Forensic Anthropology Quotes

Though a good cop, Luc Claudel has the patience of a firecracker, the sensitivity of Vlad the Impaler, and a persistent skepticism as to the value of forensic anthropology. Snappy dresser, though.

And at that pivotal moment, the University of Tennessee came calling. So did forensic anthropology. My career as “Indian grave-robber number one” was over. My true vocation—as a forensic scientist—was about to begin.

The faithful clamoured to be buried alongside the martyrs, as close as possible to the venerable remains, a custom which, in anthropological terms, recalls Neolithic beliefs that certain human remains possessed supernatural properties. It was believed that canonized saints did not rot, like lesser mortals, but that their corpses were miraculously preserved and emanated an odour of sanctity, a sweet, floral smell, for years after death. In forensic terms, such preservation is likely to be a result of natural mummification in hot, dry conditions.

Dreadful as all these processes may seem, they are only the resolution of certain carbon-based compounds into certain other carbon-based compounds. Carbon is the element of life and death. We share it with diamonds and dandelions, with kerosene an kelp. While we may wrinkle our noses at some of its manifestations, we ought also to remember that this element comes to us from the stars, which wheel over us forever in silent, glittering array, pure fires obeying celestial laws.

In both domestic and international law, as Christopher Joyce and Eric Stover dryly remarked in their book on forensic anthropology, ‘lawyers tend to recruit scientists for courtroom appearances much like the way the police shop for attack-dogs – they look for signs of good breeding coupled with a willingness to take a bite out of an adversary.’20

Closely allied with the contribution of chemists to the alleviation of disease is their involvement at a molecular level. Biology became chemistry half a century ago when the structure of DNA was discovered (in 1953). Molecular biology, which in large measure has sprung from that discovery, is chemistry applied to the functioning of organisms. Chemists, often disguised as molecular biologists, have opened the door to understanding life and its principal characteristic, inheritance, at a most fundamental level, and have thereby opened up great regions of the molecular world to rational investigation. They have also transformed forensic medicine, brought criminals to justice, and transformed anthropology.

D. H. Trujillo is a fiction author born in Colorado of Pueblo and Mexican descent. The desert is her happy place and serves as inspiration for many of her works. She holds a bachelor of anthropology from the University of Hawai‘i and a master of forensic behavioral science from Alliant International University. She currently resides in Baltimore, Maryland, with her husband, two spooky black cats, an elder chihuahua named after jeans, and the plethora of ghosts inhabiting her 1949 home. Her debut romance novel, Lizards Hold the Sun, was released under the name Dani Trujillo