All Articles – SAPIENS

Anthropology Magazine

A photograph features a square area of concrete tiling in a park’s center with bench seating around its perimeter. At the center of the square is a stone statue of a man’s bust covered in red paint.

To Decolonize, We Must End the World as We Know It

A photograph features a large body of water with a cityscape visible in the distance. On the left side, a person stands on a wooden pier near a white sign that reads: “PLEASE KEEP YOUR PIER CLEAN. USE TRASH CANS.”

Planting Seeds for a More Ethical Future

A photograph features a dark scene with red light shining from the left to silhouette a crowd of people under an overhanging tree. In the center, a person wearing hoop earrings and a head wrap poses in front of a projected illustration of a person in a white dress and head wrap.

Centering Black Lives in the Study of Human Remains

A photograph features a large crowd inside an atrium holding up flyers emblazoned with capitalized red text that reads “Decolonize This Museum.”

Embracing the Poetry of Being Human

A photograph features the corner of a large bookcase filled with books. The books’ various multicolored covers evoke patterns common on African wax print fabrics.

Can Anthropology Be Decolonized?

A photograph features a large tree fully topped with green leaves along the side of a dirt road and in front of an iron and concrete fence that encloses green grass. A car is partially visible in the foreground, and beige buildings lie in the background.

A Tree’s Tongue

Indigenizing What It Means to Be Human

A photograph features a wax figure of a seated person with a large nose and broad jaw wearing a gray collared button-up shirt under a suit jacket of a darker gray shade. Their body is angled left as they look into the distance.

What If Neanderthals Had Outlived Homo Sapiens?

A photograph features a person wearing a collared shirt and apron in a large kitchen pouring coffee from a kettle into one of several white mugs on a wooden counter.

When Coffee Is Like Angel Cake With Strawberry Jam

Rhyme & Reason: Poetry as a Cultural and Communal Bridge

A large, sheep-shaped stone with etchings on its side sits on grass alongside a road where a car speeds by in a blur of orange lights.

How Gravestones Shaped as Sheep United the Caucasus

A photograph features a person wearing torn beige clothing kneeling in the front of a cave over a stone, rubbing wooden sticks together atop the latter to create sparks. Another brown-haired person in beige clothing is barely visible in the background on the right side of the image.

The Paleolithic Age Cooked Up Creative Chefs

A photograph features a narrow street lined with tall white and beige buildings. Left of the photo’s center, a large telephone pole has numerous wires extending from it.

In Lebanon, Solar Power Is Booming. Why?

A photograph features a seaside cluster of small white and teal boats filled with miscellaneous objects parked on the sand around white plastic chairs. The chairs are arranged around a wooden table that holds jars, cups, and bowls.

Fishing in the Shadow of Oil

A photograph features a hand holding a ripe red strawberry.

Is a “Sweet Tooth” Genetic?

A battalion of soldiers gather around a cannon firing a missile that leaves a plume of smoke in its wake.

Is War Inevitable? Consider the Ancient Maya

From an aerial perspective, a photograph features a large circular garden with green shrubs crisply pruned into arc shapes oriented to form a maze. A gazebo topped with similar greenery sits at the maze’s center.

Best of SAPIENS 2022

A black-and-white photograph features four people in a discussion, with three casually dressed facing one who has their hair pinned up and wears a white-collared dress. The latter speaks and points to a flyer on the wall.

A Native Alaska Community’s Reckoning With Vaccine Hesitancy

A photograph features a man walking in a shadowy forest with sun shining in from the right side. He has disheveled brown hair and a beard, wears a fur pelt, and holds a wooden spear with a stone tip.

Did Meat Do Neanderthals In?

A photograph features a large building with four pillars across its front side. Between the pillars hang three long banners of people’s portraits alternately separated by yellow banners that read “Native Truths,” “Our Voices,” Our Stories” and “Native Truths.”

A Major Museum’s Attempt to Center Native American Voices

A photograph features a brown stone staircase lined with rough walls of similar stone. A bright yellow light illuminates the far side of a tunnel-like perspective toward the staircase’s top end.

The Dangers of Ancient Apocalypse’s Pseudoscience

A photograph features five people in colorful clothing standing on cement tiles in front of tall trees and green grass.

How a Song Bridged Diné and Ndebele Worlds

A photograph shows, through glass, a person with short black hair wearing glasses, a necklace, and a black shirt pointing at a graphic of stick figures. Different clusters of stick people interact in different scenarios as various red lines surround them, with several lines intersecting at a central node.

How Diverse Was Medieval Britain?

A photograph shows a crying person using a red cane to prop themselves up as they kneel in front of an assortment of flower bouquets, burning candles, and balloons arranged neatly on a sidewalk.

A Mass Shooting in the “Evangelical Vatican”

A child wearing a plaid shirt and a beanie looks up and holds the hand of an adult wearing jeans and a plaid shirt but whose head isn’t visible. They stand next to a cholla cactus.

Monogamy. Grandmas. Milk. The Evolution of Childhood Is Very Strange.

A crowd faces a large outdoor screen showing video of a nuclear missile launching into a blue sky. Several buses are visible in the background.

What Commentators Get Wrong (and Right) About North Korea

A photograph features a large crowd of people marching in a street. People in the front row hold up a large, long yellow banner with black text that reads “WOMEN OF COLOR FOR REPRODUCTIVE RIGHTS.” Other people also carry signs with different slogans.

Broadening Demands for Reproductive Justice

A photograph features seven people seated on a grassy plain with a tree and body of water to their left, four flags posted on their right, and mountains and blue skies in the distance. All are wearing headpieces and blue clothing decorated with colorful patches.

Do Mountains Have Souls?

A photograph features two people smiling and holding chopsticks. Surrounded by sunlight, they sit side-by-side at an outdoor table with plates, pots, and plastic cups on it.

What Is Linguistic Anthropology?

Two adults and two children in brightly patterned clothing carry wooden jugs across a sandy setting scattered with clusters of green grass.

A Somali Archaeologist Is Championing Heritage in the Horn of Africa

A photograph features several stone pillars, some tilting towards others, with etched angular and circular designs on their visible front side. Blue skies and mountains lie in the background.

Heritage Forensics Is Tackling Devastating New Forms of Cultural Erasure

An illustration features a person with a protruding forehead, long brown hair, and a beard wearing an animal skin over their shoulders and holding a wooden spear. A child with similar long brown hair and clothing sits on the person’s shoulders.

The Family Lives of the Last Neanderthals