Research Interests
My areas of specialization are zooarchaeology and palaeoanthropology, and my primary interests have been the evolution and ecology of human subsistence behavior and the dynamics of human cognitive development. My research goals are to detect cultural variability in the use of faunal resources through time and to investigate the early expressions of symbolic behavior among modern humans. In the past few years, I have been involved in developing digital catalogue on dentitions of east African large mammals. I have been co-director of a major palaeonthropological field project in Ethiopia, at the Omo-Kibish - a site best known for yielding the earliest skeletal evidence of anatomically modern humans. Beginning from 2007, I run a new field project in southeastern Ethiopia, with the objective of locating new and previously identified cave sites within the extensive limestone deposits of the region.
Current Research
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Exploration of cave deposits in southeastern Ethiopia.
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Expanding the digital reference catalogue by including extant taxa of carnivores from East Africa.
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Assisting the Smithsonian's Human Origins program in developing the Geographic Information Systems (GIS) componenet for its project at Olorgesailie, Kenya.
Education and Degrees
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B.A. in History, Addis Ababa University, Ethiopia, 1983.
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M.A. in Anthropology, SUNY at Stony Brook, 1997.
- Ph.D. in Anthropology, SUNY at Stony Brook, 2002
Selected Publications
| In Press | Assefa, Z., Lam, Y., and Mienis, Henk K., Operculum beads from the Middle Stone Age contexts of Porc-Epic cave. Current Anthropology |
| In Press | Assefa, Z., Yirga, S., Reed, Kaye E., Large mammal fossils from the Kibish Formation. Journal of Human Evolution |
| 2006 | Assefa, Z., (2006). Faunal remains from Porc-Epic: paleoecological and zooarchaeological investigations from a Middle Stone Age site in southeastern Ethiopia. Journal of Human Evolution 51 (1), 50-75. |
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2005
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Marean, Curtis W., and Assefa, Z., The middle and Upper Pleistocene African record for the biological and behavioral origins of modern humans. In Stahl, A. (ed.) African Archaeology: A critical Introduction, Blackwell Studies in Global Archaeology, Blackwell, Malden, PP. 93-129. |
| 2002 | Abe, Y., Marean, Curtis W., Nilssen, P., Assefa, Z., and Stone, E., The analysis of cutmarks on archaeofauna: a review and critique of quantification procedures, and a new image-analysis GIS approach. American Antiquity 67 (4), 643-665. |
| 2000 | Assefa, Z., Brown, F., Passey, B., Fleagle, J. G., and Yirga, S., New research in the Kibish Formation, Southern Ethiopia. Abstract in American Journal of Physical Anthropologists, 111(S30), 100. |
| 1999 | Marean, Curtis W. and Assefa, Z., Zooarchaeological evidence for the faunal exploitation behavior of Neandertals and early modern humans. Evolutionary Anthropology, 8, 22-37. |
| 1996 | Kimbel, W. H., Walter, R. C., Johanson, D. C., Reed, K. E. J., Aronson, L., Assefa, Z., Marean C. W., Eck, G. G., Bobe, Hovers, R., E., Rak,Y., Vondra, C., Yemane, T., York, D., Chen,Y., Evensen, N. M., and Smith, P. E., Late Pliocene Homo and Oldowan tools from the Hadar Formation (Kada Hadar Member), Ethiopia. Journal of Human Evolution, 31, 549-561. |
| 1994 | Fleagle, J. G., Yirga, S., Bown, Bown, Thomas M., Rasmussen Tab D., Assefa, Z., Hagos, T., and Negash, A., New paleontological discoveries from Fejij, Southern Omo, Ethiopia, In Proceedings of the Eleventh International Conference of Ethiopian studies. |
| 1994 | Assefa, Z., History of Palaeoanthropological Research in the Southern Omo, Ethiopia. In Proceedings of the Eleventh International Conference of Ethiopian studies, Addis Ababa, Institute of Ethiopian studies. |
| 1991 | Assefa, Z., An Overview of Archaeological Occurrences from the Lower Omo Basin, Ethiopia. In Proceedings of the National Conference of Ethiopian Studies, Vol. 1, Addis Ababa, 11-12. Addis Ababa, Institute of Ethiopian studies. |
Zelalem Assefa, Assefaz@si.edu
Post-Doctoral Fellow
