Anthropology, as a unified discipline of research and teaching at Southern Illinois University at Carbondale, dates from the year 1950. More than half a century earlier, however, anthropology can be said to have had its beginnings in the subfield of archaeology shortly after the University opened its doors in 1869. In 1874 Cyrus Thomas (later of Smithsonian Institution fame) initiated the collection and organization of archaeological materials from the southern Illinois area for the newly founded University Museum. Although the Thomas collections did not survive, the close ties between archaeology, anthropology, and the Museum continued for many decades. Thomas's early work for the Division of Mound Exploration of the Smithsonian Institution was conducted from his base in Carbondale.

In 1950 archaeologist J. Charles Kelley was brought from the University of Texas to be Director of the University Museum. He was given the dual charge of modernizing the Museum and beginning an anthropology program at the University in the existing Department of Sociology. Prior to that time, courses in general anthropology and American Indians had been offered by Louis Petroff, an SIU sociologist with some anthropological training and interests. Kelley added William J. Shackelford, an archaeology graduate student from the University of Texas, to the Museum staff, joining amateur archaeologist Irvin Peithman who had been hired earlier by the Museum. Shackelford taught courses in anthropology for two years before leaving SIUC. At about the same time, Howard D. Winters, also at the time a graduate student, joined the Museum as Curator of North American Archaeology and did some teaching in the Department of Sociology. With this beginning, in 1953 the name of the academic unit was changed to "Department of Sociology and Anthropology."

In 1955 the nucleus of the department-to-be was established with the addition of sociocultural anthropologist Charles H. Lange and archaeologist Carroll L. Riley. These two scholars had joint appointments in the University Museum and the Department of Sociology and Anthropology. With four anthropologists on staff, the group moved to create a separate department and this was accomplished in 1957. The following year Walter W. Taylor was added to the faculty as Professor and Chair of the Department of Anthropology.

Also in 1958 the Department of Anthropology was designated as a graduate and research department with only a nominal undergraduate program. At that point, the department began making plans to offer a Ph.D. degree in addition to its Master of Arts and Bachelor's degrees. Three new faculty appointments in anthropology were made in 1959 and 1960: Charles R. Kaut (sociocultural), George W. Grace (linguistics), and Philip J.C. Dark (primitive art); in addition two archaeologists, Pedro Armillas and Melvin L. Fowler, were added to the Museum staff with cross-appointments to the Department. These individuals pursued long-term research interests in Illinois, the Southwestern U.S., Europe, and northern and central Mexico. At the same time, Mr. Winters departed the University. The Ph.D. program began in 1960 following the recommendation of anthropologist Clyde K.M. Kluckhohn (Harvard University), who had carried out the required feasibility study for the SIU administration. Southern Illinois University at Carbondale thus became the first state institution of higher education in Illinois to offer the doctoral degree in anthropology.

During the 1960s the department expanded, both in terms of its faculty and its physical space (movement from a former residential building on Mill Street to larger quarters in the basement of what is now Quigley Hall). In 1960 the department awarded its first M.A. degree; its first doctoral degree was bestowed in 1964, an occasion also marked by anthropologist Margaret Mead's commencement address to the University. Several faculty additions were made to the Department in the 1960s, some of whom remained on the faculty for many years: cultural anthropologist Jerome Handler , linguist Joel Maring, Southeastern U.S. archaeologist Jon Muller and Maya archaeologist Robert L. Rands. Others were with the department for shorter intervals (e.g., the department's first physical anthropologist, Roger Heglar; also Marie Doenges, Milton Altschuler , Adrian Gerbrands, Lee Guemple, Bruce MacLachlan , and Roy Wagner). Along with these additions came an expansion of geographical areas of faculty research and student training, with continuing work in Mexico, and the Southwestern U.S., and new projects in New Guinea, Eastern U.S., Ecuador, sub-Arctic, and the Maya area.

The 1970s were similarly a time of considerable turnover in department faculty, reorientations within its organization, and movement to its present location on the north end of Faner Hall in 1975. In 1973 archaeologist George Gumerman joined the faculty and in 1978 founded the Center for Archaeological Investigations (CAI) . The CAI became a separate research unit within the College of Liberal Arts, working in close cooperation with the Department and taking over many of the research and publication activities formerly in the University Museum. Gumerman, the CAI, and the Department of Anthropology were closely identified with Southwestern archaeology and the Black Mesa Project (Arizona) during the succeeding decade, with several faculty appointments in archaeology. Other additions to the faculty in the early 1970s included social anthropologists Edwin Cook and Ester Maring, and linguist Lionel Bender . Three physical anthropologists joined the faculty at the end of the decade, Dean Falk (1977, departed 1979), Robert Corruccini with diverse research interests in human variation, human evolution, and teeth (1978) and Susan Ford with research interests in evolutionary biology and New World monkeys (1979). These additions spurred the development of a strong graduate program in bioanthropology in the 1980's and 1990's. Walter Taylor retired in 1974 and Philip Dark retired in 1978, the same year that Cook left the University.

1980s-present

The middle 1980s and early 1990s saw a number of retirements, reassignments, and new hires that directed the Department into its current orientations. Two sociocultural anthropologists were added to our faculty: Jane Adams (research concerning southern Illinois farm women and rural agricultural economies); and Jonathan Hill (Amazonian [Venezuela] ethnology and history, ethnomusicology). Another biological anthropologist, Brenda Benefit, joined the faculty in 1990, adding research specialization in hominoid evolution and Old World anthropoids through her field research in Kenya (Benefit left SIU in 2002). During this same time three archaeologists on the faculty retired, Carroll Riley in 1987, and George Gumerman and Robert Rands in 1990; shortly thereafter two sociocultural faculty (Lionel Bender and Jerome Handler) transferred to other academic units in the College of Liberal Arts and Joel and Ester Maring retired in 1995 and 1996 respectively. New hires in archaeology in 1991 were Don S. Rice as Director of the Center for Archaeological Investigations, with research interests in lowland Maya settlement, ecology, and agriculture, and Prudence M. Rice with research in the colonial period southern Andes, ceramics, and the lowland Maya. In 1994 a third new archaeologist joined the faculty, Izumi Shimada , with long-standing field research on the north coast of Peru. Beginning in 1995 the department initiated a series of replacement hires in sociocultural anthropology, bringing in John McCall (Africa[Nigeria], performance) and C. Andrew Hofling (Maya, linguistics), and David Sutton (Greece, historical consciousness).

The years after 2000 saw a string of new hires.  At the end of the 2000-1 academic year, Jon Muller retired after a lengthy career of teaching archaeology and serving in various University administrative offices.  Paul Welch (eastern US archaeology) was brought in to replace him in 2001. Kevin Foster (race and education in the US) was hired at the same time, with a joint appointment in Anthropology and Black American Studies (Foster left SIU in 2005). With both Don Rice and Pru Rice having moved into administrative postions in the University, in 2002 Andrew Balkansky (State formation in Oaxaca) was brought into the department to help cover Mesoamerican archaeology. The biological anthropologist Brenda Benefit moved to a different university in 2002, and was replaced first by Christopher Stojanowski, who two years later also moved elsewhere. This position is now filled by Ulrich Reichard, an expert in gibbon behavior. A new position is now occupied by Roberto Barrios whose work focuses on the recovery efforts after disasters such as hurricanes.  Janet Fuller, who studies bilingualism, language contact, and sociolinguistics, transferred into our department from Linguistics in 2004.  In 2005 a third anthropological linguist, Anthony Webster (Athabaskan languages, ethnopoetics), joined Fuller and Hofling to make our department one of the larger concentrations of anthropological linguists in the country. Finally, in 2006 a new position in osteology/forensic anthropology was created and is staffed by Tracy Prowse, whose research focuses on Roman populations in Italy.

The faculty of the Department of Anthropology have a distinguished record of research, publication, and student training that is recognized throughout SIU. As evidence of this high regard, five members of the Department have been named as the University's Outstanding Scholar and Distinguished Professor: Carroll Riley (1986), George Gumerman (1989), Robert Corruccini (1994), Prudence Rice (1997), and Izumi Shimada (2007).  Jane Adams was the Outstanding Teacher in the College of Liberal Arts for 2004.