Forensic Anthropology: Humanitarian and Human Rights Investigations

This set covers the definitions and core concepts of forensic anthropology applied to humanitarian and human rights contexts, including organizational roles and population types.

Forensic Anthropological Applications

The use of anthropology to identify unknown remains, return them to families for mortuary treatment, and establish marked burial locations.

Humanitarian Investigations

Investigations limited in scope to mass disasters, violent conflict, or migration deaths, emphasizing assistance to the living and alleviation of suffering without judicial prosecution.

Human Rights Investigations

Investigations focused on protecting communities by identifying legal violations, aiding in trauma analyses, and holding perpetrators accountable through judicial processes.

Structural Violence

A form of violence (such as gender or racial violence) toward a specific group of people that is considered culturally acceptable or justified.

Clyde Snow

A forensic anthropologist who traveled to Argentina to assist with initiatives regarding violent internal conflicts in the $1970s$.

EAAF

The Argentine Forensic Anthropology Team, founded in $1984$.

Mass Graves

Burial sites containing commingled remains, often in poor preservation states (fragmented or burned), sometimes including hundreds of individuals.

Mass disaster/Mass fatality incident

An event involving the deaths of more individuals than can be handled using local resources.

DMORT

A response team within the National Disaster Medical System (NDMS) and the US Department of Health and Human Services responsible for victim identification and mortuary services.

Interpol

The International Criminal Police Organization, the world's largest international police organization, consisting of $190$ member countries.

Closed Population

A scenario where a specific, limited number of victims are known to be involved, such as in an airplane or train accident.

Open Population

A scenario where the number of victims is initially unknown, such as after a natural disaster.

Trauma analyses

In the context of human rights investigations, this provides information on circumstances of death to serve as evidence in the prosecution of crimes.