This textbook presents a survey of physical anthropology, the branch of anthropology that studies the physical development of the human species. It plays an important part in the study of human origins and in the analysis and identification of human remains for legal purposes. It draws upon human body measurements, human genetics, and the study of human bones and includes the study of human brain evolution, and of culture as neurological adaptation to environment. The authors use the progressive term "biological anthropology" to mean "an integrative combination of information from the fossil record and the human skeleton, genetics of individuals and of populations, our primate relatives, human adaptation, and human behavior." Read more...
Content: Introduction: What is biological anthropology? --
pt. 1: Mechanisms of evolution. Origins of evolutionary thought --
Genetics : cells and molecules --
Genetics : from genotype to phenotype --
The forces of evolution and the formation of species --
Human variation : evolution, adaptation, and adaptability --
pt. 2: Primates. The primates --
Primate behavior --
pt. 3: Paleontology and primate evolution. Fossils in geological context --
Origin of primates --
Becoming human : the ape-hominin transition --
pt. 4: The human fossil record. Early hominins --
Origin and evolution of the genus Homo --
Archaic Homo sapiens and Neandertals --
The emergence and dispersal of Homo sapiens --
pt. 5: New frontiers in biological anthropology. Evolution of the brain and language --
Biomedical anthropology --
The evolution of human behavior --
Bioarchaeology and forensic anthropology --
Appendix A: Overview of the brain --
Appendix B: Primate and human comparative anatomy --
Appendix C: The Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium --
Appendix D: Metric-imperial conversions.
Abstract: This textbook presents a survey of physical anthropology, the branch of anthropology that studies the physical development of the human species. It plays an important part in the study of human origins and in the analysis and identification of human remains for legal purposes. It draws upon human body measurements, human genetics, and the study of human bones and includes the study of human brain evolution, and of culture as neurological adaptation to environment. The authors use the progressive term "biological anthropology" to mean "an integrative combination of information from the fossil record and the human skeleton, genetics of individuals and of populations, our primate relatives, human adaptation, and human behavior."
