F. Allan Hanson was born May 17, 1939, in Dixon, Illinois, and earned his bachelor's degree from Princeton University in 1961. His Masters (earned in 1963) and PhD (1966), both in Anthropology, were from the University of Chicago. He did post-doctoral work at Oxford University in 1970 and the University of Pittsburgh, 1972-1973. He married Louise Pekrol on June 16, 1963, and they had three children.

Hanson began his career at the University of Kansas in 1966, rising to Associate Professor in 1970 and Professor in 1976. He first specialized his research on the island of Rapa, a distant neighbor of Tahiti, but expanded his interests to include the rest of Polynesia; the Maoris of New Zealand; and, later, technology, culture, and testing in the United States. Among his 8 published books are Rapan Lifeways (1970), Counterpoint in Maori Culture (1983), and Testing Testing (1992).

In 2001 Hanson won the Balfour Jeffrey Award and the Higuchi/Endowment Research Achievement Award. Among his many other professional honors, he used a Fulbright Fellowship in 1980 to serve as a Visiting Professor in Denmark.

Hanson retired from the University of Kansas with the rank of Professor Emeritas in 2016.