A Free Man: The Story of a Menominee Elder
An anthropologist and Menominee Indian Nation citizen recounts the story of independent-minded Frank, a man who kept tribal lifeways in the early 20th century. “A Free Man: The…
Tag: Indigenous
Seeker of Life/Kawsay Thawiq
A Quechua poet and linguist speaks to the conflicting feelings some Indigenous groups experience when non-Native paleoarchaeologists and others visit their communities for research projects. “Se…
Born of “All That Good”
An Indigenous poet-anthropologist and new mother interrogates the idea that, overall, historic Indigenous boarding schools brought a lot of “good.” “Born of ‘All That Good’” is part …
The Woods Lament For Me
Poet-anthropologist Jason Vasser-Elong revitalizes stories of interwoven lineages of his African-descent ancestors and those who were Native American. The Woods Lament For Me – Listen —For Will…
With the Fall of a Tree, Archaeology Returns to Liberia
Following a devastating Civil War, archaeologists are helping Liberia rewrite a more inclusive history and forge a more diverse future. ✽ In 2019, in the aftermath of a…
Navigating the Ethics of Ancient DNA Research
Paleogenomic research has expanded rapidly over the past two decades, igniting heated debates about handling human remains. Who gives consent for the ancient subjects of studies—and who should…
The Path
A poet-anthropologist reflects on the musings of an older Noni woman from Cameroon who critiques anthropology’s past as a handmaiden of colonialism in responding to her daughter’s chosen…
What Do Archaeologists Do?
Archaeologists use a wide variety of methods to explore a fascinating range of topics about human history, culture, and behavior. Here’s an overview of the ways archaeologists preserve…
Mayel Lyang
A poet of the Indigenous Lepcha community of the Eastern Himalayas ponders how to draw maps of the mind, heart, and soul that show her community’s heartland—an “eternal…
Rock Drawings
A Tohono O’odham poet and linguist reflects on the stories and wisdom ancestors communicated—how people survived, how they dispersed and differentiated, how they remember. “Rock Drawings” …
A Tree’s Tongue
A Nigerian poet-anthropologist witnesses the powerful rising up of ancestors through the revival of a tree in the Igbo village of Ogbodu. “A Tree’s Tongue” is part of…
Indigenizing What It Means to Be Human
SAPIENS offers a curated collection of poems and stories that center Indigenous values, worldviews, and insights, creatively reimagining anthropology and the human experience. ✽ Anthropology’s fraugh…
Rhyme & Reason: Poetry as a Cultural and Communal Bridge
In this upcoming free live event, SAPIENS 2022 Poet-in-Residence Jason Vasser-Elong celebrates the end of his residency with a discussion of poetry as a dialogue across the ages.…
How not to consult indigenous people
Like Canada, Brazil, the whole of Africa, and many other places in the world, Cameroon has the combination of indigenous people and a special fondness for big industry.…
A Native Alaska Community’s Reckoning With Vaccine Hesitancy
An anthropologist’s research with Tlingit communities in Alaska shows they have good reasons to be skeptical about vaccines. They know their history. ✽ New COVID-19 boosters are now…
A Major Museum’s Attempt to Center Native American Voices
Chicago’s Field Museum recently unveiled their new Native North America Hall, redesigned with input from Native collaborators. But does it go far enough to address past harms? ✽…
The Dangers of Ancient Apocalypse’s Pseudoscience
Reviewing Netflix’s Ancient Apocalypse, an anthropologist explains how its host Graham Hancock devalues both archaeology and Indigenous heritage. This article was originally published at The Conversa…
How a Song Bridged Diné and Ndebele Worlds
An anthropologist recounts a magical moment of songwriting collaboration between Diné (Navajo) and Ndebele artists gathered for the WOMAD Festival in South Africa. ✽ In October, I traveled…
Alive in the Flapping of Infinite Orange Wings
Monarch butterflies’ epic annual migration from North America to Mexico inspires an anthropologist to reflect on this insect’s precarious life cycles through the lens of “multispecies ethnography.” …
Hunting Down the Facts About Paleo Diets
An evolutionary anthropologist argues that Paleolithic diets were much more varied than people think based on his research with the Hadza community, contemporary hunter-gatherers in Tanzania. This ar…
The Aztec Antichrist Chronicles Indigenous Resistance and Religious Conversion
An exceedingly rare notebook from 16th-century Mexico contains plays about the Antichrist told by the Aztecs’ descendants. An anthropologist recounts his rediscovery of the notebook and explains the…
Aztec Antichrist: A Performance of the Apocalypse
A 16th-century play written by the descendants of the Aztecs after the Spanish conquest dramatically reveals Indigenous people’s responses to their religious conversion. Excerpted from Aztec Antichri…
How Can Societies Decolonize Conservation?
Two archaeologists reflect on how social hierarchies harm biodiversity and how to move away from conservation efforts based on colonialist values. ✽ When I (Tim) arrived in Hanalei,…
Unsung Native Collaborators in Anthropology
Anthropologists such as Franz Boas and Margaret Mead could not have achieved success without their local assistants’ insider knowledge and extensive labor. ✽ Growing up a Brown girl…