Tag: evolution
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Free Resource: The Skeleton Game
As the lecturer in charge of hominin evolution for our Human Evolution and Diversity Module in 2023, I had my students participate in a weekly challenge. Every week, I would provide a new game, quiz, or activity that they were encouraged to try and win. Every volunteer got candy, but every winner got both candy…
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Free Resource: Primatology Bingo!
A vital part of contextualising the fossil record well, especially in regard to bipedalism (walking on two legs, bi=two + ped=feet) and associated anatomical changes, is illustrating the connection between humans and other extant (contemporary) primates first. If you establish those connections well, then the hunt for bipedal traits in the fossil record is an…
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Free Resource: Teaching Evolution With Sticky-Notes
As a postgraduate teaching assistant at Durham University’s Anthropology Department, part of my job was to plan and deliver plenary sessions for our Human Evolution and Diversity Module. This often meant balancing my own creativity and the class dynamic with academically-backed activities. While researching hands-on options for demonstrating allele frequency within populations, I came across…
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Embodiment (and how to use it)
When was the last time your brain thought about itself? When was the last time you noticed your skeleton inside you? It’s easy to forget that these parts of our bodies are intrinsic parts of ourselves. Our skeletons seem inorganic and passive; our thoughts seem separated from our physical bodies. But if our brains and…
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Linguistic Anthropology – An Overview
A similar subfield to Cultural Anthropology is Linguistic Anthropology. Contrary to popular belief, linguistics is not the study of languages for translation or speaking purposes, rather it is the study of how languages evolve and function within a cultural context. Some subfields of linguistics include: Linguistic Analysis – the technical study of language Sociolinguistics – how language…
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Who were the Neanderthals?
After several weeks of eager anticipation, yesterday was finally the day. Yesterday I received my results for 23andMe, the DNA analysis programme that gives you the lowdown on your ancestry and any genetic health risk factors you may carry. And while my results were pretty much as I suspected, I found out something pretty cool.…
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Biological Anthropology – An Overview
Biological anthropology is one of the four major subfields of anthropology. Very generally, biological anthropology examines the biological development of human beings–meaning that we study everything from human evolution, our evolutionary cousins (other primates), comparative anatomy, osteology (the study of bones), and ecology. Here are just some of the many subfields of biological anthropology: Palaeoanthropology…
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The Evolution Debate
Another subfield of biological anthropology that I’ve worked in is palaeoanthropology. Which, very simply, is the study of human evolution. And one of the most frustrating things I’ve experienced as an anthropologist is not evolution denial, but the very clear inability of people who do believe in evolution to give good answers to the questions put to…
The Brains and Bones Project 