Biology Reference
In-Depth Information
FIGURE 2.3
The Venus of Willendorf.
Throughout my graduate education, functional morphology (the interplay between form
and function) continued to pique my interest. I was fortunate to have had the opportunity
to work with the
WilliamM. Bass Donated Skeletal Collection
at the University of Tennes-
see. With the increasing sample of obese individuals donated to the collection in recent
years, I revisited this question posed by the Venus figurine. However, my first dissertation
direction was a dead-end. I tried pursuing a forensic application thinking about facial
reconstruction for obese individuals. Since I wanted to look at the relationship between
bone and soft tissue, I began developing contacts at the University of Tennessee Medical
Center, Department of Radiology. I applied for a graduate fellowship with an agency that
had an interest in my research agenda, namely, facial reconstruction for obese and over-
weight people.
The project went unfunded, which forced me to reconsider my research question. I began
to doubt its integrity and feared being pigeonholed in forensic anthropology (a possibility
pointed out by my advisor). I also feared the research project might be perceived as pseudo-
science, since much of facial reconstruction is more dependent upon the talent of the forensic
artist than on the actual science of skeletal facial morphology (e.g., see
Stephan and Henne-
berg, 2001
). However, the original scientific problem proposed came back to the issue of body
mass and the great effect it can have on the appearance of the face. I therefore expanded my
original question to become the following: Is it possible to determine body mass from other
