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SAR RESEARCHERSCurrent Researchers

Wenda R. Trevathan

Senior Scholar — 2021 to Present

Wenda R. Trevathan is a biological anthropologist whose research focuses on the evolutionary and biocultural factors underlying human reproduction including childbirth, maternal behavior, sexuality, and menopause. Her primary publications include works on the evolution of childbirth and evolutionary medicine. She is a co-editor of two collections of works on evolutionary medicine (Oxford University Press, 1999 and 2008) and published the book Ancient Bodies, Modern Lives: How Evolution Has Shaped Women’s Health (Oxford University Press) in 2010 following her year as a Resident Scholar at SAR (2008-2009). With Karen Rosenberg she co-edited the book Costly and Cute: Helpless Infants and Human Evolution, published by SAR Press in 2016, based on at Advanced Seminar they organized at SAR in 2015. Her current project, also with Dr. Rosenberg, is about infants and evolution. She is the recipient of several awards including the W. W. Howells Book Award, the Margaret Mead Award from the American Anthropological Association, and The Franz Boas Award from the Human Biology Association. In 2020 she was elected a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. Wenda earned her PhD from the University of Colorado and is Regents Professor Emerita of Anthropology at New Mexico State University.