Jeremy (Jerry) Sabloff, an SFI External Professor and an Institute past president, has been selected by the American Anthropological Association to receive its 2016 Alfred Vincent Kidder Award for Eminence in the Field of American Archaeology.

"The core of Jerry Sabloff’s work exemplifies a rare intellectual commitment to the balancing of science and humanism," reads his award citation. "In addition to profound contributions to the study of the rise and fall of ancient Maya civilization, Mesoamerican urbanism, and new theoretical and methodological approaches, Sabloff’s impact on anthropological archaeology in the Americas transcends the geographical area where his work has had such a profound scholarly and ethical impact."

The award committee notes his wide-ranging research interests, his innovative and insightful perspectives on a number of issues including the need for archaeologists to engage with the public, his roles as a catalyst for change and unifier of disparate perspectives and approaches, and his service as a scientist, humanist, activist, and public intellectual.

Sabloff will be presented with the award at the annual meeting of the American Anthropological Association in Minneapolis in November.

Established in 1950, the Kidder Award is given every two years to an (alternately) to an outstanding archaeologist specializing in the archaeology of the Americas and a specialist in the archaeology of Mesoamerica and the American Southwest.

Past recipients of the Kidder Award include SFI-affiliated researchers Tim Kohler (2014) and the late Linda Cordell (2001). 

More about the award here