Mar 28, 2024  
Catalogue 2018-2019 
    
Catalogue 2018-2019 [ARCHIVED CATALOG]

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ANTH 232 - Topics in Biological Anthropology

Semester Offered: Spring
1 unit(s)


This course covers topics within the broad field of biological (or physical) anthropology ranging from evolutionary theory to the human fossil record to the identification of human skeletal remains from crime scenes and accidents. Bioanthropology conceptualizes cultural behavior as an integral part of our behavior as a species. Topics covered in this course may include human evolution, primate behavior, population genetics, human demography and variation, or forensic anthropology.

May be repeated for credit if the topic has changed.

Topic for 2018/19b:  Race and Human Variation.  This course examines the nature of human variation, in the contexts of genetics, anatomy, history, and society. The course begins by surveying biological variation, both adaptive and selectively neutral, in humans. We then focus on what the term ‘race’ means biologically, and why this concept does not describe human variation. Moving from biology and genetics, we examine psychological and historical origins of racialist thinking in the United States. This historical overview segues into an analysis how racial categories are used in biomedical research today. Through the framework of the developmental origins of health and disease, we review the biological mechanisms whereby social inequality results in health disparity. Over the course of the semester, students learn about why humans vary, what this variation does and does not tell us about people, and the ways in which the social reality of race becomes manifest in biology. Zachary Cofran.

 

Two 75-minute periods.



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