Henry T. Bunn

Ph.D., University of California at Berkeley, 1982
Professor of Anthropology
At UW-Madison since 1982

Archaeology and Biological Anthropology

Research

As a paleoanthropologist, my research emphasizes the evolutionary ecology of Plio-Pleistocene hominins and the behavioral ecology and archaeology of Hadza foragers near Lake Eyasi in northern Tanzania. For many years, I participated in paleoanthropological field research at Koobi Fora, and I made the first discovery of butchery marks on fossil bones of Plio-Pleistocene age there. I conducted the first comprehensive taphonomic analysis of fossil bone assemblages from Plio-Pleistocene archaeological sites at Koobi Fora and Olduvai Gorge, Tanzania, which demonstrated significant hominin involvement in meat-eating and in the formation of the sites. To provide insights about some of the dynamics of a hunting and gathering way of life, I have conducted long-term field studies of several foraging societies, including the Kua San in Botswana and the Hadza in Tanzania (starting in 1984 and ongoing).

Teaching

My teaching includes:

• a paleoanthropology survey course combining hominin fossil and archaeological evidence from the Pliocene and the Pleistocene;
• a hands-on laboratory course in zooarchaeology on the identification and analysis of mammal bones from archaeological sites;
• early African prehistory and evolution.

Select Publications

• Bunn, H. T. (2006)
  Meat Made Us Human. In Evolution of the Human Diet, edited by P. Ungar. Oxford University Press, Oxford.
• Stanford, C., and H. T. Bunn, editors (2001)
  Meat-Eating and Human Evolution. Oxford University Press, Oxford.
• Bunn, H. T. (2001)
  Hunting, Power Scavenging, and Butchering by Hadza Foragers and by Plio-Pleistocene Homo. In Meat-Eating and Human Evolution, edited by C. Stanford and H. T. Bunn, pp. 199-218. Oxford University Press, Oxford.
• Bunn, H. T. (1994)
  Early Pleistocene Hominid Foraging Strategies Along the Ancestral Omo River at Koobi Fora, Kenya. Journal of Human Evolution 27:247-266.
• Bunn, H. T., and E. M. Kroll (1986)
  Systematic Butchery by Plio-Pleistocene Hominids at Olduvai Gorge, Tanzania. Current Anthropology 27(5):431-442.

Curriculum Vitae

Henry T. Bunn CV

Contact

Office: 5458 Sewell Social Science Bldg.
Office phone: (608) 263-6854
Email address: htbunn@wisc.edu