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About me

I am a biological anthropologist and functional ecologist. My research is focused on the feeding behavior, anatomy, and evolution of primates, and it combines fieldwork in Africa or Southeast Asia with biomechanical, molecular, and isotopic analyses. This work has been supported by a wide range of federal and private agencies: the David and Lucile Packard Foundation; the Fulbright Africa Regional Research Program; the Leakey Foundation; the National Institutes of Health; the National Geographic Society; the National Science Foundation; and the Wenner-Gren Foundation, among others. My integrative and comparative philosophy toward research is reflected in my teaching––courses in biological anthropology, functional anatomy, primate behavioral ecology––and history of mentoring students and postdocs.

At Dartmouth, I am the Charles Hansen Professor of Anthropology. I hold additional faculty appointments in Biological Sciences, the graduate program in Ecology, Evolution, Environment & Society (EEES), and the Society of Fellows. Beyond Dartmouth, I serve on the editorial boards of three journals––Proceedings of the Royal Society B, Evolution, Medicine, and Public Health, and International Journal of Primatology––and I have served on the executive councils or committees of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS; 2019-present), the American Association of Physical Anthropologists (AAPA; 2017-2020), and the IUCN Primate Specialist Group, Section for Human-Primate Interactions (2020-present).

Courtesy or visiting appointments include those at the California Academy of Sciences (2004-present), the National University of Singapore (2013), the Institute of Primate Research, Kenya (2019), the Institute for Advanced Study (Zukunftskolleg), University of Konstanz (2022), and the Institute for Advanced Studies in the Humanities, University of Edinburgh (2023).