu was revered as the sanctuary of the Sumerian heroic deity Ningirsu, who fought with supernatural beasts and made possible the introduction of irrigation and agriculture in Sumer. While much is known about the gods, their roles, and rituals inside the temples, there is little textual or archaeological evidence concerning the rituals that took place in the large open-air plazas adjacent to the temples. These areas within the sacred precinct were where the general population would gather to participate in festivals and ceremonies to honour the gods. To better understand the ancient cultic realm in southern Mesopotamia, an in-depth investigation of a favissa (ritual pit) discovered within the sacred precinct at Girsu was undertaken. The excavations recovered a large quantity of ceramics and animal remains that had been used for ritual purposes. Through the study of archaeological remains of cultic spaces at Girsu, information on ritual behaviour such as sacrificial animal slaughtering and consumption for the purpose of feasting, the types of libations provided to quench the thirst of the gods, and the distance travelled to take part in the annual festivals to pay homage to the patron god of their sacred city were explored. Analysis of the associated ceramics, cuneiform texts, and zooarchaeological remains (including stable isotope data), allowed a multi-faceted and integrative approach to better understand ceremonial behaviour and ritual feasting in this sacred city. New insights into communal and performative participation in ceremonies, especially by non-elite individuals, are generated. These data increase our knowledge not only of how Girsu’s citizens organised their sacred spaces and religious festivals, but also of how they behaved in order to satisfy the ever-demanding needs of their gods.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans4030014

Authors: Jack H. McBride Tesla A. Monson

Litter size plays an essential role in mammalian evolution and is one of the most important factors determining whether an organism is deemed to have a ‘slow’ or ‘fast’ life history strategy. Humans are distinct in being classified as having slow life history yet bearing singletons who have completed relatively less growth than other ape neonates. Previous work has proposed that the ancestral primate gave birth to singletons. However, primate litter size has not yet been contextualized within a broad phylogenetic assessment of mammalian life history. We performed a comprehensive investigation of primate litter size using life history data for 155 primate species, and litter size data for an additional 791 boreoeutherian mammals. Litter size and life history traits have strong phylogenetic signal in primates (Pagel’s lambda: 0.99, p < 0.001; Blomberg’s K: 0.6311. p < 0.001), and litter size is significantly negatively correlated with gestation length (p < 0.001). Our data support that the last common ancestors of both primates and Haplorhini gave birth to multiples (litter size 1.7 and 1.6, respectively). We also find that singleton-bearing pregnancies evolved convergently in multiple primate lineages, including tarsiers and other haplorhines. This study contributes significantly to our understanding of life history and litter size in mammals, and we emphasize the utility of a callitrichid model for investigating the evolution of human reproduction.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans4030013

Authors: Mathias Guenther

Lion transformation, among San-Bushmen, is arguably the most dramatic and spectacular instance of animal transformation. Transformation is a central component of San curing and initiation ritual and of certain San hunting practices. Moreover, it is a recurrent theme in San mythology, art and cosmology, all of them domains of San expressive and symbolic culture that are pervaded by ontological mutability (manifested most strikingly in the therianthropes of San myth and art). Lion transformation is a phenomenon that has received much mention in the ethnographic literature on Khoisan ritual and belief, through information that is based not on first-hand but second- or third-hand ethnographic and ethno-historical information. In the paper, I describe my own eye-witness account of what San people deemed a lion transformation by a trance dancer, which I observed in my early field work among Ghanzi (Botswana) Naro and = Au//eisi San in the 1970s. This is followed by my own musings on the actuality or reality of lion transformation, from both my own perspective and from what I understand to be the indigenous perspective. In terms of the latter, lion transformation—and animal transformation in general—is a plausible proposition. Indigenous doubt and scepticism, deriving from a rarely if ever fully conclusive witnessing of such transformations, are assuaged in a number of epistemological, cosmological and phenomenological ways. These are not available to a Western cultural outsider with a Cartesian mindset, nor to a Westernized—and perhaps also Christianized—insider, whose cosmos has become “disenchanted” through historical–colonial and contemporary–acculturational influences.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans4020012

Authors: Dianne Baumann

Substantial and necessary research examining the violence perpetrated against Native women continues to flourish, while violence and masculinity studies focused on Native men draws little attention. Meanwhile the murder rate of Native men is three times higher than Native women, twice as high as white men, and occurs at the hands of police more often than any other U.S. racialized group per capita. Colonization divided ‘Christians’ (white) and ‘heathens’ (Native), with settler whites identifying Native men as wild and threatening. I suggest the construct of settler colonialism and the ‘toxic gendering’ of Native masculinity continues today and impacts Native men internally (psychologically) and externally (rationally), contributing to violence perpetrated against and by them. This paper is an interpretive analysis of “Scary Brown Man” and Reservation Blues as examined through the intersection of the toxic gendering bias intrinsic to settler colonialism. Alexie’s novel offers a depiction of ‘typical’ reservation life and the conflicting struggle to maintain a healthy Native identity, while Ross’s article brings real-life situations into the conversation, encouraging the entry of intersectional discourse around Native masculinity into the arena of gender/bias research as applied to settler colonial studies while questioning the role of identity politics within disciplines.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans4020011

Authors: John Albanese Jaime A. S. Nemett

Because of systemic discrimination, transgender individuals are at greater risk of being the victims of violence and of homicide. Accurate post-mortem identification from skeletonized remains of transgender individuals must be incorporated into a new standard for forensic anthropological analyses. A critical component of any investigation is the assessment of skeletal remains for evidence of gender-affirming care. A systematic review of the current medical literature was conducted to compile in one document descriptions of changes that could be used by forensic anthropologists to recognize skeletal manifestations resulting from gender-affirming surgeries, including facial feminization surgery (FFS), shoulder width reduction surgery, and limb-lengthening procedures. These skeletal changes, when present bilaterally and without evidence of healed trauma, serve as key indicators of a person’s transgender identity postmortem. Recognizing common patterns in bone structure alterations due to gender-affirming interventions will assist in identifying transgender individuals and providing closure for families. By integrating markers from gender-affirming care practices into forensic investigations, this research contributes to more inclusive and rigorous forensic investigations.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans4020010

Authors: Randall Souza

Archaeologists deploy a variety of models and theories, often tailored to specific questions or situations, in making sense of the material record we study. The concept of the community of practice, originally developed in the context of modern work and learning situations, describes among other things how participation in shared activities can create and shape social relationships. It therefore offers a powerful and flexible framework for the many archaeological research agendas in which group dynamics play a role. Some archaeologists have already begun to use the community of practice approach (CoP) as an interpretive framework, and this essay argues that a wider embrace would be a benefit to individual archaeologists and to the field as a whole.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans4020009

Authors: Katja Soennecken Haskel Greenfield

It has been argued that the increase in the consumption of dogs in the southern Levant during the Iron Age was due to the advent of the Philistines/“Sea Peoples” into the region. In this study, we test this proposal through the presentation of new information on dog consumption and its depositional context in Bronze and Iron Age strata from the archaeological site of Tell Zirāʿa (Jordan), and we compare the results to other sites in the region. Our study does not support that such behaviour is a signal of ethnic identity.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans4020008

Authors: Hisashi Nakao Akihiro Kaneda Kohei Tamura Koji Noshita Tomomi Nakagawa

The present study collected a larger set of three-dimensional data on human crania from the Kofun period (as well as from previous periods, i.e., the Jomon and Yayoi periods) in the Japanese archipelago (AD 250 to around 700) than previous studies. Three-dimensional geometric morphometrics were employed to investigate human migration patterns in finer-grained phases. These results are consistent with those of previous studies, although some new patterns were discovered. These patterns were interpreted in terms of demic diffusion, archaeological findings, and historical evidence. In particular, the present results suggest the presence of a gradual geological cline throughout the Kofun period, although the middle period did not display such a cline. This discrepancy might reflect social changes in the middle Kofun period, such as the construction of keyhole-shaped mounds in the peripheral regions. The present study implies that a broader investigation with a larger sample of human crania is essential to elucidating macro-level cultural evolutionary processes.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans4010007

Authors: Yanik Potvin

This essay takes advantage of the current context of superdiversity to define a form of hybrid heuristics between North American anthropology and research-creation “in” the arts. In an attempt to alleviate the epistemological disaster described by Gregory Bateson as the loss of the unity of the biosphere and humanity, I position myself within a nomothetic perspective of Boasian anthropology and a postqualitative approach to research-creation. My research-creation proposes clay as an epistemic object and develops a creative methodology in the form of an experimental system that borrows from the following two types of change observable in living organisms: static and schismatic changes. The artistic activities, presented as two heuristic cycles, seek to broaden the self-reflexivity inherent in the use of clay by human groups. They provoke decentring leading to a loss of control where a new identity has to be defined. This reveals itself in terms of system thinking as the reconstruction of a new reality that is defined neither entirely by my artistic practice nor entirely by my theoretical framework derived from anthropology. It is a “place of passage” between both. It is a new identity that can be defined by the “change of change” that I call “creative anthropology”. This transdisciplinary approach introduces a “second glance” into anthropological research and opens up breaches through research-creation. It works to develop new narratives and test posthumanism in the field of my artistic practice.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans4010006

Authors: Charles D. Laughlin

Anthropology has long resisted becoming a nomothetic science, thus repeatedly missing opportunities to build upon empirical theoretical constructs, choosing instead to back away into a kind of natural history of sociocultural differences. What is required are methods that focus the ethnographic gaze upon the essential structures of perception as well as sociocultural differences. The anthropology of experience and the senses is a recent movement that may be amenable to including a partnership between Husserlian phenomenology and neuroscience to build a framework for evidencing the existence of essential structures of consciousness, and the neurobiological processes that have evolved to present the world to consciousness as adaptively real. The author shows how the amalgamation of essences (sensory objects, relations, horizons, and associated intuitions) and the quest for neural correlates of consciousness can be combined to augment traditional ethnographic research, and thereby nullify the “it’s culture all the way down” bias of constructivism.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans4010005

Authors: Donovan M. Adams Juliette R. Bedard Samantha H. Blatt Eman Faisal Jesse R. Goliath Grace Gregory-Alcock Ariel Gruenthal-Rankin Patricia N. Morales Lorenzo Ashley C. Smith Sean D. Tallman Rylan Tegtmeyer Hawke Hannah Whitelaw

Over the years, the field of forensic anthropology has become more diverse, bringing unique perspectives to a previously homogeneous field. This diversification has been accompanied by recognizing the need for advocacy and activism in an effort to support the communities we serve: marginalized communities that are often overrepresented in the forensic population. As such, forensic anthropologists see the downstream effects of colonialism, white supremacy, inequitable policies, racism, poverty, homophobia, transphobia, gun violence, and misogyny. Some argue that advocacy and activism have no place in forensic anthropological praxis. The counterarguments for engaging in advocacy and activism uphold white, heterosexual, cisgender, and ableist privilege by arguing that perceived objectivity and unbiased perspectives are more important than personally biasing experiences and positionality that supposedly jeopardize the science and expert testimony. Advocacy and activism, however, are not new to the practice of anthropology. Whether through sociocultural anthropology, archaeology, or other areas of biological anthropology, activism and advocacy play an important role, using both the scientific method and community engagement. Using a North American approach, we detail the scope of the issues, address how advocacy and activism are perceived in the wider discipline of anthropology, and define ways in which advocacy and activism can be utilized more broadly in the areas of casework, research, and education.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans4010004

Authors: Jorge Frozzini

The ability of political power to be deployed on several levels of governance is a key element of public administration, insofar as it enables the various needs of the population to be met. However, conflicts of competence, jurisdiction or vision can arise when it comes to articulating these different levels of management or intervention, particularly when policies with a broader scope are applied to local situations, thus proving ill suited to the realities experienced on the ground. This essay, with an example in the province of Quebec, illustrates how the provincial and municipal levels of governance—each with differing visions and objectives—are confronted with dilemmas respecting the constraints imposed by their levels of government. Through a systemic point of view, I show how intertwining systemic levels can produce conflicts since each has its own logic. This is explained with the example of a text-based mediated organization conducted by the “Programme d’appui aux collectivités” (PAC). The essay also identifies some challenges faced by civil servants working at two different levels of government as well as the place of the idea of resilience, and proposes recommendations.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans4010003

Authors: Shiyue Wu Francesco Perono Cacciafoco

This paper aims at documenting and reconstructing the linguistic processes generating and substantiating the use of number systems, numbers in general, elementary arithmetic, and the related concepts and notions among the Kula people from Alor Island, Southeastern Indonesia. The Kula is a Papuan population from the Alor–Pantar Archipelago (Timor area). The name of their language, Kula (or Kola), corresponds to the ethnonym. The language is, currently, endangered and not completely documented. At the level of linguistic features, numeral systems and the terms for numerals from Eastern Alor exhibit, to some extent, unique characteristics, if compared to other languages spoken in other sectors of the island. Therefore, the Kula numbering system is not only significant at the lexicological and lexicographic level, but also represents the essential role of cognitive strategies (e.g., the choice of the base for the numbering systems and the visual representation of counting with the aid of actual ‘objects’, like hands and fingers) in the coinage of numerical terms among the local speakers. Indeed, the development of numeral systems reflects the evolution of human language and the ability of humans to construct abstract numerical concepts. The way numerals are encoded and expressed in a language can impact the patterns according to which numerical notions are conceptualized and understood. Different numeral systems can indicate variations in cognitive processes involving notions of quantities and measurements. Therefore, the structure and characteristics of a numeral system may affect how numeral concepts are mentally represented and developed. This paper focuses on the number system of the Kula people and the lexical units used by the local speakers to indicate (and to explain) the numbers, with the related concepts, notions, and symbolism. The investigation delves into the degrees of abstraction of the Kula numeral system and tries to ascertain its origins and reconstruct it. Moreover, the article applies to the analysis a comparative approach, which takes into account several Papuan and Austronesian languages from Alor Island and Eastern Timor, with the dual aim of investigating, at a preliminary level, a possible common evolution and/or divergent naming processes in local numbering systems and their historical–linguistic and etymological origins.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans4010002

Authors: Sergio Da Silva Sergio Bonini

In this study, we propose a groundbreaking hypothesis for the evolution of reciprocal altruism, suggesting its emergence from random encounters characterized by theft rather than the traditionally accepted cooperative reciprocation and intertemporal choice. We challenge the conventional theory, critiquing its circular reasoning that presupposes cooperation to explain its own origin. Our approach posits that theft, when passively tolerated during times of abundance, does not negatively impact survival and reproduction. This leads to a novel understanding of cooperation as a form of “tolerated theft”. To support our theory, we developed a Python-based simulation model that succinctly demonstrates how this mechanism could operate. Our key finding is that in environments where theft is tolerated, offspring may evolve to overlook such acts, eventually emerging as reliable reciprocators in times of scarcity. This hypothesis, while potentially controversial due to its originality, opens up new perspectives on the accidental evolution of reciprocal altruism and encourages a reevaluation of the fundamental mechanisms driving cooperative behaviors.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans4010001

Authors: Daniel Côté

Occupational health and safety (OHS) is a largely technical field, still guided by a biomedical model of health that seeks to isolate factors that cause injury. Despite a growing literature on organisational and managerial factors influencing occupational health, their full integration into the OHS concept has been slow. A broader understanding is still needed to recognise the restructuring of work and the link between well-being at work and management style. In the context of a rapidly changing world of work, increasing workforce diversity, and inequality, OHS needs to take account of the social sciences and humanities to broaden its reductionist vision. Occupational illnesses, distress, and suffering, especially in relation to relational or organisational issues, have no initial cause or specific ontology; they result from a long-standing process or repetitive relational pattern that needs to be exposed and understood in greater depth, considering contextual factors and dynamics. Using the authors’ anthropological backgrounds and the basic principles of the double bind theory developed many decades ago by Gregory Bateson and his colleagues at the Palo Alto School of Communication, we propose a reflection on pragmatic paradoxes or double bind situations in the workplace (which can be briefly defined as the presence of contradictory or conflicting demands or messages), their potential impact on workers’ health and well-being, and how to resolve them. This paper sought to explore the world of pragmatic paradoxes and double binds by discussing different categories, types, or forms of paradoxes/double binds that occur in the context of occupational health and their underlying mechanisms. It also includes a discussion of the possible link to the concept of super-diversity, as it too is associated with migration channels, employment, gendered flows, and local systems. Finally, we discuss the practical implications of this understanding for health professionals, researchers, and policymakers, from a perspective of promoting more holistic and context-sensitive interactional approaches to occupational health.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans3040024

Authors: Itiel E. Dror

A “Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis of the Effects of Race in the Criminal Justice System” [...]

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans3040023

Authors: Sylvie Genest

This article focuses on methods for designing heuristic models within the paradigm of systems theory and in the disciplinary context of intercultural communication. The main question arises from the striking observation that common language is insufficient to develop knowledge about human communication, especially when many factors of complexity (such as ambiguity, paradoxes, or uncertainty) are involved in the composition of an abstract research object. This epistemological, theoretical, and methodological problem is one of the main challenges to the scientificity of anthropological theories and concepts on culture. Moreover, these questions lie at the heart of research on intercultural communication. Authors and theorists in the complexity sciences have already stressed the need, in such cases, to think in terms of models or semiotic representations, since these tools of thought can mediate much more effectively than unformalized language between the heterogeneous set of perceptions arising from the field of experience, on the one hand, and the philosophical principles that organize speculative thought, on the other. This sets the scene for a reflection on the need to master the theory of heuristic models when it comes to developing scientific knowledge in the field of intercultural communication. In this essay, my first aim is to make explicit the conditions likely to ensure the heuristic value of a model, while my second aim is to clarify the operational function and required level of abstraction of certain terms, such as heading, concept, category, model, and system that are among the most commonly used by academics in their descriptive accounts or explanatory hypotheses. To achieve this second objective, I propose to create cognitive meta-categories to identify the three (nominal, cardinal, or ordinal) roles of words in the reference grids that we use to classify our ideas and to specify how to use these meta-categories in the construction of our heuristic models. Alongside the theoretical presentation, examples of application are provided, almost all of which are drawn from my own research into the increased cultural vigilance of the majority population in Québec since the reasonable accommodation crisis in this French-speaking province of Canada. The typology I propose will perhaps help to avoid the confusion regularly committed by authors who attribute only cosmetic functions to words that nevertheless have a highly heuristic value and who forget to consider the logical leaps of their theoretical thinking in the construction of heuristic models.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans3040022

Authors: Bob W. White Mathilde Gouin-Bonenfant Anthony Grégoire

In recent years, the question of “difference” has become a central feature of public debate and social concern, especially in the context of transnational migration. The underlying question that we attempt to answer in this article is: how can we talk about difference without reinforcing prejudice? Starting from the observation that perceptions and representations of difference have an impact on the way that individuals and groups interact with each other in increasingly diverse urban environments, we argue that a systemic approach to the analysis of intercultural situations gives us a unique window into emerging discourses and evolving norms about difference. After a brief historical overview of debates surrounding cross-cultural comparison in anthropology, we consider how various fields outside of anthropology have drawn inspiration from anthropology in order to gain a deeper understanding of intercultural dynamics in various professional settings. This article also examines several anthropological concepts that have been used as tools to theorize cross-cultural comparison, and how participants in a new research methodology use the systemic notion of “cultural variables” to resolve the basic paradox underlying pluralist philosophy and practice.

Humans doi: 10.3390/humans3040021

Authors: Michele Filippo Fontefrancesco

This research delves into the intricate relationship between objects and communities, focusing on the central question: Can an object, such as cheese, contribute to the development and structure of a community? The paper explores the affective economy of the Formatge of San Lazzaro in the Italian Western Alps, exploring the product’s role as a cultural resource and community builder. Specifically, the article analyzes the connection between product and territory that underlies the production of local food and suggests that a product can be called “local” when it is part of the community, an integral part of a network of affective, cognitive, and spatial relationships that connect a territory through time and space. Thus, it explains the cultural significance of products for territories and why they represent a resource not only economically but also as culturally resilient.