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LETTER TO THE EDITOR
The legacy of Cláudia Sousa: bridging disciplines towards an integrated
anthropology
Kimberly J. Hockings
a,b
*, Margarida Fernandes
a,b
, Francisca Alves Cardoso
a,b
, Amélia
Frazão-Moreira
a,b
a
Departamento de Antropologia, Faculdade de Ciências Sociais e Humanas, Universidade Nova de Lisboa (FCSH/NOVA), Portugal
b
Centro em Rede de Investigação em Antropologia (CRIA), Portugal
*Corresponding author: hock@fcsh.unl.pt
Article received on the 23
rd
of October of 2015 and accepted on the 28
th
of October of 2015
Cláudia Sousa (1975-2014) was a talented
scientist who devoted her life to pioneering
research in Biological Anthropology. Cláudia
was the first Portuguese Primatologist to
examine chimpanzee behaviour and
cognition in both captive and wild
populations, with her research taking her
from the Primate Research Institute of Kyoto
University in Japan to the tropical forests of
Guinea (Bossou Reserve) and Guinea-Bissau
(Cantanhez and Cufada National Parks).
Her students remember her kind nature,
her unwavering support for their career
development, and her tenacious drive and
thirst for scientific knowledge. She was an
inspiration for many of her peers within the
Department of Anthropology at the Faculty
of Social and Human Sciences, New
University of Lisbon (FCSH/NOVA), where she
gained a permanent lectureship position, as
well as the Centre for Research in
Anthropology (CRIA) and the University of
Hockings et al./Cadernos do GEEvH 4(1): 87-90
88
Coimbra, where she obtained her
Undergraduate and Masters’ degrees and
where she taught as a guest lecturer. Cláudia
also inspired students through her
involvement in the Portuguese Primatology
Association (APP), of which she was a
founding member and active associate, and
in the Portuguese Ethology Society (SPE).
Cláudia’s contribution to the field of
Anthropology at a Portuguese and
International level is not restricted to her
own areas of expertise. Always curious and
attentive she knew how to embrace human
aspects of fieldwork in Africa, understanding
that biodiversity conservation requires
working with local people and maintaining
consideration of their perspectives.
In recognition of the inspiration that
Cláudia Sousa gave to everyone around her, a
one-day conference Chimpanzees, Humans
and Nature: The Legacy of Cláudia Sousa
(Chimpazés, Humanos e Natureza: O Legado
de Cláudia Sousa) was held on the 9
th
October 2015 at the National Museum of
Ethnology in Lisbon (Portugal). This
conference not only honoured her memory,
but also highlighted her immense
contribution to Anthropology and
Primatology through bringing together a
group of distinguished academics who
collaborated with Cláudia throughout her
career. Many of her former students and
colleagues also attended the conference, and
alongside Cláudia’s mother and father,
listened to and participated in discussions on
research topics that Cláudia exhibited a
particular passion for, including ape cognition
and behaviour, human-primate interactions,
human evolution and primate conservation.
A large photographic display in the lobby of
the museum provided a visual journey
through Cláudia’s research career, from her
early days working with captive primates in
Japan up to more recent research on primate
conservation in Guinea-Bissau.
The conference commenced with
welcoming speeches from João Costa (Dean
of FCSH), Antónia Pedroso de Lima (President
of CRIA), and Maria Filomena Silvano (Head
of Anthropology, FCSH) who recalled the
huge contribution that Cláudia made to
University life as a well-liked and highly
valued colleague, and through her teaching,
mentoring, and pioneering research. The first
session of the conference “Cognition,
Behaviour and Human Evolution” was
opened by João Leal (FCSH/NOVA and CRIA),
who introduced the first speaker Tetsuro
Matsuzawa from the Primate Research
Institute, Kyoto University, Japan. As
Cláudia’s PhD supervisor, he presented an
overview of Cláudia’s research in both
laboratory and fieldwork settings, from the
use of tokens by captive chimpanzees to
acquire food to the use of tools by wild
chimpanzees to access resources. He used
previously unshared footage to detail
Cláudia’s story allowing us to fully realise the
novelty and diversity of her work. The video
archive can be accessed by following the link:
http://langint.pri.kyoto-u.ac.jp/ai/en/claudia/?1007.
This was followed by a presentation by
Dora Biro (Department of Zoology, University
of Oxford, UK) who interwove wonderful
stories of her and Cláudia’s long-term
friendship with their pioneering research on
how wild chimpanzees at Bossou learn to use
tools for nut-cracking and leaf-folding to
Hockings et al./Cadernos do GEEvH 4(1): 87-90
89
drink water. Following this, a former student
of Cláudia’s, Susana Carvalho (Department of
Anthropology, University of Oxford, UK),
described how Cláudia gave her the
opportunity and support to pursue her
lifelong dream to study wild chimpanzees,
thereby laying the foundations for the new
research field of Primate Archaeology and
cementing Portugal’s position at the
forefront of contemporary Primatology. This
was followed by a presentation on social
intelligence in chimpanzees and the origin of
the human mind by Satoshi Hirata (Wildlife
Research Center, Kyoto University, Japan)
who linked his and Cláudia’s collaborative
experiments that explored questions on
chimpanzee cognition with more recent work
on chimpanzees and bonobos at the
Kumomoto Sanctuary in Japan. Eugénia
Cunha (CENCIFOR, University of Coimbra,
Portugal), who was Cláudia’s master’s
supervisor, close colleague and friend,
followed with a video presentation on
compassion and aggression in human
evolution. To finish off the first session,
António Bracinha Vieira (CFC, University of
Lisbon, Portugal), who met Cláudia during
her master’s degree in Coimbra and was a
member of the panel who selected her to
join FCSH, gave a video presentation about
the origins and evolution of language, an
area that Cláudia always had a special
interest in.
The afternoon session “Conservation and
Human-Primate Interactions” was opened by
Margarida Fernandes (FCSH/NOVA and CRIA),
a close friend and colleague of Cláudia’s at
FCSH, with a few warmly spoken words about
Cláudia. She invited the first speaker
Kimberley Hockings (CRIA and FCSH/NOVA)
to talk about her and Cláudia’s recent work
on human-chimpanzee interactions at
Cantanhez National Park in Guinea-Bissau.
Cláudia’s dedication to understand the
behaviour of these previously unstudied
chimpanzees coupled with her passion to
conserve these endangered apes was
unmistakable, as was the fact that her
research and conservation vision in Guinea-
Bissau will continue through her friends,
colleagues and students. Spartaco Gippolitti
(Safari Ravenna Zoological Park, Italy) who
first completed a primate census in Guinea-
Bissau in 1994 and who spent time with
Cláudia on the first of her many trips to
Guinea-Bissau gave a thought-provoking talk
on the issue of biased conservation efforts,
discussing some of the challenges we have in
conserving wildlife in the 21
st
Century.
Catherine Hill (Department of Social Sciences,
Oxford Brookes University, UK) who co-
established with Cláudia an ERASMUS
programme between the New University of
Lisbon and Oxford Brookes University, as well
as collaborating in research projects, then
discussed the role of primatologists as social
actors and their influence on village life,
politics, and conservation. As someone who
enthusiastically embraced more social
aspects of fieldwork, Cláudia would have
identified with the ethical concerns of
primatological field work discussed during
this talk. Amélia Frazão-Moreira (FCSH/NOVA
and CRIA) gave the last presentation of the
day, laying emphasis on Cláudia’s genuine
ability to conduct cross-disciplinary research
that bridged the social and biological sciences
at the forefront of Anthropology. She guided
us through Cláudia’s impressive record of
Hockings et al./Cadernos do GEEvH 4(1): 87-90
90
past research projects, detailing their varied
and long-term collaborative work in Guinea-
Bissau.
The conference ended with closing
remarks by Tetsuro Matsuzawa and Amélia
Frazão-Moreira, with touching accounts of
Cláudia’s life and achievements, and how she
will be sorely missed but never forgotten.
Those of us who are fortunate enough to
have known Cláudia Sousa and to witness her
enthusiasm for research know that she would
have humbly appreciated this initiative.