North America

Sanghamitra Das

Sanghamitra Das is a Sociocultural Anthropologist specializing in Medical Anthropology. Her research investigates the intersections of Medicine, Genetics, Technology, and Society. She received her PhD from the interdisciplinary Center for Biology and Society at Arizona State University in 2023. From 2023 to 2025, Sanghamitra was a Postdoctoral Fellow in the Department of Anthropology sponsored by the Committee on Southern Asian Studies at the University of Chicago. Her research has been supported by the Wenner-Gren Foundation and the Social Science Research Council. Sanghamitra is currently working on her first book manuscript, Ordering Tribal Disorders, which explores the politics of sickle cell management in India, a genetic blood disorder that is biomedically and bureaucratically described as being prevalent among the historically othered Indigenous Adivasi and the previously “Untouchable” Dalit communities. By centering on lived experiences, the book highlights Indigenous articulations of sickle cell health that trouble techno-capital centric public health interventions while foregrounding citizenship and justice.

Degrees and Education

M. Phil. 2017. Centre for Studies in Science Policy, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, India.
PhD 2023. Center for Biology & Society, Arizona State University, Tempe, US.

Research Description

Sanghamitra’s broader research investigates how notions of human difference—rooted in Race, Caste, and Indigenous positionalities—are essentialized through biogenetic discourses that in turn structure global and local political economies of health. At the same time, this research asks how genetic research on human health and the adoption of genetic technologies as therapeutic strategies are leading to the generation of not only an unprecedented volume of biological data. But it also highlights the social, cultural, political, and ethical complexities entailing such knowledge production and its mobilization. The objective is to recenter questions about equity and justice in emerging health economies. Continuing to pay close attention to community articulations of health and well-being, her ongoing research also investigates how medical and environmental justice have historically been intricately interconnected.

Publications:

Research Articles

  • Das, Sanghamitra. “Indentured Clinical Labor? An Indigenist Standpoint View of “Forced Surrogacy” and Reproductive Governance in India.” BioSocieties. Online First. October 2022.
  • Das, Sanghamitra. “Our blood itself is disabled!”: Hemoglobinopathy, Certificate Anxiety and Contested Constitutionalism in Disability Legislations in India.” Medicine Anthropology Theory. 9(3). 2022.
  • Das, Sanghamitra & Samhita Das. “Intimate Labor at Biomedical Frontlines: Situated Knowledges of Female Community Health Workers in the Management of COVID-19 in India.” Catalyst: Feminism, Theory, Technoscience. 7(1). 2021.

Media Articles

Courses

Comparative Healthcare Systems [Fall 2025]

Health care delivery and access to healthcare face a number of competing challenges. Local and global economies of health, diminishing expenditure on public health, pharmaceutical interventions, patient demands, and patient advocacy are forcing us to look more critically at how healthcare is delivered to devise changes for the future. These are simultaneously issues related to the governance of health systems and health markets. Changes made to health systems are often based on economic and political rationale and with many countries currently experiencing significant changes to the way in which health care systems have historically been funded and delivered. Students will explore a range of key concepts and themes in comparative healthcare from a multidisciplinary perspective. They will develop critical appraisal skills to assess the quality of evidence used to support developments in healthcare policy and practice and help students to look critically at the role that governmental and non-governmental organizations as well as community perspectives play in shaping healthcare. This course will provide students will a firm grounding in key concepts and themes in comparative healthcare. It adopts a multidisciplinary approach to look at issues pertaining to local and global health, the way in which healthcare systems are funded and delivered, identity-based health inequality and the social meanings of health and well-being. Direct comparisons will include health experiences in USA and South Asia to allow students to relate their learning on this course to their own educational and healthcare settings.

Bryan K. Hanks

Bryan Hanks (Ph.D., University of Cambridge 2003) is an archaeologist whose research interests have focused on the development of late prehistoric societies in Europe and the Eurasian steppes. He has been engaged in collaborative field research in Russia since 1998 and has directed research projects in the southeastern Ural Mountains region of Russia and most recently in southeastern Europe in the Republic of Serbia. The projects in Russia have focused on the subsistence strategies of Iron and Bronze Age mobile pastoralists, craft production related to copper mining and metallurgy, and geophysical and geochemical study of households and settlement patterning. In Europe, he has been working with colleagues to document the appearance and growth of early Neolithic agrarian villages and the construction of early enclosures and fortifications. Since 2014, he has been working annually with the US Forest Service on the study of Native American Pit House villages along the Salmon River and its tributaries in the state of Idaho. He is committed to providing opportunities for student field training and in addition to including students in international projects he routinely offers, in collaboration with Dr. Marc Bermann, opportunities for field training in geophysics surveys in the Pittsburgh region.

 

 

Research Description

Prehistoric Pit House Village Patterning along the Salmon River and its Tributaries, Idaho

This project focuses on the study of pit house villages occupied over the last 4000 years in central Idaho. The villages are located within the Frank Church River of No Return Wilderness, which is the largest designated wilderness in the lower 48 states encompassing over two million acres.  Collaboration with the U.S. Forest Service is focusing on the use of geophysical and geochemical surveys to examine the spatial extent of these sites and to explore near surface and subsurface cultural deposits. This research will contribute to the long-term management and protection of these important cultural heritage resources. Project Partners: Dr. Tim Canaday (United States Forest Service, Idaho), Dr. Rosemary Capo (University of Pittsburgh, Department of Geology and Environmental Science), Sarah Montag (BPhil candidate, University of Pittsburgh, Department of Anthropology) and Petra Basar, MA (graduate program, University of Pittsburgh, Department of Anthropology).  

Village Growth, Demographic Trends, and Craft Specialization among Neolithic Vinča Culture Communities in Southeastern Europe (5400 - 4600 BCE)

This project focuses on the emergence of early agro-pastoralist communities and related developments in craft specialization, including early stages of metallurgy, village growth and demography, and evidence of enclosure and fortification. Research to date has been conducted at several Middle-Late Neolithic settlements and has integrated geophysical and geochemical site surveys, pedestrian survey and artifact collection, and targeted soil coring and excavation. Project Partners: Dr. Miroslav Kočić (Balkanological Institute, Serbian Academy of Arts and Sciences), Dr. Dušan Borić  (Columbia University, UK); Dr. Dusko Slijivar (National Museum of Belgrade, Serbia), Dr. Slaviša Perić (Serbian Academy of Sciences, Institute of Archaeology) and Marija Simonović, MA and Dr. Marko Grković (Institute for the Protection of Cultural Monuments, Serbia).

Middle to Late Bronze Age Social and Technological Change in the Southeastern Ural Mountains Region of Russia (2100-1500 BCE)

This program of research has examined settlement patterning, the scale and nature of copper metallurgy, and socio-economic organization as practiced by Bronze Age communities who inhabited the central Russian steppes from the Middle to Late Bronze Age phases (2100 to 1500 BCE). Field research has focused on micro-regional study of the Bronze Age Sintashta culture settlements of Stepnoye and Ust’ye and has employed: 1) geophysical and geochemical survey, 2) targeted small-scale excavation, 3) additional site catchment study and 4) analysis of archaeometallurgical materials and associated features. The field research component of this project has finished and the team is in the process of final data analysis and publication. Project partners: Dr. Roger Doonan (University of Sheffield, UK), Dr. Derek Pitman (University of Bournemouth, UK), Dr. Dimitri Zdanovich (Chelyabinsk State University, Russia), Dr. Elena Kupriyanova (Chelyabinsk State University, Russia) and Dr. Nikolai Vinogradov (Chelyabinsk State Pedagogical University).

Bioarchaeological Study of Bronze Age Health, Diet and Demography in the Southeastern Ural Mountains of Russia (2100-1500 BCE)

This project has focused on the study of human remains recovered previously by Dr. Andrei Epimakhov at the Kamennyi Ambar 5 Bronze Age cemetery in Russia. We have conducted detailed study of the human remains including isotopic analysis for dietary trends and aDNA analysis.  This project has now completed and we are in the process of final data analysis and publication. Project Partners: Dr. Margaret Judd (University of Pittsburgh); Dr. Andrei Epimakhov (Southern Ural State University, Russia); Dr. Dmitri Razhev (Institute of History and Archaeology, Russia); Dr. Alicia Ventresca Miller (University of Michigan) and Dr. David Reich (Reich Laboratory for aDNA).

Courses

Archaeology of Russia, Central Asia and Mongolia

This course provides an overview of the key prehistoric and early historic developments that occurred in the territories of the former Soviet Union. This investigation will include: early evidence of animal and plant domestication in the Neolithic, the emergence of Indo-European languages, innovations in metallurgy and the rise of complex societies in the Bronze and Iron Age periods, and the impact of early ‘nomadic’ societies and empires.   The course will cover a vast period, stretching from the earliest occupation evidence in the Paleolithic to the Mongol Empire of the 13th century AD. The primary focus of the course will be on evaluating the main lines of archaeological evidence to interpret and understand the key cultural, economic, technological and ideological developments noted above.  However, the course also will investigate the substantial role that the discipline of archaeology and interpretations of the past have played in the larger socio-political dynamics of the Soviet and Post-Soviet periods.  Therefore, this course will appeal to a broad range of students interested in comparative studies of Old World archaeology as well as cultural and historical studies of the Soviet and Post-Soviet Union.

The Archaeologist Looks at Death

The aim of this course is to provide students with an understanding of how archaeologists investigate, analyze and interpret human remains from archaeological contexts. While the focus will be primarily on prehistoric case studies, the course will also look at the rapidly developing area of forensic archaeology in the contemporary world.  Therefore, the course will be divided into two main parts. The first half will focus on presenting some of the main elements inherent in the bioarchaeological analysis of human remains and the types of specific information that can be gained about the past lives of individuals and their place within societies. The second half of the course will focus more on how archaeologists construct interpretations relating to mortuary practices and rituals, attitudes about the afterlife, and principles of social organization and structure within past societies. 

Prehistoric Foundations of European Civilization

This course surveys European prehistory from the earliest human occupation of Europe until the Roman conquest. Geographical coverage will include Western, Central and Eastern Europe and southern areas including parts of the Mediterranean and Aegean. Emphasis will be placed on investigating major changes in social organization, cultural contact and exchange, technology and economy. Key developments covered will include the interaction between Neanderthals and Homo sapiens, the emergence of Upper Palaeolithic art, Neolithic megalithic constructions, the emergence and spread of agriculture, the impact of metallurgy, Iron Age ‘Celtic’ developments, and the expansion and influence of the Roman Empire. This course will provide a useful foundation for students interested in archaeology, history, ethnic history, art history and classics.

Zooarchaeology

Animal remains are often some of the most frequently encountered material remains recovered from archaeological sites and therefore provide crucial information relating to subsistence strategies, animal husbandry patterns, paleoenvironments and a wide range of other human behaviors.  This course provides an introduction to the main elements of Zooarchaeological research and will focus on the recovery, identification and contextual analysis of animal remains.  The course will provide both laboratory training as well as seminar discussions to evaluate the significance of Zooarchaeology within archaeological research.  Participants will have the opportunity to gain practical skills in faunal remains identification and analysis and to learn how this information can be applied to the comparative study of complex societies.

History of Anthropological Thought

This course provides a wide-ranging survey of the development of anthropological thought and the formation of the four-field discipline of Anthropology. Starting with early intellectual growth in Antiquity and the Middle Ages the course charts a path for students that will guide them through the dense and complex world of theory development in Anthropology from the time of Classical thought up through contemporary times. This class offers a critical foundation of knowledge for students majoring in Anthropology and/or undergraduate students planning to take more advanced seminar/writing courses in Anthropology, History, Sociology, and History and Philosophy of Science.

People, Places and Things

This course examines the use of recent theoretical perspectives that cross-cut many of the humanities and social sciences to explore the complex relationships that are created between people, landscapes and physical settings, and the use of objects and other forms of material culture. The course will survey key theoretical approaches to explore object agency, symbolism and ritual set within natural and built environments, and the roles that such places and things play within the composition of culture and long term mediation of social processes and memory. The course is diachronic in nature and examines a host of places and objects from around the world from prehistory to the present. A heavy emphasis will be placed on “interdisciplinary thought” with the goal of achieving a more nuanced and comparative understanding of the dynamic role that material culture and the natural and built environment have within the ever-evolving human condition.

Archaeological Geophysics 

This course introduces common methods of geophysical prospection being used within archaeology today. Classroom lectures and field surveys off campus at local historic sites provide students a unique hands-on approach to understanding and using geophysical instrumentation, collecting data, and analysis of datasets. Classroom lectures are provided on: (1) integration of geophysics as a tool within broader research programs, (II) background theory on the methods and their use in field research (fluxgate gradiometery, earth resistance, GPR, magnetic susceptibility, electrical conductivity), and (III) opportunity to process and interpret geophysics datasets.

Kathleen M.S. Allen

Kathleen Allen is an archaeologist whose interests focus on the development of tribal societies, regional settlement patterns, and contact studies exploring the interface between anthropology, history, ethnohistory, and archaeology.

 

Research Description

Kathleen Allen's primary geographic area of research interest is the Eastern Woodlands of North America with a special focus on pre- and post-contact period Iroquoian cultures of the eastern Great Lakes. Methodological interests include the application of geographic information systems to archaeological problems and the study of ceramic form and style.

Courses

Women, Men, and Children in Archeological Perspective

This course examines men, women, and children in past societies through the use of archaeological, ethnographic, and historic information. Extensive readings will provide an overview of gender studies in the field. Topics addressed include gender and material culture; division of labor; households and domestic economy, craft specialization; power, hierarchy, ideology; and culture contact. Gender will be examined from a perspective that includes men as well as women and will include recent studies aimed at recovering children in the archaeological record. Readings will focus on recent archaeological studies of gender and much class time will be devoted to discussion of readings. Students are expected to participate in leading discussion and will write a research paper on gender in their particular area of interest. Grades will be earned primarily through class discussion and a major research paper.

Basic Laboratory Analysis

Have you ever wondered how archaeologists look at bits of stone pottery to understand how people lived in the past? This course provides you with basic skills in analyzing lithics (rocks) and pottery so you can understand how artifacts were made and used. You will learn how to tabulate data and make interpretations about the activities in which people were engaged. Classes will include lectures, discussions of readings, assignments, and lots of hands-on experience working with material culture that archaeologists find most often. In the later part of the course, students will develop a research project and do an analysis using material from an Iroquois village site occupied in the 16th century. Prerequisites: At least one prior course in Archeology such as Introduction to Archeology, Archaeology Field School, or Mesoamerica Before Cortez is required.

Pots and People

In this course we examine pottery from two perspectives: that of the people who made pots in the past and that of the archaeologists who seek to interpret pottery found at archaeological sites. The aim of this course is to engender a perspective on pottery that is based on real life experience with it. Students will work through the process of producing the clay fabric, manufacturing pots, decorating them, and firing. In the last section of the course, we analyze pottery produced in the class using archaeological techniques. These include characterizing temper, cross-section analysis to determine manufacturing techniques and firing conditions. This course will lead to a better understanding of how pottery was produced in the past and of how the analysis of it will answer archaeological questions. Readings will focus on pottery manufacture and on archaeological approaches to the study of ceramics. A Special Fee of $20.00 to cover the cost of materials. This course will be offered every other year. Prerequisites: Introduction to Archaeology

Archaeology of North American Indians

In this course we examine archaeological evidence for the occupation of Native Americans in North America prior to, during, and after contact with Europeans. We will look at contemporary Native Americans and their views about the past as well as about how archaeology informs us about past societies. Major topics include the peopling of North America and the variety of Native American cultures that existed in different regions and their long histories. Special emphasis is placed on examining the trajectories of development of more complex societies in eastern North America, the Southwest, and the Northwest coast. This course will be offered irregularly. Prerequisites: Intro to Archaeology (Anth 0582).

Introduction to Archaeology

Modern archeology draws much of its theory and goals from anthropology. This course will show how archaeologists use the fragmentary traces left by past peoples to develop an anthropological understanding of their cultures. We will explore the variety of ways archaeologists investigate such things as prehistoric diet, social life, politics, technology, and religion. Topics to be covered include: the nature of archaeological information, dating techniques, interpretation of material objects, and archaeological ethics. Studies from around the world will be used to illustrate major principles in archaeological research. The course will provide an understanding of how and why we study past societies, as well as the unique contribution archaeology can make to understanding ourselves. Recitation sections are an important part of the course and are not optional. Recitation section grades will be determined by a combination of participation, short quizzes, and exercises.