Prehistoric Cultures -- University of Minnesota Duluth

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Table of Contents

1. Introduction to Anthropology

HEREDITY AND EVOLUTION

2. The Development of Evolutionary Theory

3. Heredity and Evolution

4. Human Variation and Adaptation

5. Macroevolution: Processes of Vertebrate and Mammalian Evolution

PRIMATES

6. An Overview of the Primates

7. Primate Behavior

PALEOANTHROPOLOGY/FOSSIL HOMININS

8. Understanding the Past: Archaeological and Paleoanthropological Methods

9. Hominin Origins

10. The First Dispersal of the Genus Homo: Homo erectus and Contemporaries

11. Premodern Humans

12. The Origin and Dispersal of Modern Humans

ARCHAEOLOGY

13. Early Holocene Hunters and Gatherers

14. Food Production

15. The First Civilizations

Appendix A: Atlas of Primate Skeletal Anatomy

Appendix B: Summary of Early Hominin Fossil Finds from Africa

Appendix C: Population Genetics

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New to this Edition
(from publisher)

For this new edition, the authors have improved and updated the book's content, tightened up its coverage of key topics, and made it shorter in the process. A significant change includes the combination of former Chapters 15 and 16 into one Chapter 15, "The First Civilizations," which creates a more balanced treatment of this important cultural development.
To ensure that students receive a clear understanding of the development of the earliest human technology and the combined effects of biocultural processes on human evolution, the authors expanded the sections dealing with the archaeology of fossil hominins in Chapters 9 through 12.
This edition addresses many of the crucial new discoveries relating to the fossil hominins themselves, including a 3-million-year-old infant skeleton from Ethiopia, as covered in Chapter 9, and Chapter 10's discussion of new evidence regarding the body size of some of the earliest hominins to leave Africa (discovered in the Republic of Georgia) as well as discoveries of 1.2-million-year-old fossils from northern Spain that are the earliest western European hominins yet found.
Chapters 11 and 12 address some of the astounding breakthroughs in studies of ancient DNA, derived from miniscule fragments preserved in partially fossilized hominin bones dating as far back as 50,000 years ago.
Additional changes to the text include redrawn maps and a substantially expanded and updated photo and artwork program, which make the book more visually appealing and provide a better sense of what physical anthropologists and archaeologists do, and why they enjoy doing it. The focus questions, "At a Glance" boxes, and other learning aids in every chapter have also been updated, in order to help students master more easily the sometimes complex material.

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© 1998 - 2010 Timothy G. Roufs
Page URL: http:// www.d.umn.edu /cla/faculty/troufs/anth1602/pctext.html
Last Modified 06 September 2009
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