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This month's focus: A Note From the Chair Fish Vendors vs. the State Origins, Southern Style Women's Gym to be Restored Dean's Musings Around the College Bookbeat Grants CLASnotes CLASnotes |
Anthropologist on the Move
Boinski has been researching the social behavior and ecology of wild monkeys in the tropics of the western hemisphere for twenty years. As one of the world's foremost scholars on squirrel monkeys and capuchins, she tries to decipher what these animals talk about. "What they are saying to each other is much less pure emotion than lumps of information like 'Predators are here; I want to move the troop this way,' or 'Mama, where are you?'" Boinski says.
Boinski has studied primates in Costa Rica, Peru, Argentina, and Brazil. Since 1995, she has been working in Suriname (South America). "It's an amazing place, one of the top research sites for primates in the neo-tropics," Boinski says. "Eighty-five percent of the country is undisturbed rain forest." Suriname's internal strife effectively closed the wilderness to scientists from 1980 to the early 90s, but when the country re-opened, Boinski was among the very first researchers to begin fieldwork there. "At about the time Suriname was opening up, my husband and I were entertaining guests, including a scientist from that country," Boinski says. "When I showed her pictures of the squirrel monkeys I studied, she said, 'Oh, we have those in our backyard.' Of course, that got my attention."
Studying monkeys in the wild has provided Boinski with plenty of adventure. While writing her dissertation in Costa Rica, she worked on the Corcovado Pennisula, which is famous for its strong ocean currents and high density of sharks. "Sharks were always at the river mouth near our camp, especially to feed at high tide," Boinski says. "If I went into the water to clean my tennis shoes, they would swim toward me." Boinski has also had frequent brushes with wild cats. "When we are new to an area, I try to effectively mark out our territory, and sometimes the cats follow behind and scratch over those areas," she says. Once, however, before Boinski could make her presence known at a new Suriname camp, she crossed paths with a puma as it chased a red brocket deer. "The legs on both animals were moving so fast that I couldn't even see them," she says. Despite a few close calls, Boinski remains low-key about the danger inherent in her fieldwork. "I'm sure I'm going to die an old lady in my bed. But, of course, we did apply for life insurance last year, and my husband was approved, but I wasn't!" --John Elderkin
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Sue Boinski has faced wild pumas, camped beside shark-infested waters, and contracted parasites never before found in humans. But the CLAS anthropologist, who studies squirrel monkeys and capuchins, says she is not taking inordinate risks in her work. "My field research is actually far less dangerous than a night in a typical American city," she explains. "But I'll admit--there are times in the grocery aisle at Publix that I want to shout 'I'm really a Jungle Woman!'"
Whether or not such communication constitutes formal language remains an unresolved issue. In her new book, On the Move: How and Why Animals Travel in Groups (University of Chicago Press, 2000), which she co-edited with Paul Garber of the University of Illinois, Boinski explores how social interactions and environmental factors contribute to group travel preferences. One important indication that the squirrel monkeys are employing sophisticated language is their use of deception while making travel decisions. "Primates sometimes demonstrate Machiavellian social maneuvers. They can be sneaky--monkeys will give each other false information. This implies that they are aware of what others are thinking. It's a critical threshold," Boinski says. "Our book argues that they really do seem to be tricky and complex in the social processes that determine how a group moves."
In 1996, she received a University of Florida Division of Sponsored Research Award that allowed her to lead a group of field assistants into the Suriname forest. Boinski has found that the species of squirrel monkey there is markedly different than species found elsewhere in South and Central America. In Costa Rica, for example, squirrel monkeys are very egalitarian and males and females co-exist peaceably. In Peru, females control the troop. Squirrel monkeys in Suriname, however, are dominated by aggressive males. The reasons for these variations, and the role group communication plays in them, remain unclear. Boinski hopes to join new UF anthropology faculty member Michael Heckenberger next summer in a study of a fourth species of squirrel monkey in the Brazilian Amazon.
Boinski says she does not spend as much time in the field as she would like. Her husband, Gary Steck, an entomologist and curator at the state of Florida's Department of Plant Industry, also travels frequently, and they must balance their fieldwork with time at home with their children, Victor and Rosie. "Sometimes I feel like I spend ten hours in front of the computer for every hour I'm out in the forest," Boinski says. "But I'm very lucky. I grew up in the north woods of Wisconsin. I loved playing in the woods, and reading and writing. And that's still what I do now."
Boinski scrambled a few feet up a tree as the deer escaped into the bush. Then she heard a loud roar as the puma charged toward her. "Every neuron in my body was plugged in. The puma came to a point about three meters away from me and leapt up to my face," Boinski recalls. "I saw its jaw drop open, but then it turned around in mid-air and passed away from me." Although she was frightened, she also admits that the experience was unexpectedly exhilarating. "Actually, I've never felt so alive," she says. "I was absolutely certain I wasn't going to die."