Tom Dillehay

Tom Dillehay is an American anthropologist who is the Rebecca Webb Wilson University Distinguished Professor of Anthropology, Religion, and Culture and Professor of Anthropology at Vanderbilt University. In addition to Vanderbilt, Dillehay has taught at the Universidad Austral de Chile and the University of Kentucky. Since 1977, Dillehay has been involved in the excavations at Monte Verde in Chile, where an early human settlement was found in 1975. Dillehay claims that the remains are about 14,500 years old, challenging the Clovis theory of the first human arrival in the Americas. In addition to his archaeological work, Dillehay has conducted ethnographic work among the Mapuche of southern Chile and the Jívaro of northern Peru.