Rethink cannibalism

Posted: March 3, 2014 2:30 p.m.

Beth Conklin, Vanderbilt University anthropology professor Photo courtesy of Beth Conklin

Cannibalism has long disgusted, scared, and fascinated us. Did you know it was practiced in Europe in systematic ways late into the 1800s or that there are human groups that until very recently treated it as the ultimate expression of compassion and love, and an essential part of a dignified human life?  Beth Conklin, a Vanderbilt University anthropology professor and world expert on cannibalism and other cultural practices that involve close contact with corpses, will deliver a thrilling public lecture on these and related topics Thursday, March 6.

Professor Conklin will also be directing a workshop Friday, March 7 titled A Conversation Between Old and New BioLogics:  Relational Biology in Native Amazonia and Emerging Paradigms in Genetics and Immunology. This will be an anthropological discussion on resonances between new research in Western medicine and native Amazonian thinking about the body. 


Public lecture: Rethinking Cannibalism: Sensory Ecologies of Death in Amazonia and Beyond
Speaker: Beth Conklin, Vanderbilt University anthropology professor
Location: Classroom Building room 112
Date:  March 6
Time:  7:30 p.m. - 9:00 p.m.

Free parking in Lot 15 stalls marked “M” Thursday, March 6 evening.

Workshop: A Conversation Between Old and New BioLogics:  Relational Biology in Native Amazonia and Emerging Paradigms in Genetics and Immunology
Speaker: Beth Conklin, Vanderbilt University anthropology professor
Location: Ad-Hum 527
Date: March 7
Time:  10:30 a.m. - 12:30 p.m.

For further information about either event please contact Department of Anthropology head, professor Carlos David Londoño Sulkin at  carlos.londono@uregina.ca.