Welcome to That Anthro Podcast Dr. Matthew Velasco, a Professor at Cornell University. On this episode we discuss how Dr. Velasco’s love for history and film led him to undergraduate and graduate degrees in Anthropology. We also discuss his experience taking his first anthropology class at Stanford and the impact Dr. John Rick’s Intro to Archaeology class had on his academic path. This includes being invited to join Dr. Ricks project at Chavin de Huantar the summer after taking that intro class. He expresses his love for Peru, the importance of community engagement, and how he has continued to conduct research there. Currently he is working on a book project regarding cranial modification in the Colca Valley in Peru, and how archaeologists can look at cranial modification within a specific community. We also take a tangent to discuss the graduate application process and he provides some very useful advice.

SAA conference info: The Bioarchaeology Interest Group (BIG) is organizing a Mentoring Event for the 88th Annual Meeting of the Society for American Archaeology (SAA), to be held Thursday, March 30, from 9:00 a.m.-11:00 a.m, location TBD. This free workshop will provide an opportunity for students to receive mentoring from expert bioarchaeologists of different backgrounds and career tracks. Please complete this form to register for the event. If you have any questions or concerns, please feel free to e-mail the BIG Co-Chairs, Sara Juengst (sjuengst@uncc.edu) and Matt Velasco (mcv47@cornell.edu). We look forward to meeting you in Portland! Sign up here https://forms.gle/bgRrS6kKxdduTh3a9