Diane Gifford-Gonzalez named Sigma Xi Distinguished Lecturer

Awards and Honors

Professor of anthropology Diane Gifford-Gonzalez has been named a Sigma Xi Distinguished Lecturer for 2006-07.

Gifford-Gonzalez, who specializes in zooarchaeology, joins a group of lecturers selected for two-year tenures beginning in July. Considered outstanding in their fields, lecturers are selected to "address issues at the intersection of science and society" with Sigma Xi chapters worldwide.

Diane Gifford-Gonzalez

Sigma Xi is an international research society with nearly 65,000 members in more than 100 countries. It promotes appreciation for the role research has played in human progress. Since 1937, the society's Distinguished Lecturers Program has given members an opportunity to learn from the experts during events hosted by Sigma Xi chapters around the world.

Gifford-Gonzalez will deliver lectures on a range of subjects including the disappearance of fur seals from the Monterey Bay Area, the role of animal disease in the spread of pastoralism in Africa, and ancient farming in Africa.

Gifford-Gonzalez has conducted fieldwork in Kenya, Tanzania, the Netherlands, and the western United States. Her current research includes NSF-funded work on animal and human paleoecology around Monterey Bay, ethnicity and animal use at a colonial New Mexican Pueblo, and early pastoralism in Niger and Kenya.

The author of more than 50 academic articles and book chapters, she is a highly regarded teacher, as well as curator of the Monterey Bay Archaeology Archives and a board member of the Cabrillo College Archaeological Technology Certificate Program.

Email this story
Printer-friendly version
Return to Front Page