By Alicia Gregory 

LEXINGTON, Ky. (April 29, 2025) — On April 25, the University of Kentucky Board of Trustees approved 18 University Research Professors for the 2025-26 academic year. Established by the Board of Trustees in 1976, the professorships program recognizes excellence across the full spectrum of research at UK.

“It is our privilege each year to recognize distinguished experts who have made significant contributions across the breadth of research fields at the University of Kentucky,” said Ilhem Messaoudi, UK’s acting vice president for research. “Our next

One of the panels at the symposium was “Disaster Perspectives in Appalachia” and featured three CLIMBS participants. The session explored questions about disaster perspectives in Appalachia, sharing and communicating research data and connecting with the community. The panel also included a session to discuss research reciprocity and receive feedback from the Appalachian scholar community.

Kevin Puckett, KY NSF EPSCoR’s communication strategist, moderated the panel and

By Jennifer T. Allen 

LEXINGTON, Ky. -- Philip Mink, in the University of Kentucky Department of Anthropology in the College of Arts and Sciences, has been named director of the Office of State Archaeology and the William S. Webb Museum of Anthropology. 

Mink has been at UK for 25 years, most recently serving as the assistant director of the Office of State Archaeology. He replaces longtime director George Crothers, who recently retired.  

“The work of these two entities is significant. It’s critical that we document the history of the Commonwealth and I think it’s especially important that this be done at the flagship university of the Commonwealth,”

One of public television’s most popular series, "Secrets of the Dead," brings its historical analysis to Kentucky.

The series, which uses the latest science to challenge prevailing ideas and share fresh perspectives on historical events, investigates an incident from Kentucky history known as the “Simpsonville Massacre,” when 22 Civil War soldiers from the 5th US Colored Cavalry on a cattle drive to Louisville were ambushed and slain by outlaws.

The episode “The Civil War’s Lost Massacre,” which was co-produced by KET, revisits the events of January 25, 1865, tracing the stories of several of the Kentucky soldiers and their families with help from guest historians, two of whom hail from Kentucky: Jerry Miller, a former state legislator from Louisville,

By Jesi Jones-Bowman 

LEXINGTON, Ky (Oct. 10, 2024) — The University of Kentucky Office of Undergraduate Research has selected 15 undergraduates for the 2024-25 Undergraduate Research Ambassador program.

The program’s mission is to increase awareness and create opportunities for students to  engage in research. Ambassadors must demonstrate academic excellence, leadership potential and be involved in mentored research. This year’s ambassadors represent four colleges, nine disciplines and 10 research areas.

The student leaders’ goal is to make undergraduate research more accessible. Ambassadors promote undergraduate research involvement through

By Jennifer Sciantarelli and Tom Musgrave 

LEXINGTON, Ky. (July 12, 2024) — University of Kentucky archaeologist Paolo Visonà, Ph.D., an adjunct associate professor in the University of Kentucky’s School of Art and Visual Studies (SA/VS), announced a major archaeological discovery in Calabria, Italy.

Visonà and his team discovered Spartacus’ first battlefield and Roman fortification systems built by Crassus to blockade Spartacus’ army.

Through fieldwalking and geophysical and remote sensing techniques, Visonà’s team followed the Roman lines for more than 1.6 miles in a dense forest and

LEXINGTON, Ky. (June 13, 2024) — In March, the University of Kentucky Alumni Association honored six recipients with this year’s Great Teacher Awards.

Launched in 1961, they are the longest-running UK awards recognizing accomplished and passionate educators.

In order to receive the honor, teachers must first be nominated by a student. The UK Alumni Association Great Teacher Award Committee, in cooperation with the student organization Omicron Delta Kappa, then makes the final selection. Recipients receive a commemorative award and stipend.

Zada Komara, Ph.D., senior lecturer in the Lewis Honors College and an

On May 1, Anthropology Ph.D. students Emmanuel Asante, Nuwan Herath, Jessica Nwafor, Brittany Thomas and Refah Tamanna received Unite Predoctoral Research Enhancement Awards. The UNITE Predoctoral Research Enhancement Program provides benefits to graduate students interested in an academic career, including a $10,000 stipend, mentorship from UK professors, and research career development activities. 

In late spring, James Keppeler and Michelle Roberts were awarded grants from the Wenner Gren Foundation. The foundation plays a leadership role in anthropology by publishing the Sapiens anthropology magazine and the journal Current Anthropology while also sponsoring workshops as well as pre-doctoral and post-doctoral fellowships. 

Roberts’ fieldwork project is  "Webs of Care: Understanding Acquired Disability in Rural Appalachia through Culture, Politics, and Biomedicine." Keppeler’s fieldwork is  “Unearthing Mindanao: Archaeological

By Meredith Weber and Steve Shaffer 

LEXINGTON, Ky. (March 8, 2024) — What makes a good teacher a great one? University of Kentucky students were eager to share their opinions about the best teacher in their lives, nominating them for one of the most esteemed awards on campus.

The UK Alumni Association 2024 Great Teacher Award was recently bestowed upon six UK educators. Initiated in 1961, UK’s

By Lindsay Travis 

LEXINGTON, Ky. (Oct. 6, 2023) — The University of Kentucky will be home to a new research center focused on tobacco regulations in the Commonwealth named the Appalachian Tobacco Regulatory Science Team. Ann Kingsolver, professor of anthropology in the College of Arts & Sciences and director of the Appalachian Studies Program, is a member of the team. 

AppalTRuST is funded over five years with a $19 million grant from the National Institute on Drug Abuse  under

By Jesi Jones-Bowman 

The Office of Undergraduate Research (OUR) at the University of Kentucky has selected 26 outstanding undergraduates for the 2023-24 Undergraduate Research Ambassador program.

The program’s mission is to increase awareness and create opportunities for students to actively engage in research. Ambassadors must demonstrate academic excellence, leadership potential and be involved in mentored research. This year's ambassadors represent six colleges, 21 disciplines and 18 research areas.

The student leaders’ goal is to make undergraduate research more accessible. Ambassadors will promote undergraduate research involvement and opportunities through student outreach and program

LEXINGTON, Ky. (July 12, 2023) — Are you looking to get lost in your next summer read but don’t know where to start?

We asked the University of Kentucky community to recommend books they feel would make good additions to anyone’s reading list.

In the descriptions below, faculty members across various colleges and disciplines share the novels they can’t put down. Pulling from the worlds of history and fiction — their picks explore timely themes while providing intriguing insights.

The recommendations below range from short stories to dystopian, historical and horror fiction.

“Demon Copperhead” by Barbara Kingsolver

Recommended by Diane Loeffler, senior lecturer in the 

Congratulations to the following Anthropology students!

       

Donald P. Cliggett Ph.D. International Travel Research Fund



Emmanuel Asante, Ph.D. candidate

Stephen Fox, Ph.D. candidate       

Established in 2018 by Professor Lisa Cliggett in memory of her father, Dr. Donald P. Cliggett, this fund supports travel and other costs associated with field research for Anthropology undergraduate or

By Robby Hardesty 

UK Libraries has recognized seniors Seth Garcia and Anna Watrous with the 2023 Dean’s Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Scholarship. The annual prize celebrates exceptional and original scholarship in a traditional paper and a media or digital project, and is awarded to students whose research makes substantive and creative use of UK Libraries’ collections, services and resources.

Garcia, a history, anthropology, and secondary social studies education major, was awarded for “A Peculiar Institution: White Supremacy and the Black Guides of Mammoth Cave.”

Analyzing mid- to late-19th century diaries, guidebooks and travelers’ accounts, Garcia examined the white perspective of

By Daniel Flener 

LEXINGTON, Ky. (May 16, 2023) — The Office of the Vice President for Research and the University of Kentucky International Center  have announced the first cohort of UKinSPIRE fellows. UKinSPIRE is an internal funding opportunity for UK faculty, jointly funded by the OVPR and UKIC, intended to stimulate high-impact research projects in any discipline linking UK faculty and international collaborators and to establish collaborations with new international partner institutions or add greater depth to existing institutional partnerships.

Among them is Hugo Reyes-Centeno, assistant professor of anthropology in UK's College of Arts & Sciences. His project is “Resolving the Austronesian Problem:

Bill Jansen’s Career: A Shining Example of Development Anthropology

By Monica Udvardy

Dr. William Jansen II returned to UK’s anthropology community on January 27, 2023, to give the Department of Anthropology's Annual Alumni Talk. Bill earned his bachelor's degree in anthropology with honors from the department in 1971 and went on to earn his master's and doctorate in anthropology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1975, based on fieldwork in the Canadian Arctic.

In 1976, Bill began his long and distinguished career with the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). He started as a social science analyst for development assistance programs in Southeast Asia.

As his career unfolded, 

Despite the vast social and geographic distance between Kentucky and Alaska, Elaine Drew (Ph.D. Anthropology ’04), Travis Hedwig (Ph.D. Anthropology ’13), and Britteny Howell (Ph.D. Anthropology ’17) call Alaska their home.

Dr. Drew is an Associate Professor at the University of Alaska Fairbanks (UAF), where she teaches and mentors undergraduate and graduate

Born and raised in the Netherlands to Surinamese immigrants, Aminata Cairo came to the United States to pursue a college education. She obtained a Bachelor's in Psychology and a Bachelor's in Physical Education from Berea College, a Master's in Clinical Psychology from Eastern Kentucky University, and a Master's and Ph.D. in Medical Anthropology from the University of Kentucky. Her goal is to use her academic skills to positively impact communities.

Dr. Cairo has done extensive community work in the United States, the Netherlands, Suriname, and Ghana. She founded her own multi-cultural dance company called Sabi Diri in Kentucky and performed across the United States and Suriname. As a professor, she committed herself to uplifting students and promoting their sense of

Anthropology post-doc Amber Plemons won the 2023 J. Lawrence Angel Student Paper Award of the American Academy of Forensic Sciences. Her paper examines the evolutionary significance of population affinity from craniofacial morphological features.

Amber earned her Ph.D.in Anthropology at the Michigan State University, an M.A. from the Mississippi State University and her B.S. at the Texas State University before arriving at the University of Kentucky to conduct research in the Human Evolution and Virtual Archaeology (HEVA) Laboratory. HEVA explores the evolutionary and biocultural mechanisms contributing to the emergence, diversification, and adaptation