Integrative Paleoanthropology I

Catalog description

This course provides a detailed overview of the early stages of human evolution from the Miocene to the early Pleistocene, focusing on the fossil and archaeological record of the earliest hominins up to and including early Homo in East and South Africa. It emphasizes the anatomical, phylogenetic, and behavioral traits of Plio-Pleistocene hominins in Africa. Special topics include: a critical review of recently described fossils purported to be early hominins from the late Miocene of Africa; an introduction to phylogenetic methods, geochronology, and the evidence used to reconstruct global climate change; comparative morphology and tool-using behavior of extant hominoids; the earliest tool industries; models of early hominin dietary behavior; functional morphology and locomotor behavior; and debates surrounding early hominin biogeography, taxonomy and phylogenetic relationships. Students will supplement their reading of the primary literature with the study of comparative skeletal materials and casts of early hominins in the laboratory.