Search People Result | Academic Influence

Find the most influential people in 24 academic disciplines and numerous subdisciplines

Find famous and important people related to your research. This is an excellent tool for research papers, topic papers, and building a bibliography. Using our influence-based algorithm, our rankings synthesize data from Wikipedia, Wikidata, Semantic Scholar, and CrossRef.

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School

Gender

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Discipline

Subdiscipline

Ranking

List of the most influential female people in Anthropology,

#501

Angela von den Driesch

#92870

Overall Influence

1934 - 2012 (78 years)

Angela von den Driesch was a German archaeologist and veterinarian. She was a professor and former director of the Institut für Paläoanatomie, Domestikationsforschung und Geschichte der Tiermedizin at the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich.

#502

Mary Beaudry

#129663

Overall Influence

1950 - 2020 (70 years)

Mary Carolyn Beaudry was an American archaeologist, educator and author whose research focused on historical archaeology, material culture and the anthropology of food. She was a Professor of Archaeology, Anthropology, and Gastronomy at Boston University .

#503

Rebecca Gowland

#156316

Overall Influence

Rebecca Gowland is a bioarchaeologist. She is a Professor of Archaeology at Durham University. Education Gowland studied for an undergraduate degree at Durham University. She then completed a master's degree at the University of Sheffield before returning to Durham, where she completed her PhD in 2002.

#504

Judith Littleton

#154048

Overall Influence

Judith Littleton is a New Zealand anthropology academic, and as of 2018 is a full professor at the University of Auckland. Academic career After a 2011 PhD titled 'A delicious torment : an analysis of dental pathology on historic Bahrain' at The Australian National University, Littleton moved to the University of Auckland, rising to full professor.

#505

Malika Zeghal

#130934

Overall Influence

1965 - Present (60 years)

Malika Zeghal is a Tunisian Professor in Contemporary Islamic Thought and Life at Harvard University, and formerly an associate professor of the anthropology and sociology of religion in the University of Chicago Divinity School.

#506

Margaret Stefana Drower

#85813

Overall Influence

1911 - 2012 (101 years)

Margaret Stefana Drower Hackforth-Jones MBE , known as Peggy Dower, was an English historian of Ancient Near Eastern History and Egyptology. She was awarded the MBE and elected a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of London. She wrote the definitive biography of Flinders Petrie.

#507

Jean Schensul

#136311

Overall Influence

1950 - Present (75 years)

Jean J. Schensul is a medical anthropologist and senior scientist at The Institute for Community Research, in Hartford, Connecticut. Dr. Schensul is most notable for her research on HIV/AIDS prevention and other health-related research in the United States, as well as her extensive writing on ethnographic research methods. She has made notable contributions to the field of applied anthropology, with her work on structural interventions to health disparities leading to the development of new organizations, community research partnerships, and community/university associations. Schensul’s work h...

#508

Heather Hurst

#82449

Overall Influence

1976 - Present (49 years)

Heather Hurst is an American archaeologist and archaeological illustrator. Career Dr. Hurst graduated from Skidmore College in 1997 and from Yale University in 2009 with a Ph.D. in anthropology. She teaches at Skidmore College. Her research is focused on art and iconography, with a focus on Maya murals and Olmec rock art. She has studied the art and architecture of Bonampak, Copan, Holmul, Oxtotitlan, Palenque, Piedras Negras, San Bartolo, and Xultun.

#509

Theresa Howard Carter

#139508

Overall Influence

1929 - 2015 (86 years)

Theresa Howard Carter was an archaeologist, educator, and scholar. Personal life and education Carter was born on May 15, 1929, in Millbrook, New York, to Clarence K. Howard and Anne Warren Howard. She grew up on a dairy farm and attended Miss Howard's School, which was run at the farm by her aunt and namesake, Tess. When she reached the age of 13, Carter began attending the Millbrook Memorial School. Upon graduation she successfully pursued an A.B. in Anthropology at Syracuse University. She then went on to complete an M.A. in Anthropology at the University of Pennsylvania in 1954. During th...

#510

Rita P. Wright

#56081

Overall Influence

1936 - Present (89 years)

Rita P. Wright is an American anthropologist, and professor emeritus at New York University. She graduated from Wellesley College with a B.A. in 1975 and from Harvard University with an M.A. in 1978 and Ph.D. in 1984. She specializes in Near East societies, the Indus Civilisation and gender roles. She currently teaches the introductory archaeology course, required for the anthropology major at the university.

#511

Encarnación Cabré

#121356

Overall Influence

1911 - 2005 (94 years)

Encarnación Cabré Herreros was a Spanish archaeologist. Cabré developed an interest in archaeology at a young age. She accompanied her father , a prominent Spanish archaeologist, on expeditions to peninsular Spain. She was a prolific academic in the 1930s, presenting her research in archaeological excavation in various journals and international conferences. After the Spanish Civil War of the late 1930s, the Francoist dictatorship forbade her from teaching, and she mostly retired. She returned to the field in 1975, where she remained active for the rest of her life.

#512

Lisa Peattie

#138335

Overall Influence

1924 - 2018 (94 years)

Lisa Redfield Peattie was an American anthropologist and professor of urban anthropology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. She was best known for her work in advocacy planning, a type of urban planning which seeks social change by including all interests and groups in the planning process. Peattie, who earned her Ph.D. from University of Chicago in 1968, published extensively on slums and squatter settlements. She also engaged in numerous peace actions, and had a long, although minor and nonviolent, arrest record.

#513

Jenny Tung

#46653

Overall Influence

Jenny Tung is an evolutionary anthropologist and geneticist. She is an Associate Professor of Biology and a researcher at Duke University. In 2019, she was awarded a MacArthur Fellowship. Personal life Tung’s mother and father immigrated to the United States from China and moved to Maryland and then to Delaware where they had Tung and her older sister, Wenny. Tung’s father was a chemical engineer for DuPont, an American chemical company, and her mother was a teacher prior to their coming to the United States. Upon starting her undergraduate work at Duke University, Tung studied biology with ...

#514

Nora England

#44875

Overall Influence

1946 - 2022 (76 years)

Nora Clearman England was an American linguist, Mayanist, and Dallas TACA Centennial Professor at the University of Texas at Austin. Her research focused on the grammar of Mayan languages and contemporary Mayan language politics.

#515

Martha Menchaca

#85766

Overall Influence

1956 - Present (69 years)

Martha Menchaca is an academic in the fields of social anthropology, ethnicity, gender, oral history, legal anthropology, immigration, and Chicana/o Studies on the relationship between U.S. and Mexican culture. Menchaca is recognized for her research on immigration, naturalization, and birthright citizenship. She is currently a professor at the University of Texas, Austin in the Department of Anthropology.

#516

Claire Smith

#121118

Overall Influence

1957 - Present (68 years)

Claire Smith , is an Australian archaeologist specialising in Indigenous archaeology, symbolic communication and rock art. She served as Dean of the College of Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences at Flinders University in 2017-2018 and, prior to that, as head of the Department of Archaeology. She served two terms as president of the World Archaeological Congress from 2003 to 2014 and greatly increased the organization's size and visibility. Among her many publications is the Encyclopedia of Global Archaeology .

#517

Chunghee Sarah Soh

#86932

Overall Influence

1950 - Present (75 years)

Chunghee Sarah Soh or Sarah Soh is an American professor of Anthropology at San Francisco State University. She is a sociocultural anthropologist who specializes in issues of women, gender, sexuality.

#518

Rosemary Joyce

#132543

Overall Influence

1956 - Present (69 years)

Rosemary A. Joyce is an American anthropologist and social archaeologist who has specialized in research in Honduras. They were able to archeologically confirm that chocolate was a byproduct of fermenting beer. She is also an expert in evaluating the archaeological records of society and the implications that sexuality and gender play in culture.

#519

Erella Hovers

#166240

Overall Influence

1956 - Present (69 years)

Erella Hovers is an Israeli paleoanthropologist. She is currently a professor at The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, working within the Institute of Archeology. The majority of her field work is centered in the Horn of Africa, with a primary focus on Ein Qashish, Israel and Eastern Ethiopia. Her research concentrates on the development of the use of symbolism during the Levantine Middle Palaeolithic and Middle Stone Age. Other research interests include lithic technology, taphonomy, and general behavior of early hominids.

#520

Mary L. Gray

#58947

Overall Influence

Mary L. Gray is an American anthropologist and author. She is a Fellow at Harvard University's Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society, as well as a Senior Principal Researcher at Microsoft Research. Along with her research, Gray teaches at Indiana University, maintaining an appointment as an Associate Professor of the Media School, with affiliations in American Studies, Anthropology, and Gender Studies. In 2020, she was awarded a MacArthur Genius Grant in recognition of her work "investigating the ways in which labor, identity, and human rights are transformed by the digital economy."

#521

Agnes Kirsopp Lake Michels

#80155

Overall Influence

1909 - 1993 (84 years)

Agnes Freda Isabel Kirsopp Lake Michels known as "Nan" to her friends, was a leading twentieth century scholar of Roman religion and daily life and a daughter of the Biblical scholar Kirsopp Lake . Michels earned her bachelor's, master's and doctoral degrees in Latin from Bryn Mawr College, where she was also a member of the faculty from 1934 until 1975. After her retirement she frequently taught courses at Duke University as well as at the University of North Carolina.

#522

Tomris Bakır

#37492

Overall Influence

1941 - 2020 (79 years)

Tomris Bakır was a classical archaeologist from Turkey, who specialised in ceramics, and was the Director of Excavations at Daskyleion. Biography Tomris Akbaşoğlu was born on 5 November 1941. She studied at Ankara University, where she obtained her undergraduate degree. She was awarded a doctoral degree at the Archaeological Institute of Heidelberg University, doctoral advisor was Roland Hampe. She was married to the archaeologist Güven Bakır .

#523

Lisa Matisoo-Smith

#88120

Overall Influence

1963 - Present (62 years)

Lisa Matisoo-Smith is a molecular anthropologist and Professor at the University of Otago. As at 2018, she is Head of the Department of Anatomy. Biography Born in Hawai‘i in 1963, Matisoo-Smith also lived in Japan and California, following her father's naval postings.

#524

Wendy Ashmore

#127159

Overall Influence

1948 - 2019 (71 years)

Wendy Ann Ashmore was an American professor of Maya archaeology at the University of California, Riverside. She was involved in excavations in Belize, Guatemala, and Honduras. Her research focused on the implications that spaces, settlement patterns, and gender can have on social organization. She received her B.A. from the University of California, Los Angeles in 1970 and her Ph.D. in 1981 from the University of Pennsylvania. Her dissertation analyzed the results of the site periphery program that took place between 1975 and 1979 at Quirigua, Guatemala. In her dissertation, she discusses the...

#525

Margaret Bender

#109192

Overall Influence

1963 - Present (62 years)

Margaret Clelland Bender is an American anthropologist who specializes in the language and culture of the Cherokee people. She received her Ph.D. in 1996 from the University of Chicago, where she studied with the anthropologist Raymond D. Fogelson. She is currently Associate Professor of anthropology and Chair of the Anthropology Department at Wake Forest University.

#526

Christine Obbo

#71710

Overall Influence

1947 - Present (78 years)

Christine Obbo is an Ugandan socio-cultural anthropologist. She attended school at Makerere University in Uganda, earning her BA and MA there and went on to receive a doctorate at the University of Wisconsin, with a scholarship from Rockefeller Foundation. She was then a professor at Wheaton College and then Wayne State University, later becoming involved in activities with HIV/AIDS, gender, and policy issues.

#527

Sarah Wagner

#147045

Overall Influence

1972 - Present (53 years)

Sarah E. Wagner is an American professor of anthropology at the George Washington University's Columbian College of Arts and Sciences and a 2017 Guggenheim Fellow. Wagner is especially recognized for her research and work on genocides.

#528

Susan C. Antón

#95095

Overall Influence

Susan C. Antón is an American biological anthropologist and paleoanthropologist. She is a professor at New York University and fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Education Antón graduated with B.A. in Anthropology at the University of California, Berkeley in 1987. She remained at Berkeley for further study, receiving her M.A. and Ph.D. in anthropology in 1991 and 1994, respectively. She worked as a curator on skull collections during her studies.

#529

Farideh Heyat

#90866

Overall Influence

1949 - Present (76 years)

Farideh Heyat is a British-Iranian anthropologist and a writer based in London. She is a retired lecturer of SOAS, University of London and American University of Central Asia in Bishkek. Heyat is the author of numerous articles on women in Azerbaijan and Kyrgyzstan. She is also the author of the following books: Azeri Women in Transition: Women in Soviet and post-Soviet Azerbaijan and The Land of Forty Tribes.

#530

Julia Farley

#156852

Overall Influence

Julia Farley is a British archaeologist specialising in Iron Age and Roman metalwork. She is the Curator of the European Iron Age & Roman Conquest Period collections at the British Museum. Career Farley studied archaeology and anthropology at the University of Cambridge, graduating with a Bachelor of Arts degree in 2007. She then studied archaeology at Cardiff University, graduating with a Master of Arts in 2008. She undertook postgraduate research at the University of Leicester, completing her Doctor of Philosophy degree in 2012 with a thesis titled "At the Edge of Empire: Iron Age and ear...

#531

Courtney Angela Brkic

#96276

Overall Influence

1973 - Present (52 years)

Courtney Angela Brkic is a Croatian American memoirist, short story writer, and academic. Early life Brkic is a native of Washington, D.C. who grew up in Arlington, Virginia and graduated from Yorktown High School. She graduated from the College of William and Mary with a major in anthropology and a minor in Hispanic Studies. Before earning her MFA from New York University, Brkic lived in Bosnia, Croatia, and the Netherlands.

#532

Alcinda Honwana

Alcinda Honwana

#128164

Overall Influence

1962 - Present (63 years)

Alcinda Manuel Honwana is a Mozambican anthropologist who is a Centennial Professor and the Strategic Director of the Firoz Lalji Institute for Africa at the London School of Economics and Political Science. Her research considers young people, social movements, political protests and social change. She served as a Senior Adviser for the United Nations in the Department of Economic and Social Affairs.

#533

Cecilia Ballí

#131925

Overall Influence

1976 - Present (49 years)

Cecilia Ballí is an American journalist and anthropologist who writes about the borderlands of Texas, security and immigration. She is a writer-at-large for Texas Monthly, and has been published in Harper’s Magazine and The New York Times Magazine as an independent journalist. She has been an assistant professor at the University of Texas at Austin and from 1998 to 2000 was a staff writer at the San Antonio Express-News.

#534

Merata Kawharu

#128519

Overall Influence

1950 - Present (75 years)

Merata Kawharu is a New Zealand Māori writer and academic active in the New Zealand Historic Places Trust and the Māori Heritage Council. Her principal research is on the concept of kaitiakitanga within Māori culture.

#535

Diane Zaino Chase

#59094

Overall Influence

1953 - Present (72 years)

Diane Zaino Chase is an American anthropologist and archaeologist who specializes in the study of the Ancient Maya. Career Chase attended the University of Pennsylvania, graduating with a BA in anthropology in 1975. She completed her PhD at the University of Pennsylvania in 1982 with a dissertation on "Spatial and Temporal Variability in Postclassical Northern Belize".

#536

Dee Ann Story

#141896

Overall Influence

1931 - 2010 (79 years)

Dee Ann Story was an American archaeologist. Story lived in Wimberley, Texas and was a professor at the University of Texas at Austin. Story's best-known excavations were the George C. Davis and Deshazo sites. Story's work with Caddo Mounds State Historic Site, took place in the 1960s and 1970s and pinpointed the timeline of the area. She brought more advanced techniques to the dig, such as radiocarbon dating. Story was also the first woman hired to work as a professional archaeologist for the state of Texas.

#537

Circe Sturm

#170508

Overall Influence

1967 - Present (58 years)

Circe Sturm is a professor in the Department of Anthropology, University of Texas, Austin. She is also an actress, appearing mainly in films and commercials. Background Circe Dawn Sturm was born in Houston, Texas. She identifies her father as being of Mississippi Choctaw descent and her mother as being Italian American.

#538

Jale İnan

#52028

Overall Influence

1914 - 2001 (87 years)

Jale İnan was a Turkish archaeologist, and she is considered to be the first Turkish woman to have been active in the discipline. She led excavations in Perga and Side which resulted in the expansion of the Antalya Museum. Her restoration work on the Temple of Apollo in Side was noted for its significance to Turkish heritage. Her scientific work on the "Weary Hercules" statue in the collections of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston formed the legal basis for return of the bust of the statue to the Antalya Museum to be reunited with the statue's base. The Antalya Women's Museum has an annual awar...

#539

Naomi Miller

#116381

Overall Influence

Naomi Miller is an archaeobotanist who works in western and central Asia. Miller is based at the University of Pennsylvania. Biography Miller completed her Ph.D. dissertation in 1982 in the Department of Anthropology, University of Michigan on archaeobotanical evidence for the economy and environment of third millennium BC Malyan in southern Iran.

#540

Susan Starr Sered

#37756

Overall Influence

1955 - Present (70 years)

Susan Starr Sered is Professor of Sociology at Suffolk University and Senior Researcher at Suffolk University's Center for Women's Health and Human Rights. Previously, she was the director of the "Religion, Health and Healing Initiative" at the Harvard University Center for the Study of World Religions, and a Professor of Sociology and Anthropology at Bar-Ilan University, Israel. Her interests include both research and advocacy/activism.

#541

Ann Laura Stoler

#102932

Overall Influence

1949 - Present (76 years)

Ann Laura Stoler is the Willy Brandt Distinguished University Professor of Anthropology and Historical Studies at The New School for Social Research in New York City. She has made significant contributions to the fields of colonial and postcolonial studies, historical anthropology, feminist theory, and affect. She is particularly known for her writings on race and sexuality in the works of French philosopher Michel Foucault.

#542

Maria Teschler-Nicola

#79658

Overall Influence

1950 - Present (75 years)

Maria Teschler-Nicola is an Austrian human biologist, anthropologist and ethnologist. The Pallister–Killian syndrome is also called Teschler-Nicola syndrome after her. Biography Teschler-Nicola took her Matura exams in 1970, and studied human biology, medicine and folkloristics at the University of Vienna from 1971 to 1976, and graduated with a Ph.D. degree in human biology. From 1970 to 1972 she worked as a research fellow in the Institute for Forensic Medicine at the University of Vienna, and afterwards until 1976 as contractual assistant professor at the Institute of Human Biology of the University of Vienna.

#543

Joan Breton Connelly

Joan Breton Connelly

#32833

Overall Influence

1954 - Present (71 years)

Joan Breton Connelly is an American classical archaeologist and Professor of Classics and Art History at New York University. She is Director of the Yeronisos Island Excavations and Field School in Cyprus. Connelly was awarded a MacArthur Fellowship in 1996. She received the Archaeological Institute of America Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching Award in 2007 and held the Lillian Vernon Chair for Teaching Excellence at New York University from 2002 to 2004. She is an Honorary Citizen of the Municipality of Peyia, Republic of Cyprus.

#544

Diana E. Forsythe

#60895

Overall Influence

1947 - 1997 (50 years)

Diana Elizabeth Forsythe was a leading researcher in anthropology and a key figure in the field of science and technology studies. She is recognized for her significant anthropological studies of artificial intelligence and informatics, as well as for her studies on the roles of gender and power in computer engineering.

#545

Nicky Milner

#114052

Overall Influence

Nicola Jane Milner is a British archaeologist and academic. She is head of the Department of Archaeology at the University of York. Her research focuses on the Mesolithic period, and the transition between the Mesolithic and Neolithic. She has worked at the iconic site of Star Carr in the Vale of Pickering for over 15 years, and has directed excavations at the site since 2004.

#546

Mary Manhein

#115936

Overall Influence

Mary Huffman Manhein is an American forensic anthropologist. Nicknamed The Bone Lady, she was the founding director of the Forensic Anthropology and Computer Enhancement Services laboratory at Louisiana State University in 1990, and of the Louisiana Repository for Unidentified and Missing Persons Information Program in 2006. The repository is considered the "most comprehensive statewide database of its kind".

#547

Lourdes Gutiérrez Nájera

#136594

Overall Influence

Lourdes Gutiérrez Nájera is an American cultural anthropologist. She is a tenured Associate Professor at Fairhaven College of Interdisciplinary Studies teaching in the American Cultural Studies curriculum. Her prior experience includes her work as assistant professor in the Department of Anthropology at both Dartmouth College and Drake University. She is a member of the Latin American Studies Association, American Anthropological Association, and Mujeres Activas en Letras y Cambio Social. Her research is published in journals and books such as Beyond El Barrio: Everyday Life in Latina/o America.

#548

Rosemarie Garland-Thomson

#49417

Overall Influence

1946 - Present (79 years)

Rosemarie Garland-Thomson is Professor of English at Emory University with a focus on disability studies and feminist theory. Her book Extraordinary Bodies, published in 1997, is a founding text in the disability studies canon.

#549

Roberta Gilchrist

#67274

Overall Influence

1965 - Present (60 years)

Roberta Lynn Gilchrist, FSA, FBA is a Canadian-born archaeologist and academic specialising in the medieval period, whose career has been spent in the United Kingdom. She is Professor of Archaeology and Dean of Research at the University of Reading.

#550

Barbara Voss

#102911

Overall Influence

1967 - Present (58 years)

Barbara L. Voss is an American historical archaeologist. Her work focuses on cross-cultural encounters, particularly the Spanish colonization of the Americas and Overseas Chinese communities in the 19th century, as well as queer theory in archaeology and gender archaeology. She is an associate professor of anthropology at Stanford University.

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