Department of Anthropology and Ethnohistory
At its most basic level, the study of Anthropology is the examination of all aspects of humanity. It is the scientific consideration of our past, present, and in some cases even our species’ very future.
Anthropology is divided into several distinct, but overlapping sub-fields. Ethnohistory combines anthropology and history. The Department conducts research and holds collections relating to the following:
- Archaeology: The study of humanity’s past through material remains.
- Biological (Physical) Anthropology: The study of humanity through biological remains.
- Cultural Anthropology: The study of humanity’s culture, both past and present.
- Forensic Anthropology: The application of archaeology, cultural, and primarily, physical Anthropological techniques to the solving of criminal and other legal cases. It is also used in the identification of missing persons and the remains of wartime casualties.
- Ethnohistory: "The study of identities, locations, contacts, movements, numbers, and cultural activities of primitive peoples from the earliest written records concerning them, onward in point of time."
Featured Publications and Research
Peter Ferdinando, Thesis, 2002
The Florida Anthropologist; March 2007
Peter Ferdinando
The Florida Historical Quarterly
Vol. 89. No 2, Fall 2010
Peter Ferdinando
“Floridae Americae Provinciae Recens & Exactissima”
Theodor de Bry, 1591
Peter Ferdinando, 2007
Conference Poster; 2011
Peter Ferdinando, Ann O. Laffey, and John Kriegbaum
Publications in Development
- New Perspectives on the Timing of Regional Development and Complexity around Lake Okeechobee: Radiocarbon Dates for the Belle Glade Burial Mound (8PB41) with Comparison to the Pond-mound Complex at Fort Center (8GL13)
