As a student in Syracuse University’s Renée Crown Honors Program, I knew I would finish my undergraduate experience with the longest research paper I had ever written. Any subject within the constraints of my major(s) would be acceptable. Fortunately, in the summer of 2024, I participated in the Jucu Project Field School with Transylvania Bioarchaeology, a non-profit organization. It was in Cluj-Napoca, Romania, that I realized how much I enjoyed the analysis of bones and artifacts to understand the human experience. Thus, I quickly discovered my thesis topic.

I have always cared about human rights and acceptance and found a passion around ethics in bioarchaeology. The staff at Transylvania Bioarchaeology taught us osteological methods to estimate sex, age, stature, and pathology, including the limitations that come with this analysis since the experiences of individuals do not always appear in their bones. We especially focused on the topic of estimating “ancestry,” a term which, in the 1990s, was used to replace “race” estimation. This shift occurred due to the scientific notion that “race” is not something that can be biologically determined. However, “ancestry” estimation is quite the controversy among biological anthropologists, many of whom claim that “race” was changed to “ancestry” without a change in methodology to accompany it. Exposure to this ancestry estimation debate seemed to be a great topic for my research.

Writing your first thesis is certainly not for the weak. I had my friends for support and my faculty thesis advisor for guidance. With my advisor helping, I was able to email well-known anthropologists who provided information on crucial resources. My advisor supplied articles and I furthered this research using library databases.

My thesis, titled A Discussion on the Ethics and Accuracy of Ancestry Estimations Using Fordisc, was one that my thesis advisor said must be carefully parsed out. To evaluate the debate on the ethics of ancestry estimation, I asked three crucial questions:

1. How has the history of race typology become embedded within modern methods of determining ancestry?
2. Though “race” has been replaced with “ancestry,” to what extent has this terminology been adopted within the discipline?
3. How do we explain how to appropriately use ancestry estimation, particularly when it is both controversial and unclear?

Due to the deeply rooted history of 19th century “race science,” I found these questions challenging at the start of my research. There are also limited standards on how bioarchaeologists evaluate ancestry estimation. In addition, I had to provide extensive background information for my readers, outlining the history of biological anthropology, forensic anthropology, and the development of Fordisc.

I laid out the history of bioanthropology which created assumptions about race before having an understanding of human genetic variation, answering my first question above. My second question led to the discovery of a paradox: anthropologists deem race not a biological reality due to variation existing on a geographical cline (meaning, biological traits gradually change across a geographic area, rather than being distinctly different between groups of people). However, clinal variation is the same reason why those who support ancestry estimation argue that it is a valid analytical method. In fact, many anthropologists define ancestry estimation as an estimation of social race! With this, some emphasize a distinction between “social” and “biological” race.

Nonetheless, for many biological anthropologists, this distinction is not made explicit, thereby reinforcing outdated race concepts. Additionally, terminology such as “race” and “ancestry” is conflated along with differences in usage of terminology by forensic anthropologists, law enforcement and medicolegal offices, and the ways in which individuals self-identify. The answer to my last question included an organizational standardization of terminology, updating reference data, and an updated teaching curriculum shedding light on these controversies. I initially thought I would be evaluating whether or not bioanthropologists should use ancestry estimation. However, I emphasized instead how researchers should evaluate the contexts of craniometry and Fordisc to improve standardization and ethics.

With this completed project and a plethora of skills in my pocket, I would like to offer advice to those who are in a similar situation:

• Create outlines! Make bullet points for each chapter you want to write, laying out each sub-section in these chapters. As someone with ADHD, putting all my thoughts into a document was helpful and prevented ideas from building up in my brain and causing major stress. 
• Communicate when you need help! When I was honest with my faculty advisor, she provided resources I needed, and encouraged me to work to the best of my ability.
• Start small. One reason I struggled was because I kept picturing my thesis as this huge, daunting thing that I had to get done all at once. Set small goals for yourself—even if it is writing a few paragraphs. Getting a start will help with what you will write next.

I completed a 96-page thesis which I submitted for both the Honors Program and for an “Anthropology Distinction.” Clicking that final “Submit” button filled me with pride. I could not have been happier when presenting this project to the Honors faculty, the Anthropology Department, and my friends and family.

The post How do you put your passions into a large-scale anthropological paper? appeared first on The Anthropology Career Readiness Network.