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 A105 Human Origins and Prehistory
A105 Lecture 1 Spring 2002

Brief Outline:
I. Introduction to Course (syllabus, etc.)
II. What is Anthropology? The Four-Field Approach
III. Questions we'll explore this semester
IV. Major topics and concepts
V. Why study human origins? Creation stories and the scientific method
 

  • Anthropology -- The Study of Humans
          -- Four main subfields: Sociocultural, Linguistics, Biological or Physical, 
             and Archaeology. 
          -- Palaeoanthropology (study of human origins) comes from both 
              Biological Anthropology and Archaeology. 
  • Sociocultural Anthropology
          -- The study of cultures, done through ethnography. 
          -- Began in the 1800s. 
           --  Can give us analogies to use for behaviors of ancestors.
  • Linguistics
         -- Aimed at reconstructing language histories and relationships.
  • Biological/Physical Anthropology
         -- Studies the physical characteristics of living and fossil (or skeletal) humans. 
         -- Also includes primatology, paleopathology, genetic anthropology. 
 
  • Archaeology
        -- Studies the physical remains of past human behavior, from the earliest stone tools to the ruins of civilizations like Egypt and Rome. 
        -- Attempts to reconstruct the processes that created sites, explain past cultures and past behavior.
  • Questions we’ll explore
             -- How does evolution work? 
             -- What are primates, how did they evolve, and what can we learn 
                 from them? 
             -- How did our uniquely human traits evolve -- bipedalism, big brains, 
                 sophisticated technology, intelligence, language, worldwide 
                 distribution? 
  • The Big Concepts: Adaptation, Analogy, Variation, Culture (if you missed this, check with classmates or in glossary of text).
  • The Smaller Concepts: Technology, Classification, Species
  • The Big Subject Areas: Technology, Bipedalism, Primate, Hominid
  • Why study human origins?

    •               -- Curiosity 
                  -- Interest in why humans are the way they are. 
                  -- Desire to learn about our common past.
    • People have always tried to find explanations for why humans are like they are.
             -- Creation myths or stories 
             -- We looked at the Yanomamo, Maya, and Genesis creation stories. 
             -- We also discussed creation science or scientific creationism. 
                   -- Scientific creationism tries to find support from science for the Biblical creation story.  But, is it science? 
                   -- Scientists say it is not; it does not meet the criteria for scientific investigation. (See Scientific Method in your text.)
             -- However, science and religion do not necessarily have to be in conflict.
    • Science and religion
                 -- They need not be in conflict. Science and religion are two different ways of looking at the world. 
                 -- Darwin, Wallace, Leakey all held deep religious beliefs. 
                 -- Catholic Church accepts evolution.