Melvin Konner

Melvin J. Konner, M.D, Ph.D is Samuel Candler Dobbs Professor of Anthropology, Neuroscience, and Behavioral Biology at Emory University . He studied at Brooklyn College , CUNY (1996), earned his doctorate in biological anthropology (Harvard University, 1973), and did postdoctoral work at the Laboratory of Neuroendocrine Regulation at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He spent two years doing fieldwork among the Kalahari San or Bushmen, studying infant development and the hormonal mechanism of lactational infertility. After six years on the Harvard faculty, he attended Harvard Medical School (1985) and moved to Emory as department chair. He has held NIMH and NSF research grants, and has been a fellow of the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences, the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation, and the Social Science Research Council, and the Foundations Fund for Research in Psychiatry. Lately he has spent time advocating single-payer health reform, and has testified twice at U.S. Senate hearings.

Selected Bibliography

Konner, Melvin. The Tangled Wing: Biological Constraints on the Human Spirit. Owl Books: 2003.

Konner, Melvin J. Medicine at the Crossroads: The Crisis in Healthcare. Pantheon Books: 1993.

Konner, Melvin J. and C. Worthman. Nursing Frequency, Gonadal Function and Birth Spacing Amount / Kung Hunter-Gathers. Science: 1980.