Paper short abstract:

Apart from reviewing the history of bio-cultural research I will discuss major challenges in integrating multiple theoretical orientations and methodologies of biological and cultural anthropology in implementing holistic anthropological research.

Paper long abstract:

Livingstone's research of sickle cell anemia and malaria in West Africa (1958) is considered by the majority of biological anthropologists as a classic in bio-cultural synthesis. Livingstone came with an elegant solution to the question why the protective sickle cell anemia allele was absent from West Africa where malaria was holoendemic by linking biology (genetics, evolutionary theory, disease ecology) with anthropology (archeology, linguistics, subsistence regimes, settlement practices). Bio-cultural approaches developed further since the 1960s and 1970s with the initiative of the Adaptability Project of the International Human Biological Program that stressed the importance of analyzing the influence of physical environment on human biological variation and opened the door for researching the interaction between human biology with biotic and cultural environments. A very productive avenue in bio-cultural synthesis became evident from the mid 1990s onwards in the work of Dressler and colleagues who employed a cognitive theory of culture to study the relationship between culture, individual behavior and health. Despite notable efforts of more sophisticated operationalization of cultural phenomena in biocultural reseach, biological anthropologists still tend to emphasize the 'bio' more than the 'cultural', perhaps because we are more skilful in measuring the biological than the cultural. In this talk, apart from briefly reviewing the history of bio-cultural research, I will discuss the challenges I face in my current research that focuses on the issues of integrating biomarkers with ethnographic research to understand how contextual factors become inscribed "under the skin" to shape the health and well-being.