I walked into my first biological anthropology class as a sophomore Environmental Sciences major, ready to explore a new field. I had taken a research class the previous semester and fallen in love with non-human primates and their morphology. After a month of the introductory class, I knew human evolution was the topic for me. By the end of semester, I had applied to become an anthropology major and was ready to learn everything about early human evolution. My main research interests center around hominin bipedalism. I am interested in studying bipedal locomotion by exploring functional morphology and biomechanics. I am most interested in the lower limb, but I have not yet determined which area of the limb on which to concentrate. In terms …show more content…
I have taken many relevant classes in multiple subfields of anthropology, including Human Osteology, Introduction to World Archaeology and Medical Anthropology. This variety has provided me a wide array of knowledge that will be applicable to future projects. In terms of biological anthropology classes, I have taken Disease and Society, am currently taking Human Osteology and will be taking Human Variation and Human Paleopathology in the spring. These classes will provide me with a diverse knowledge in my specific field, which can be directly applied to my current and future research projects. In terms of biological sciences, I have also taken a variety of classes, including Human Anatomy and Physiology and Primate Ecology and Evolution; these have allowed me to explore my curiosities in relation to field of biological anthropology. Other classes of relevance include Introduction to Statistics and three levels of Spanish, both of which have provided me with knowledge that can be broadly applied to the field of anthropology as a …show more content…
This work primarily consisted of identification and photography of Late Pleistocene animal bones and microfossils, including those of various mammals, armadillos and turtles. Along with this work, I learned about the environment of the Late Pleistocene and general taxonomy of Late Pleistocene mammals. Overall, I was able to work alongside paleontologists and mammologists in a museum collection setting. While I did learn that museum work is not my calling, I also learned how to work well in a collaborative environment with both peers and people of higher position. This experience in collaborative work will be directly applied to my graduate learning in which collaboration is crucial. I was also able to gain experience with fossils, which will help when working with human fossil
Robbins, R. H. (2014). Cultural anthropology: a problem-based approach (Second Canadian ed.). Itasca: F.E. Peacock.
In my visit to the American Museum of Natural History (AMNH), I observed many interesting things concerning the issue on evolution and natural selection. An example of evolutionism I saw in the AMNH was the Hall of Human Biology and Evolution. This hall concentrated on human evolution and how certain traits arose through successful generation—such as the change in the skeletal system as a result of walking upright. Fossils of Australopithecus afarensis, which is believed to be the earliest human relative, are dated back nearly 4 million years.
Evolution can be defined differently within each sub-field of anthropology. However, biological anthropology is defined as: the sub-field of anthropology that studies humans as a biological species (Park, 2008). With that said, a biological anthropologist would study evolution using things such as: genetics, fossil records, bio-diversity, primatology, or human ecology. In particular (albeit rare) cases, some anthropologists have been known to study monkeys and apes because their genes are more closely related to humans than that of any other species. According to fossil records, it has been shown that there were a bewildering number of hominid species over the last 6-7 million years (Willoughby, 2005). However, Homo sapiens is the sole hominid on the planet, and has been for about the last 25,000 years (Tattersall, 2000). This type of fossil research is beneficial to the study of evolution since it has provided tangible evidence that evolution has happened, is currently...
Many students decide to become a forensic anthropologist after watching highly glamorized television shows that depict these scientists as intuitive crime solvers. The field of forensic anthropology is heavily involved in the criminal justice system, but biological anthropology is equally important.
Name: Patrick Wrenn Take home Exam Anthropology 104: Biological Anthropology. Answer all of the questions to the fullest. 1. What is the difference between a. and What are the three types of speciation?
Anthropology proves to be satisfying and intellectually fulfilling to many in the field. However, there are also many challenges and bumps in the road along the way. Napolean A. Chagnon and Claire Sterk faced many of these challenges themselves.
Today’s culture has many problems, but none more apparent and in our face, then racial divide, social injustice and misinterpretation of public events. Not a day goes by that I turn on the news and do not see some of kind of race related events. It stands at the front of the current debacle we call an election and is a conversation in many homes to inform our kids on one side or another. It has been attempted in many other movies to portray people’s true feelings and emotions but none as effective and valid as Spike Lee’s “Get on the Bus” film released in 1996. Get on the Bus is about fifteen African Americans that set forth on a journey from California to Washington D.C. to participate in the Million Man March.
It had also given me more interest to how they looked at the bones and what
Physical anthropology delineated from the nineteenth-century naturalists and natural historians. The naturalists, although rooted in religious beliefs and explanations of the world, were the pioneers of evolutionary science because they began to look for explanations that were not found in religious texts. They explored the natural world. In today’s world, physical anthropologists focus on human variation in order to determine what factors into the physical and genetic variation of humans. Because the human anatomy is a large part of our biological makeup, some physical anthropologists specialize in just studying the human anatomy and physical anthropology is a good basis for other career choices s...
Susan Lindee and Ricardo Santos’ goal was to understand the contexts of genesis and development of biological anthropology around the world from an international standpoint, focusing on engagement with living human populations. Their contributors, scholars in history of science, science studies, and anthropology, were guided by key questions about national histories, collections, and scientific field practice.
Perhaps the most ubiquitous subset in anthropology is the socio-cultural subfield of sociocultural anthropology. This branch analyzes social patterns and customs across cultures. Focusing in particular on how people from different cultures live and their respective societal organization. Sociocultural anthropologists observe societies as a whole entity but break it down into smaller subsections including nationality, race, sexuality, gender and class then look at how these sections work in conjunction to create the entire society. These are the anthropologists which come to my mind when I conjure up a mental image of anthropology, the researcher who “goes-native” immersing themself into a society to gain firsthand knowledge of a distant culture. They learn how a society handles their everyday problems and what is of importance. Some of the areas which this branch of anthropology is concerned with are health, education, agriculture and work.
There is a lot of conflict to the question “is anthropology a science?” A lot of this conflict leads from defining what a science is, in the dictionary science is, “a branch of knowledge or study dealing with a body of facts or truths systematically arranged and showing the operation of general laws.” (Dictionary.com, 2011) Anything that can be studied is considered a science. Without science anthropology would be nearly impossible to study, science makes everything quantifiable. Anthropology should continue along its current path of being a science. Anthropology is quantifiable; by using science you can determine information much more precisely. Anthropology is absolutely 100 percent a science in every way shape and form, and should also be considered one.
Cultural anthropology examines different cultures and studies them in their native environments by observing or becoming part of each group to understand each culture from within. According to Crapo (2013), “Cultural Anthropology is the study of the similarity and diversity of human ways of life (cultures) and of the regularities in how culture functions” (sec. 1.1). When observing each culture neutrally from the outside in, is called an etic point of view and when experiencing the culture from within is referred to as an emic perspective. Emic narratives can be subjective and are explained by the culture experiencing it. In this paper, I will examine gender and the discrimination of women in my own culture from an outside or etic perspective,
When I first came into this class, introduction to indigenous studies, I was uncertain of what to expect but really interested. Part taking in my major towards history and noticed this class I immediately pounced on it as I was quite interested and very pleased. I have been paying attention to many circumstances going on with the indigenous people, their land and culture over the past few years. As even into the first day of class it opened my eyes to a whole new way of life, situations and much much more that indigenous people have went through and are still going through taking my perception much more in-depth, and I cant belief how astonished I am already only six weeks into the course.
Anthropology encompasses four main aspects in the field: archaeology, linguistics, physical anthropology, and cultural anthropology. All four areas must collect data and find a way to interpret the data collected. Data is then interpreted with the use of theories. The data would be useless to any anthropologist without any meaning. Theory helps an anthropologist choose what data to collect and how to interpret the results. Authors McGee and Warms assert that theory “helps us think about who and what we are as human beings,” (2). Basic understanding of different anthropological theories enlightens anthropologist about different cultures by attempting to understand and learn from each other. Overtime some theories have been disregarded due to