Salary and Outlook

According to the US Department of Labor, there are 7,500 people employed as anthropologists and archeologists in the United States. The median annual salary is $61,910. Entry level employees earn approximately $37,870 per year and senior employees earn approximately $99,830 per year.

Estimates do not include other potential benefits such as health insurance, overtime pay, or retirement benefits that may be offered by employers.

Job Duties

• Describe artifacts' physical properties or attributes, such as the materials from which artifacts are made and their size, shape, function, and decoration.
• Plan and direct research to characterize and compare the economic, demographic, health care, social, political, linguistic, and religious institutions of distinct cultural groups, communities, and organizations.
• Compare findings from one site with archeological data from other sites to find similarities or differences.
• Record the exact locations and conditions of artifacts uncovered in diggings or surveys, using drawings and photographs as necessary.
• Assess archeological sites for resource management, development, or conservation purposes and recommend methods for site protection.
• Gather and analyze artifacts and skeletal remains to increase knowledge of ancient cultures.
• Collect artifacts made of stone, bone, metal, and other materials, placing them in bags and marking them to show where they were found.
• Identify culturally specific beliefs and practices affecting health status and access to services for distinct populations and communities, in collaboration with medical and public health officials.
• Consult site reports, existing artifacts, and topographic maps to identify archeological sites.
• Train others in the application of ethnographic research methods to solve problems in organizational effectiveness, communications, technology development, policy making, and program planning.
• Advise government agencies, private organizations, and communities regarding proposed programs, plans, and policies and their potential impacts on cultural institutions, organizations, and communities.
• Create data records for use in describing and analyzing social patterns and processes, using photography, videography, and audio recordings.
• Develop intervention procedures, using techniques such as individual and focus group interviews, consultations, and participant observation of social interaction.
• Develop and test theories concerning the origin and development of past cultures.
• Lead field training sites and train field staff, students, and volunteers in excavation methods.
• Collaborate with economic development planners to decide on the implementation of proposed development policies, plans, and programs based on culturally institutionalized barriers and facilitating circumstances.
• Clean, restore, and preserve artifacts.
• Conduct participatory action research in communities and organizations to assess how work is done and to design work systems, technologies, and environments.
• Organize public exhibits and displays to promote public awareness of diverse and distinctive cultural traditions.
• Formulate general rules that describe and predict the development and behavior of cultures and social institutions.
• Study archival collections of primary historical sources to help explain the origins and development of cultural patterns.
• Apply traditional ecological knowledge and assessments of culturally distinctive land and resource management institutions to assist in the resolution of conflicts over habitat protection and resource enhancement.
• Enhance the cultural sensitivity of elementary and secondary curricula and classroom interactions in collaboration with educators and teachers.
• Participate in forensic activities, such as tooth and bone structure identification, in conjunction with police departments and pathologists.
• Study objects and structures recovered by excavation to identify, date, and authenticate them and to interpret their significance.
• Collect information and make judgments through observation, interviews, and review of documents.
• Research, survey, or assess sites of past societies and cultures in search of answers to specific research questions.
• Write about and present research findings for a variety of specialized and general audiences.

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