Membership entitles you to a reduced registration fee for the annual SAP symposium. It enables each member to participate in the activities of the society, by taking part in votes to renew the Board of Directors and in votes at the Annual General Meeting (held each year at the time of the colloquium, at the end of January). Members are regularly informed of the society's activities and of anthropological news in France and abroad (contracts, symposia, etc.).

You can apply for membership using the form on this page. Once your application has been approved by the SAP Board of Directors, you will be able to pay your membership fee according to one of the methods described in the fees section.

SAP is a non-profit association under the French law of 1901. As such, you can make a donation to SAP, even if you are not a member.

Note that if you declare your income in France, you can deduct 66% of the amount of your annual membership fee or donation from your taxes, even if you are not taxable. So it really only costs you a third of what you pay into the Society.

Last Updated: 24 October 2023

Aims

The Société d’Anthropologie de Paris is a scholarly society founded in 1859. It was recognised by decree on 21 June 1864 as an organisation serving the public interest and operates as a  not-for-profit association under the French Charities Act of 1901. Its aim is to study the natural history of humans, i.e. the origin and biological diversity of the human species.

Activities

The activities of the Société d'Anthropologie de Paris are essentially the publication of an international scientific journal, the Bulletins et Mémoires de la Société d’Anthropologie de Paris, and the organisation of an annual scientific meeting "Les Journées", also of international scope. It also distributes scientific prizes and holds a conference for the general public each year in conjunction with the annual scientific meeting.

Nowadays, the society communicates through this website, a mailing list for its members, a Facebook account, an X account (ex-Twitter : @fil_sap) and a Discord server. This Discord server aims at beeing a place of exchanges open to all members (and even everyone for some spaces) to increase scientific discussion and fellowship within our community.

How to use the Discord server (in French): 

January 29-31 2025 in Musée de l'Homme, Paris

Theme 1: Hierarchy and power in human and non-human primates

Invited speaker: Dr. Elise Huchard, Institut des Sciences de l'Evolution de Montpellier, FR

Hierarchies are the structured and codified expression of more or less visible inequalities within societies. They refer to the organisation of individuals subject to relationships of subordination. The power exercised by some, suffered or accepted by others, is the expression of various factors: intrinsic abilities (size, physical strength), individual identity (age, sex), social identity (lineage, clan), social status/role (technological, economic, political in the broadest sense). 

Identifying hierarchical contexts in past societies, tracing their evolution and diversity, makes it possible to assess their consequences (funerary treatment, diet, health, activity) and to test their causes: socio-cultural, ecological and even biological determinants of power relationships, particularly between the sexes. From this perspective, data from non-human primate societies provide information on the evolutionary factors of sex-linked social traits, such as coercive behaviour (dominance of one sex over the other).

How can we recognise the attributes of power in human and non-human social structures, past and present? What are the practices, productions and aspirations of the 'dominant' and 'elite'? What factors contribute to the definition of their rank in society and to their perpetuation at the level of the social group, and even beyond? The papers proposed in this theme will focus, from the point of view of the archaeo-anthropologist or the primatologist, on the concepts of hierarchy and power, the relationships of domination between individuals, particularly between the sexes, their origins, the mechanisms by which they are expressed, and their consequences. 

This theme is intended to be inclusive in terms of study models, approaches, methods and periods, in the sense that it concerns all primates, human and non-human, and all social organisations and structures, past or present.

Key words: Hierarchy, domination, social structures, social status, gender.

Scientific committee: Yann Ardagna, Christophe Darmangeat, Julie Duboscq, Cécile Garcia, Aline Thomas, Sébastien Villotte

Theme 2: Asia as a crossroads zone

Invited speaker: Dr. Janet Kelso, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, DE

From the very first out-of-Africa events during the Lower Pleistocene to the “New Silk Roads”, the Asian continent has been at the crossroads between Africa, the Americas, Oceania, and Europe, from which most of the world's regions have been populated.

Over time, different human populations have occupied this area. Asia, the first region outside Africa to have been peopled by the Homo genus, also stands out for the diversity of human species that coexisted during the Middle and Upper Pleistocene: H. neanderthalensis, H. longi, H. luzonensis, H. floresiensis, Denisovans and H. sapiens. During the pre-, proto- and historic periods, a great variety of human populations and archaeological cultures have been present in Asia. In particular, two independent Neolithisation events took place there and spread across the entire continent. Later, the expansion of populations, particularly from the steppes to the east and south of Asia, brought these different chrono-cultural groups into contact with each other, and established a great population and cultural diversity that continues existing today. Finally, Asia is a region with a wide range of climates and geographical conditions, from glacial to tropical, from the world's highest mountains to vast deserts. Humans have been found in all of these regions, raising questions about biological and/or cultural adaptation mechanisms to these various environments.

The aim of this session is to bring together research pursued on Asia as a crossroads zone, at different temporal scales, from settlement to admixture between populations and on their genetic and non-genetic adaptations.

Key words: Asia, paleoanthropology, population genetics, Neolithic, adaptation, admixture.

Scientific committee: Julio Bendezu-Sarmento, Céline Bon, Bérénice Chamel, Florent Détroit, Nina Marchi, Olivia Munoz

Theme 3: Scientific breaking news

Last Updated: 11 September 2024

This page lists PhD theses in biological anthropology or related to this discipline done in French research laboratories. 

ARZELIER Ana
Migrations et fonctionnement des communautés de la transition Néolithique final - Bronze ancien en Europe de l’Ouest : apport de la paléogénomique.
Laboratoire d’inscription : UMR 5199 PACEA, Univ. de Bordeaux
Direction : Marie-France DEGUILLOUX
Soutenance : 29/09/2023
Lien : https://theses.fr/2023BORD0215

COSNEFROY Quentin
Structure osseuse et diversité locomotrice chez le hominines. Modélisation par l'expérimentation appliquée à la ceinture et au membre pelviens.
Laboratoire d’inscription : UMR 7268 ADES, Aix-Marseille Univ.
Direction : François MARCHAL, Gilles BERILLON et Michel SIGNOLI
Début de thèse : 01/10/2020

DODAT Pierre-Jean
Isotopes du calcium et anthropobiologie au Paléolithique moyen.
Laboratoire d’inscription : UMR 5276 LGL-TPE, ENS Lyon
Direction : Vincent BALTER et Bruno MAUREILLE
Soutenance : 23/02/2023
Lien : https://theses.fr/2023ENSL0007

DU FAYET DE LA TOUR Anaïs
De l'os brûlé en contexte archéologique à l'identification médico-légale : apports méthodologiques.
Laboratoire d’inscription : UMR 5199 PACEA, Univ. de Bordeaux
Direction : Christine COUTURE, François PARAF (PU-PH)
Soutenance : 09/10/2023
Lien : https://theses.fr/2023BORD0243

HABINGER Sophie Gabriele
Écologie évolutive des primates fossiles d’Asie du Sud-Est.
Laboratoires d’inscription : Dpt. de Géosciences, Univ. de Tübingen & UMR 7262 PALEVOPRIM, Univ. de Poitiers (cotutelle)
Direction : Hervé BOCHERENS (Département de Géosciences, Université de Tübingen), Olivier CHAVASSEAU
Soutenance : 11/07/2023
Lien : https://theses.fr/2023POIT2265

KIRGIS Pauline
Insectes, momies et pratiques funéraires : contribution de l’archéoentomologie, de la paléoparasitologie et de l’imagerie 3D à l’étude de momies préhispaniques de la côte centrale du Pérou.
Laboratoire d’inscription : UMR 5199 PACEA, Univ. de Bordeaux
Direction : Jean-Bernard HUCHET, Andrew NELSON
Soutenance : 13/12/2023
Lien : https://theses.fr/2023BORD0425

LACOMBE Jean-Paul
Les sépultures de la nécropole néolithique de Rouazi-Skhirat datée du Ve millénaire avant notre ère (Province de Témara-Skhirat, Maroc) : anthropologie et taphonomie.
Laboratoire d’inscription : UMR 5608 TRACES, Univ. Toulouse Jean-Jaurès
Direction : Thomas PERRIN et Bruno MAUREILLE
Soutenance : 08/09/2023
Lien : https://theses.fr/2023TOU20034

MARÉCHAL Laura
Variation, covariation, adaptation et évolution de la cavité nasale et des voies aériennes nasales.
Laboratoire d’inscription : UMR 5199 PACEA, Univ. de Bordeaux
Direction : Yann HEUZÉ
Soutenance : 06/06/2023
Lien : https://theses.fr/2023BORD0133

WALDVOGEL Laura
Sépultures et sociétés dans la plaine d'Alsace du Néolithique ancien au Néolithique récent (5300 - 3400 av. n.-è.). Une approche paléo-sociologique.
Laboratoire d’inscription : UMR 7044 Archimède, Univ. De Strasbourg
Direction : Christian JEUNESS
Soutenance : 15/11/2023
Lien : https://theses.fr/2023STRAG008

Last Updated: 17 June 2024