Our Vision at Hofstra
As members of a discipline that studies what it means to be human from every angle, we are pleased to play an active role at Hofstra not just in our major but also through our cross-cutting ties to other disciplines and campus-wide programs. As anthropologists, we see our work as a science (in exploring human origins and adaptation to different geographical environments), a social science (for our concern with the past and present variations in human societies), and a humanity (for our continuing critical engagement with the question of how we can best study our culturally invented selves). We are a discipline without borders or predefined limitations. We teach our students to use their minds to cross the artificial barriers to our common humanity, barriers imposed by ethnocentric ideas of race, gender, class and assumed levels of "civilization." At this critical moment in our country's history, with increased concern about global conflict, human rights and terrorism, we are committed to providing students and colleagues with insights to promote cross-cultural understanding and counteract ignorance and prejudice of other cultures.
The strength of anthropology at Hofstra is the strength of the American four-field approach in our training. Cultural anthropologists study people in all parts of the world by going to where they live and speaking in the local language. Linguists examine the similarities and differences of the several thousand languages currently spoken. Archaeologists study the material culture of the past, usually by digging it up. Biological or physical anthropologists study human genetic variation, the fossil evidence of our evolution, human adaptation to different environments and the behavior of the great apes. As full-time professors and several superb part-time faculty, we have practical experience in a wide range of the areas which we have been taught. We bring to our students first-hand knowledge of life in Africa, the Middle East, Europe, South Asia, Latin America, Central America and North America.
The current members of the department have made major commitments to special programs on campus, including directing African Studies and the Middle Eastern and Central Asian Studies, as well as teaching courses in Women's Studies, Latin American Studies, Labor Studies and Asian Studies. Several of the faculty have taught courses in other departments, such as philosophy, history, honor's college and graduate education. We have organized and directed major conferences at Hofstra on African Studies and Long Island Native Peoples. The department has jointly sponsored colloquia, including well-attended forums with Ruth Behar (a MacCarthur Fellow), Michael Blakey (director of the African American Burial Ground project in New York) and Ian Tattersall (one of America's premier experts on human evolution).
As educators, our students are put first. We teach a large number of cross-cultural courses, bringing to students an awareness of the world outside our own society and encouraging them to reflect on the wide diversity of human behavior, past and present. For our majors and minors, we provide experience outside the classroom in everything from the latest ethnographic films at the Margaret Mead Film Festival in New York to a Native American sweat lodge on Long Island. Students have also received internships with local non-profit organizations in the local community. The first archeological field school at Hofstra began in the summer of 2004. We have encouraged several majors to study abroad, helping them go to Europe, Australia and the Middle East for college courses or research projects. Our students have also won important awards, such as the Gates Scholarship, on campus. Many of them stay in touch, keeping us informed of their career moves, whether in anthropology or not.
The future of anthropology at Hofstra, as we see it, will continue to serve the entire community. We focus on diversity as our society continues to reinvent itself as a multicultural community. We offer students a view on the entire world, drawing from our own experience. We reach across disciplines to colleagues with shared interests in many of the other departments on campus. We are active in our profession, publishing, lecturing, receiving major research grants and being elected to leadership positions in our professional organizations. In our continued service to the university, we see potential for growth and welcome you to be a part of an exciting major and possible career.
Dan Varisco
Timothy Daniels
Sharryn Kasmir
Chris Matthews
Cheryl Mwaria
March, 2006