Visiting Assistant Professor, Biological Anthropology

Visiting Assistant Professor, Biological Anthropology

Western Washington University, with over 15,000 students in seven colleges and the graduate school, is nationally recognized for its educational programs, students and faculty. The campus is located in Bellingham, Washington, a coastal community of 90,000 overlooking Bellingham Bay, the San Juan Islands and the North Cascades Mountain range. The city lies 90 miles north of Seattle and 60 miles south of Vancouver, British Columbia.

Western has additional sites in Anacortes, Bremerton, Everett, Port Angeles, and Poulsbo. Western is recognized nationally for its successes, such as being named one of the top public master's-granting institutions in the Pacific Northwest for 25 years in a row by U.S. News & World Report.

The College of Humanities and Social Sciences and the Anthropology Department support Western's mission, which states that together with our students, staff, and faculty, we are committed to making a positive impact in the state and the world with a shared focus on academic excellence and inclusive achievement. We encourage applications from women, people of color, people with disabilities, veterans, and other candidates from underrepresented backgrounds and with diverse experiences interested in this opportunity.

The Department of Anthropology invites applications for two full-time, non-tenure track Visiting Assistant Professor positions in Biological Anthropology to begin in September 2026. The ideal candidates will have a Ph.D. at the time of application and will have significant research and teaching experience in the areas of human evolution, human anatomy and osteology, reproductive health, and quantitative methods. We would like to add Biological Anthropologists whose research builds upon the department's existing strengths in the primate fossil record and the evolution of life history.

We are especially interested in candidates with a track record of the ability to provide hands-on, personalized research and educational experiences for students interested in health sciences. The Department of Anthropology is dedicated to the implementation of anthropology to address issues affecting human health, incorporating collaborative research and an evolutionary biology framework. The successful candidates will contribute to these areas and demonstrate the ability to integrate their health and evolution-oriented research program into the curriculum.

Teaching priorities include Reproduction and Physiology, Human Osteology and Forensics, Quantitative Methods, Human Origins, Human Evolution, and advanced writing seminars in the area of the applicants' research. The successful candidates will be expected to fulfill teaching and mentoring responsibilities that provide equitable and inclusive learning environments for all students. Candidates should address at least one of the topical areas outlined above in their cover letter, indicating how their past experiences, current interests and activities, and/or future goals could promote a work climate that values and supports inclusion.

Required Qualifications:

• PhD in Anthropology or related field
• Evidence of ability to teach diverse set of courses in biological anthropology, especially Reproduction and Physiology, Human Osteology and Forensics, Quantitative Methods, Human Origins, Human Evolution, and advanced writing seminars in the area of the applicants' research.
• Evidence of a research program in human evolution, human anatomy and osteology, reproductive health, and quantitative methods.
• Evidence of the ability to provide hands-on, personalized research and educational experiences for students interested in health sciences.
• Evidence of the ability to integrate their health and evolution-oriented research program into the curriculum.
• Evidence of the ability to mentor undergraduate and graduate students in research and professional development.
• Evidence of ability to work with students from diverse backgrounds.
• Evidence of ability to provide equitable teaching and learning environments for students.

Preferred Qualifications:

• Postdoctoral experience in Anthropology or related field
• Evidence of ability to acquire internal and external research funding.
• Experience working with the primate fossil record
• Ability to engage with primate skeletal collections at WWU, utilizing them in research and teaching.
• Ability to engage with technological resources available to Anthropology, including micro-CT scanners, structured light scanners, 3D printers, and other resources.
• Experience with/dedication to reproducible statistical workflows (e.g., Git Hub repositories and general R code sharing), open-source data repositories (e.g., 3D scans, landmark data, etc), and increasing accessibility via 3D digital/statistical analysis.

Salary: $1,178-1,400 per credit, commensurate with experience and qualifications. The expected teaching load includes teaching 2 or 3 courses per quarter, on a 10-week quarter system (up to 7 courses total).…