11 July 2008

Humanitarian award for Professor Sue Black

Professor Sue Black, Professor of Anatomy and Forensic Anthropology and Director of the Centre for Anatomy and Human Identification at the University of Dundee, has been named the 2008 recipient of the Lucy Mair Medal for Applied Anthropology from the Royal Anthropological Institute.

The Lucy Mair Medal is awarded to honour excellence in the application of anthropology to the relief of poverty and distress, and to the active recognition of human dignity.

Upon being notified of her award Professor Black said, "This has come as a huge surprise. Forensic anthropology has a developing role to play in the alleviation of suffering, and in the last four years the University of Dundee has really invested and supported this enormously important venture".

Professor Black's work in recent years has included identification of victims of the tsunami in Thailand and in areas of armed conflict including Sierra Leone, Kosovo and Iraq. Her forensic examinations have also played a key role in many criminal investigations within the UK.

Professor Black’s own view of her work is certainly informed by an appreciation of human rights and an insight into human suffering. “Forensic anthropology is best described as the analysis of human remains for the medico-legal purposes of establishing identity," she said.

"Being able to assign a name to the deceased is critical to achieving psychological closure for families as well as being core to the successful outcome of all legal investigations. In a judicial investigation, one cannot predict which parts of the human body will present for identification and therefore it is vital that every element be examined in an effort to determine the positive identity of the deceased. Within the last 10 years, forensic anthropology has come to play an increasingly important role in judicial investigations both within the UK and internationally, being core to issues of repatriation, mass disasters and war crimes."

The Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland (RAI) is the world's longest-established scholarly association dedicated to the furtherance of anthropology (the study of humankind) in its broadest and most inclusive sense. The Royal Anthropological Institute seeks to combine a distinguished tradition of scholarship stretching back over more than 150 years with the active provision of services to contemporary anthropology and anthropologists (including students of anthropology). It has a particular commitment to promoting the public understanding of anthropology, and the contribution of anthropology to public affairs. The Institute's regular special lectures comprise the Huxley Memorial Lecture and Presidential Address and the Henry Myers and Curl Lectures.

The Royal Anthropological Institute awards several international prizes, such as the Curl Essay Prize, the Wellcome Medal for Medical Anthropology, the Lucy Mair Medal for Applied Anthropology, and the J.B. Donne Essay Prize in the Anthropology of Art. It serves as a Trustee of several funds which award research grants, including the annual Leach/RAI Fellowship, and the annual RAI Fellowship in Urgent Anthropology.

For media enquiries contact:
Roddy Isles
Head, Press Office
University of Dundee
Nethergate Dundee, DD1 4HN
TEL: 01382 384910
E-MAIL: r.isles@dundee.ac.uk