Buikstra awarded for 2 lifetime achievements
<p>The odds of anyone receiving a lifetime achievement award are slim; being honored with two in one year is almost unheard of.</p><separator></separator><p>But that’s exactly what is in store for Jane Buikstra, a professor in ASU’s School of Human Evolution & Social Change.</p><separator></separator><p>On Feb. 20, Buikstra will receive the prestigious T. Dale Stewart Award from the Physical Anthropology Section of the American Academy of Forensic Sciences.</p><separator></separator><p>The award, which is given for lifetime achievement in forensic anthropology, will be presented during the academy’s 60th annual meeting, held in Washington, D.C.</p><separator></separator><p>In April, Buikstra will travel to Columbus, Ohio, for the 77th annual meeting of the American Association of Physical Anthropologists. There, she will receive the association’s highest academic honor: the Charles Darwin Lifetime Achievement Award.</p><separator></separator><p>She was chosen for this award for her “extensive and enduring contributions to the discipline of biological anthropology as a whole, and her pioneering contributions to bioarchaeology and paleopathology in particular.”</p><separator></separator><p>Buikstra, who is the director of ASU’s Center for Bioarchaeological Research, modestly describes the awards as an “embarrassment of riches.”</p><separator></separator><p>But major accomplishments and awards are nothing new for the woman known as one of the founders of modern bioarchaeology.</p><separator></separator><p>In the course of her career, Buikstra has been elected to the National Academy of Sciences, published and lectured extensively and received numerous awards, as well as more than 30 grants, many from the National Science Foundation.</p><separator></separator><p>Along with continuing her anthropological research, Buikstra remains an involved teacher, instructing students in general bioarchaeology, osteology and mortuary site archaeology. She also is the director of the Center for American Archeology in Kampsville, Ill.</p>