Sensory Enculturation and Neuroanthropology: The Case of Human Echolocation Page 1 of 29 PRINTED FROM OXFORD HANDBOOKS ONLINE (www.oxfordhandbooks.com). (c) Oxford University Press, 2015. All Rights Reserved. Under the terms of the licence agreement, an individual user may print out a PDF of a single chapter of a title in Oxford Handbooks Online for personal use (for details see Privacy Policy). Subscriber: Macquarie University; date: 11 May 2017 Abstract and Keywords Neuroanthropology seeks to bring the broadest possible account of cultural variation into our understanding of the human brain’s potential, expanding the methods we use to trace the envelope of human neurodiversity and the trajectories of neurological development to include robust qualitative and ethnographic methods in natural settings. My research has focused on athletes and other highly trained individuals who demonstrate both the range of activity-induced neuroplasticity and the characteristics of regimes under which this plasticity can be deployed in systematic ways. They also demonstrate how cultural expectations, daily activities, and aversions to activity can inculcate or exacerbate disability. Neuroimaging data may not always be available, especially given the whole- body nature of these activities in ecologically valid settings and the circumstances of anthropological field study. Nevertheless, neuroanthropology argues that neurologically plausible accounts of the abilities that our subjects demonstrate and the experiences that they report are both possible and theoretically productive. Keywords: Neuroanthropology, neurodiversity, ethnography, development, neuroplasticity Sensory Enculturation and Neuroanthropology: The Case of Human Echolocation Greg Downey The Oxford Handbook of Cultural Neuroscience Edited by Joan Y. Chiao, Shu-Chen Li, Rebecca Seligman, and Robert Turner Print Publication Date: Dec 2015 Subject: Psychology, Cognitive Neuroscience, Neuropsychology, Social Psychology Online Publication Date: Apr 2016 DOI: 10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199357376.013.23 Oxford Handbooks Online