A century of skeletal biology and paleopathology: Contrasts, contradictions, and conflicts

For the first half of the 20th century, biological anthropology stagnated in a state in which racial typology was its major theoretical and methodological focus. In 1951, Sherwood Washburn proposed the "new physical anthropology" that would move biological anthropology beyond description. Washburn repositioned it into a science that focused on process, theory, and hypothesis testing. The commitment to a process-oriented biological anthropology has been slow, but there has been progress. Biocultural studies and functional anatomy have produced a more dynamic science characterized by hypothesis testing and a heightened concern for causality. Unfortunately, a return to historical particularism has limited progress. An increasing interest in forensic application and resurgent interest in measures of population distances and migrations represents a reversion to an earlier descriptive past.