Anthropological Musings and Concepts

Mosquitos vs. Homo sapiens

8/13/2017

I know I have titled this blog as them versus us, but, is it really? The mosquito is classified as the world's deadliest animal, but it is really? Even when they are not “out to kill,” is the itchiness that comes from a mosquito “bite” actually their fault? In the following blog I will address these questions, delve into the origins of the diseases they carry, specifically West Nile virus, dengue fever, yellow fever, and of course, malaria, and why it is our fault they pose such a threat to us. Now mosquitos are first in the “deadliest animal” category (humans themselves come in second), but, and I feel a bit silly saying this, it really is not their fault. The mosquitos that bite are all female; they need the blood to help their offspring. I know what you may be thinking “why should we want more?!,” but think of it from the mosquitos point of view, they are just trying to survive and procreate like every other living being out there. And, it really is not their fault they carry so many deadly diseases.
First I would like to start off with the disease that has claimed the least amount of lives, the West Nile virus. This virus was originally discovered in 1937 in the West Nile District of Uganda, and it was not til 1999 that it was reported in the United States, New York to be exact. Not to startle anyone, but you may have had it if you live in Africa, Eastern Europe, West Asia, the Middle East, or the United States. What I mean by this is the signs of this virus is very close to those of the flu; fever, headache, body aches, but one thing that sometimes happens with the West Nile virus is the appearance of skin rashes and swollen glands. Serious cases of West Nile virus are 1 in 150. Those serious cases, if not handled, can result in death. In the United States alone, out of over 20,000 who had infection of the brain or spinal cord, more than 1,900 have died according to the CDC. Unlike the other diseases I will discuss, this one originated in birds.
Next up we have dengue fever. Mosquitoes infect widespread areas of Africa, Central and South America, the Caribbean, the Eastern Mediterranean, South and Southeast Asia, and Oceania. This is found throughout the world, but it is more prevalent in these specific areas because it mainly occurs in tropical and subtropical areas. This information of common areas is curious because the “first recognized Dengue epidemics occurred almost simultaneously in Asia, Africa, and North America in the 1780s, shortly after the identification and naming of the disease in 1779.” Even though the first recognized epidemics happened in the late 1700's, the first record of a probable case was in a Chinese medical encyclopedia from the Jin Dynasty, which was from 265 to 420 CE. Some of the symptoms are similar to West Nile, but to add to them we have nausea, vomiting, mild bleeding (nose bleed, bleeding gums) and pain behind the eyes. Now, the origin of dengue fever comes from our extended family, it comes from monkeys. It took one mosquito to take the blood of an infected monkey, and that was it. “Each year, an estimated 390 million dengue infections occur around the world. Of these, 500,000 develop into dengue haemorrhagic fever, a more severe form of the disease, and dengue results in up to 25,000 deaths annually worldwide.”
   We now have yellow fever. This disease affects less of the world, being only found in, like dengue fever, in tropical and subtropical areas; but unlike the many places dengue can be found it, yellow fever is found in South America and Africa. Yellow fever may not have a hold on the world, but it does have a hold on our history. What I mean by this is scientists believe yellow fever has been in our lives in Africa since around 3,000 years ago. It was isolated just to Africa for a good 1,400 years, until it was imported to the west during the beginning of slavery. Symptoms of yellow fever have all the symptoms of both West Nile and dengue, but, again, there are more to yellow fever; these add on chills, loss of appetite, and yellowing skin. Unlike West Nile, but just like dengue the origin comes from nonhuman primates. As for the death rate, the World Health Organization estimates “200,000 cases of disease and 30,000 deaths a year occur; the number of officially reported cases is far lower.” It does not seem as that much more than with dengue, but that is 5,000 more lives lost because, once again, the monkey did it.
     Lastly we have the biggest bringer of death, malaria. If you were impressed with how long yellow fever has been around, you are going to be flabbergasted by how long malaria has been in the world. This disease predates humans, or mammals. As of 130 million years ago, malaria has been around, but what I mean is the parasites that cause malaria because there are four types that evolved just for humans. These are “P. vivax, P. malariae, P. ovale and P. falciparum; the first three likely either co-evolved with humans or at least first became associated with infecting humans very soon after anatomically modern humans evolved.” To give you an idea how much of a role malaria has played in human history, it is said it helped in the fall of the Roman empire. Now a days malaria is not commonly found in Europe, but “About half of the world's population is at risk. Large areas of Africa and South Asia and parts of Central and South America, the Caribbean, Southeast Asia, the Middle East, and Oceania are considered areas where malaria transmission occurs.” But seeing how the humans living in Africa have been there for most of human history they have a diesease named "sickle-cell anemia (I mentioned it in this blog:
http://anthropologicalconcepts.weebly.com/blog/genetic-drift) which helps few in the population in the resistance to malaria. Now, malaria has all the symptoms I have previously mentioned in the diseases I have spoken of, but to add to those, malaria has profuse sweating, diarrhea, anemia, convulsions, bloody stools, and to top it all off, coma. Unlike the two previous diseases that originated in unnamed monkey species, malaria originated in African gorillas and chimpanzees, which makes sense if it were to co-evolve with us, because both gorillas and chimpanzees are very close to humans in genetic make up. Now I know I said earlier that the people of Africa have a safe because of sickle-cell, but not all have it. Which is why “Malaria kills one child every 30 seconds, about 3000 children every day. Over one million people die from malaria each year, mostly children under five years of age, with 90 per cent of malaria cases occurring in Sub-Saharan Africa.” Compared to the fatalities of the previously mentioned diseases, they have nothing on malaria.
  So, why humans? Why are we stuck with the most fatalities? I am sure if one million gorillas or chimpanzees or even 25,000 annually got infected there would be no more. The answer is our brains and what we did with them. What I mean by this is we went from being nomads, to settling down, to farm, to build what we now see as “civilization.” With a good amount of humans in one place, it must have felt like a buffet for the mosquitos. Everything we have to deal with mosquitos is really our fault....or our bodies fault. What I mean by our bodies is the only reason we itch after a mosquito has bitten us is because our body's immune system reacts to the saliva the mosquito is putting into out bodies (their saliva has protein that keeps the blood from clotting). What our body does is it sends out histamine to get rid of the saliva and the histamine is where the bump comes from; and because the skin in that area is not used to being in bump form the nerves are disturbed, thus the itching. And if you have noticed when you scratch the bump gets itchier and bigger it is your nerves response to your action. So, blame our brains and our bodies for the disturbances mosquitos cause us.
     I know I did not mention the Zika virus, but the reason I did not is it is relatively new, as in the known existence and fear of it is relatively new (because it has been around since 1947). As mentioned before, it really is not the mosquitos fault, it is all the humanness of humans that are to blame. I think if our evolutionary ancestors, like Homo erectus or Homo habilis, would have had big communities as we have now, there would be no us As in malaria would have been our downfall before there was a chance to become Homo sapiens.
     Please feel free to comment on what you thought of the blog, or other physical anthropological subjects you would like me to cover.

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The Evolution of Food

10/30/2016

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Not so much the food's evolution, but how as we evolved so did our teeth. In an earlier blog I discussed how different teeth can influence what a specific species eats (http://anthropologicalconcepts.weebly.com/blog/-diet-and-teeth). The following blog is about what our evolutionary ancestors ate, and what types of teeth they would have to have to eat those foods.
Just like in my earlier blog about the means of the names of our evolutionary ancestors (http://anthropologicalconcepts.weebly.com/blog/meanings-and-origins-of-evolutionary-ancestors-names), I will start with Ardipithecus ramidus. This species foods are interesting because they were most likely omnivoures. That means that their diets consisted of plants, meat, and fruit, but did not eat hard foods, such as nuts. How we know this is because of their enamel (the visible part of the tooth, covering the crown). The enamel of Ar. ramidus was not thick or thin; if it was thick that would imply they could eat tough foods. It is theorized they “probably also avoided tough foods, as they did not have the heavy chewing specializations of later Australopithecus species.”
     That brings us to the next of our evolutionary ancestors, Australopithecus afarensis. These, unlike Ar. ramidus would eat hard foods, but soft ones as well. They had a diet of leaves, fruit, seeds, roots, nuts, and insects. This is the reason I said the foods of Ar. ramidus was “interesting,” because we do not see a meat eating (even though insects are seen as meat) evolutionary ancestor til we begin to speak of the family of Homo. Now unlike Ar. Ramidus, the way we know what Au. Afarensis ate is because of dental microwear (scratches and pits that can result from chewing) and the tooth size and shape. At the end of the previous paragraph I stated that the Australopithecus species had the ability to chew on hard foods. We know this because of their jaws; they were more robust and could take the chewing of hard foods.
In the 1940s and 1950s, the next evolutionary ancestor was thought to have eaten meat because the bones of Australopithecus africanus would be found next to broken animal bones. It was assumed these broken bones were used as weapons. But in the 1970s and 1980s other scientists recognized there were other predators alive at the same time Au. africanus was, so the bones they found of them were the remains of a meal. The actual meals of Au. africanus could not be further than meat. “...diet similar to modern chimpanzees, which consisted of fruit, plants, nuts, seeds, roots, insects, and eggs (although modern chimpanzees eat other apes, that is the difference in their eating habits).”
     Now we will dive into the world of the meat eating Homo's. First we have Homo habilis. Seeing how the meaning of the name of this species is they could make tools, they did eat meat. But meat was not the only part of their diet. Because their dental microwear and because of their thick strong jaws (even though they had smaller teeth that those of the Australopithecus), they had a “broad range of foods.” These included leaves, woody plants, meat, and (bone) marrow eating. Notice how when I said “they could make tools,” I did not say “weapons.” Reason for this is because early Homo scavenged for meat, but for H. habilis to get to the bone marrow they had to have had some sort of tool to crack the bone open.
     Next we have Homo ergaster. Not much is known about this Homo's diet, but we knew they definitely ate meat. How we know this is because of their skeletal make up. They had a “narrower pelvis and rib cage,” and this suggests they had a smaller gut that Australopithecus afarensis. That said, they had a bigger brain, which means they needed more nourishing foods, so this suggests they would have had more meat in their diets.
     The Homo I will address next is the first to cook their food, mostly because they were the first to have discovered fire. This is Homo erectus. This was not only the first Homo to cook their food, but to hunt for it as well. They discovered fire just in time because they had relatively small teeth and jaws which were not suited for eating raw meat. Not only did H. erectus eat meat, but they got their fill of veggies; mostly leaves and crunchy foods (root vegetables, like carrots, celery, potatoes, or radishes). Their tools give insight on what kinds of foods they would eat. For example their hammers (big rounded and/or pointed stones) were most likely used for nuts and seeds.
     Homo erectus may have been the first hunter, but Homo heidelbergensis was an even more skilled hunter. I say this because they hunted large animals, from rhinos, bears (they were not skilled enough to hunt mammoths because the Neanderthals were the first to hunt those). H. heidelbergensis would then use the hides of their kills for the colder temperatures. Even though they did eat other foods, such as grasses, fruits, and nuts, a good 70% of their diet was meat.
     Last we have Homo sapiens. Not much is known about the foods of this Homo. Some eat meat, vegetables, and fruits, while others eat only vegetables and fruits. This is a very confusing species. Of course, I am speaking of our current species. It is interesting (but saddening) how some have an abundance of food in which they can not decide what to eat, while others have none.
   Please feel free to comment on what you thought of the blog, or other physical anthropological subjects you would like me to cover.

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Blood

10/9/2016

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I am sure you are questioning the image above seeing how todays blog is titled “Blood,” but it has a purpose. All I ask is that you keep this image in mind and try to figure out just how much it is and how it pertains to this blog. Now we are all acquainted with blood, it is the red liquid that keeps us alive. That said, how much does the average person really know about blood other than what I have already stated. In the following blog I will discuss what makes up blood along with other facts; what facts? Well, you will have to read the following to find out.
     Before we get into what exactly is blood, I want to speak of just how much blood are we made of. The average amount of blood in a human is about one and a half gallons, which makes up approximately 7 percent of a person with the weight of 150 – 180 (although it slightly less in women because of the blood loss in their menstrual cycles). What is most interesting about this blood is that once children reach the ages of 5 or 6 they have the same amount of blood as adults; “But because children are smaller and their bones, muscles and organs don't weigh as much, their blood makes up a larger percentage of their body weight than it does in adults.”
     Now that we have that out of the way, what is blood, as in what makes it up. Like the skull that is made up of many different bones, our blood is made up of different components. The ones that most people know of are the red and white blood cells it carries. The white blood cells are very important to everyone because these protect us from infectious diseases and foreign invaders. When we are sick, one of the reasons you feel so tired is because your white blood cells are busy fighting off what is making you sick. The red blood cells on the other hand need some “foreign” substance. This substance is oxygen. They carry this oxygen from the lungs to the rest of the body and takes the carbon dioxide from the body back to the lungs so it can be exhaled (and it is a little sad because the average red blood cell can only survive for 120 days).
     As I said, many people know of the white and red blood cells, but along with them are two very important components. The first of which is plasma. Unlike the cells that are in the blood, we are able to see this with our naked eye. The plasma of the blood is a light yellow liquid that “transport nutrients, hormones, and proteins to the parts of the body that need it.” And it helps out the white blood cells because plasma contains antibodies. The last component blood has is vital when we get cut or have our skin broken, this component is known as platelets. These, unlike plasma, are tiny blood cells, smaller than both red and white blood cells (of which white are the biggest, red is bigger than platelets by a small margin). Platelets are the ones that spring into action to form clots to stop bleeding. “If one of your blood vessels gets damaged, it sends out signals that are picked up by platelets. The platelets then rush to the site of damage and form a plug, or clot, to repair the damage.”
     There are those people who are diagnosed with hemophilia whose ability to clot is severely reduced. This brings me back to the image at the start of this blog. I am sure you thought I forgot all about it, but I wanted to save it for the end. The amount in the pitcher is half a gallon (2 liters) which is all you need to lose to die. The average human body has 1.2 to 1.5 gallons (4.7 to 5.5 liters) of blood. The image below is a pack of donated blood which is 1 pint or half a liter. Even after donating blood, you will not be able to donate again for about four to six weeks for your blood to recover. This is why you are given water (plasma is 92% water, which also makes sense that you would die from dehydration first than starvation) and food after donating. The amount you would have to lose to die is 4 times the amount in the image below...or just the amount of the image at the start of this blog.

So with all that in mind, the blood network sounds like a well oiled machine. Does what it needs to do when it needs to do it. Without even one of these components...I do not see us surviving for the long run. The white blood cells keep us healthy, the plasma keeps us nourished, the platelets keep us from running dry, and the red keep us breathing. Sure you have all of the organs to help keep us alive, but without blood...we would be dead.
Please feel free to comment on what you thought of the blog, or other physical anthropological subjects you would like me to cover. Below is a cute comic that I think accurately illustrates how the different components of the blood work together.

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Meanings and Origins of Evolutionary Ancestors Names

9/18/2016

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Most of us have been met with names of our evolutionary ancestors and we think, “Where did they get that from?!” Seeing how some of them are so long and difficult to say, for some, it makes sense. But I promise you that with every name that is given to a species within our lineage or not, the anthropologist, or the scientists given this task go through every possibility to make it as exact to represent the species as they can; at least most of the time. In the following blog I will address the names of our evolutionary ancestors, what they mean, and hopefully by the end of this blog you will see how each of the names fit perfectly.
Let us start at the beginning of our “bloodline.” I put bloodline in parenthesis because even though we can say with mild certainty this one is where we began the trek to becoming Homo sapiens sapiens, there is no way we could have access to their blood. Mostly because this evolutionary ancestor lived about 4.4 million years ago. This ancestor's name is Ardipithecus ramidus. Ardi (as the fossils of an almost complete skeleton, image below, are known) was amazing. She, of course, could climb trees, but had adapted to bipedal activity. But I am getting off blog topic. Ardi's name is very fitting to the first in our lineage. “Ardi” means “ground” or “floor,” “pithecus” means ape, but the meaning of “ramid” is perfect. “ramid” means “root.”

On to the next one which most of the world is aware of their existence because of a female that was found in 1974. A female that we know as Lucy (image below). Lucy's species name is Australopithecus afarensis. This ancestor lived between 3.9 and 2.9 million years ago. This species is seem to be more closely related than the Australopithecus that came after them, which I will address. “Australo” means “Southern,” and as I stated with Ardi, “pithecus” means ape. The meaning for afarensis is “of or belonging to Africa,” or just “Afar.” The entire literal name of Lucy makes more sense than Arid's. Her species full meaning is “Southern ape from Afar,” or “Southern ape belonging to Africa.” Next we have another type of Australopithecus which is Australopithecus africanus. This one is frequently referred to as “the younger Australopithecus,” or “the younger Australopithecus africanus.” Just like Lucy's species Australopithecus means “Southern Ape,” but unlike Lucy's species with the “of or belonging to Africa” or “Afar,” africanus just means “African.”

We are now done with the Australopithecines, and dive right into the genus Homo. Since the rest of our evolutionary ancestors I will speak of all belong to the Homo genus I will define it right now for the rest of them. Homo means man or human. The reason the evolutionary ancestors I will speak of all fall under the genus “Homo” is because unlike our Australopithecine or Ardipithecus brethren, they are seen to be more human than Lucy or Ardi. The first one of the Homo genus is Homo habilis, who lived from approximately 2.33 to 1.4 million years ago. This evolutionary ancestor is thought to be the first that was not only able to use tools but make them as well. The word “habilis” means “handy” or “skillful,” so their species name was “handy man.” That is why they have the species name of Homo habilis (given to them by Louis and Mary Leakey).
     Next up is a combination, of which H. habilis should be part of but they are always put apart. H. habilis is one of three that are given the most credit to get us to where we are today; the other two are Homo ergaster, who lived between 1.9 and 1.4 million years ago, which not many people know of this one that said I am sure everyone know of the third one, which is given the species name of Homo erectus, who lived 1.9 million years ago. The reason, I think, all three are put together, most of the time seen as the same species, is because what they did is seen as the building blocks and vital to our evolution. With H. habilis using and making tools and H. erectus being the first one to walk exclusively on two feet, they might as well had been H. sapiens; but it was just a matter of their cranial capacity and skull shape. For H. ergaster the “ergaster” means “work,” so their species name really means “workman.” With H. erectus, “erectus” means “upright,” which makes sense seeing that they were the first to walk upright.
     What is next is very exciting because it is just one step away from being human. The next Homo I will address is Homo heidelbergensis, who lived between 600,000 and 200,000 years ago. This one does not have any special meaning in their name. What I mean by this is the only reason they were named “heidelbergensis” is because they were found in the German city, Heidelberg; “heidelbergensis” is just a latinised version of the name. Now out of H. heidelbergensis came two subspecies; that of Homo sapiens idaltu and Homo sapiens neanderthalensis who lived between 500,000 and 10,000 years ago. Just like H. heidelbergensis, H. sapiens neanderthalensis is named after the location in which they were found in. The name of the location is Neander Valley in, once again, Germany. The German word for valley is “Tal,” but in the 1800's it was spelt “Thal (which is why some people pronounce Neanderthal with a “th” sound instead of a “t” sound).”
     I know I said I was one step away from being human, and I really was...well am. Homo sapiens idaltu were almost modern human beings. They lived almost 160,000 years ago, and it was these first types of H. sapiens that interacted with the Neanderthals. “idaltu” is a Saho-Afar word meaning “elder of first born,” and “sapiens” from Latin meaning “wise.” Which gives H. sapiens idaltu the fitting name of “First born wise man.” Soon after H. sapiens idaltu, between 60,000 – 40,000 years ago, came us, Home sapiens sapiens, which means “Man wise wise.” The reason there is a distinction between H. sapiens idaltu and H. sapiens sapiens is because H. sapiens sapiens are also known as “Anatomically modern humans.”
     You, at least those of you who are aware of our lineage, are wondering, “Where is the Cro-Magnon?” This is not really common knowledge but the Cro-Magnon, the second type of Homo sapiens that interacted with the Neanderthals, was us. The age of the first Cro-Magnon fossil that was found was about 30,000, a good 30,000 years after our species came into existence. It must have been terrifying but interesting to have been a Neanderthal, to be able to interact with and, in a way be witness to two types of Homo sapiens, last of which, would be the only one that survived. Those poor H. sapiens neanderthalensis.
   Please feel free to comment on what you thought of the blog, or other physical anthropological subjects you would like me to cover.

H. sapiens idaltu H. heidelbergensis H. erectus H. ergaster H. habilis

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Evolution Nose What It's Doing

8/21/2016

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The nose. The thing that we always keep in our sights, whether we want to or not. But why is the human nose so...out there? In comparison to our primate cousins, we look pretty much the same. If you ignore the hair covering their bodies, our hands, feet, arms, legs, eyes, even the lips if placed on a human would not look that different. But their noses, they have flat noses with the nostrils facing forward, not down like ours. In the following blog I will address why we have protruding noses, why it is a benefit for us humans, and what influenced this notable change.
First in our evolutionary lineage to have a nose that began to resemble a modern human nose was Homo erectus (image below on left). Before this type of homo came along was Homo rudolfensis (image below on right), in which the nose shape was drastically different. H. rudolfensis is known for having a flatter face, but with H. rudolfensis the hominid diet changed. Before H. rudolfensis came along the diet consisted of seeds, plants, and roots, but with the rise of this new hominid came a new diet consisting of plants and meat. It was because of the “meat” part of the diet did H. erectus develop a less ape-like nose and a more human like nose.

But what is so special about meat? What is special about meat is that to obtain meat they had to hunt. This hunting, which most likely involved running (one of the theories why we “lost all” our hair, but that is a subject for another time) is one of the reasons our noses look as they do now. Reason being when we run we lose moisture through sweat, and if we still had an ape like nose we would get dehydrated extremely fast because the air would just go in. I am sure you are thinking that when we humans breathe the air just goes in, it does, but it has been “suggested that this new shape of nose allowed a greater volume of incoming air to be moisturized before it reached the lungs and yet also permitted moisture to be conserved and reclaimed as air was exhaled.”
I know it all seems to come together for why our noses are as they are. We could always stop here and thank our bipedal form of locomotion to our noses, but we can not. There is another out-of-body factor that is necessary for this type of evolution, and it still plays a huge part in modern noses. This factor is humidity. When there is humidity in the air is also moisture, and, as I stated earlier, our noses and moisture work together. What this means is in environments where it is hot and wet, our bodies sweat, but our noses also have to adapt, like our skin colour. “...the nose could respond to that pressure and, over time, evolve into having a wider shape, which allows for more heat loss and may help keep the brain cool...” This does make sense when we look at different people coming from different types of places. In comparing someone of European ancestry with someone of African ancestry, besides the different skin colour, the thing that jumps out is the shape of the nose.
This has been a learning experience if not only for you, but me as well. Who would have thought how big a part our noses play in keeping us cool. But the nose does so much for us that we do not realize. For example, taste. Sure the tongue helps us with that, but the noses sense of smell is what keeps us tasting. It has been theorized when were still hunting that our noses helped us smell out our prey, but once we began to domesticate animals, that ability slowly went away. Nevertheless, let us hope our noses do not stop what it is doing to keep us cool. The nose...the personal air conditioner.
Please feel free to comment on what you thought of this fun fact, or other physical anthropological subjects you would like me to cover.

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Fun Fact about...Margaret Mead

7/24/2016

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Sadly, not many people know about the subject that is anthropology and even more do not know what it means. So it is understandable that the super stars of the anthropological universe are not seen as such outside of anthropology. And when they do become noticed, it is their accomplishments that make the headlines, not their line of work...at least not til recently. In this blog I will speak of the famous cultural anthropologist, Margaret Mead.
     It seems as though Mead was destined to become an anthropologist seeing how both her parents were social scientists. In her time she was seen as a pioneer. What I mean by this is her research (which she conducted for nine months in 1925) in Samoa was a huge hit, revered by both psychologists and anthropologists. Her research, in which she wanted to see if the pain and uneasiness of adolescence was univeral, brought her to Samoa. She explained in her book “Coming of Age in Samoa (published in 1928)” that the years of the Samoa adolescence was free to do as they pleased (ex: have casual sex, few responsibilites, “easy relations with parents and other kin, and consequently a period of harmony rather than disequilibrium and strife.”). With these findings she made the conclusion that it was culture, not biology that was responsible for the “storm and stress” of American youth. Because of her research and this book, it is said that she caused a sexual revolution in America.
     That said, her findings have come to have a lot of controversy. For one, there is an anthropologist from New Zealand named Derek Freeman, who in 1983 published a book “Margaret Mead and Samoa: The Making and Unmaking of an Anthropological Myth” in which he challenged many of Mead's claims. For example, Mead had claimed that because of the sexual freedom the Samoan's had there was no rape, which Freeman commented that rape was common and that premarital sex was disapproved of. He also spoke with the young woman (who were now older women) who told him “They had lied to her, inventing wild tales about premarital sex to impress her. Freeman even tracked down one of her informants (by then an old woman) who admitted exactly this.”
     Although, Mead supporters have her back. What I mean by this is they have reasons why the information Freeman obtained contrasts with Mead's. Reason for the girls telling him they lied was most likely a lie to Freeman because when Mead went to Samoa she was a young woman close in age to them, but Freeman was a middle-aged man. And the biggest defense of Mead's study was the time. She conducted her study in the 1920's while Freeman did his in the 1980's, so something must have changed. Nevertheless, “some Samoans have found her depiction of Samoan adolescent sexuality offensive.”
Even though Mead's name seems to have been dragged through the mud, she was, as I stated earlier, a pioneer. She was one of the founders of Psychological Anthropology and inadvertently created biological (physical) anthropology. What I mean by this is that “many also rejected the relevance of the biological sciences for illuminating anything about social behavior and social organization” because social scientists “were coming to reject the view that western civilization, the white race, the male sex represented the pinnacle of the human evolutionary process.” Of course physical anthropologists know better now, but we have to remember how racism ran rampant in the United States for a good part of the 1900's (and still does).
     Please feel free to comment on what you thought of this fun fact, or other physical anthropological subjects you would like me to cover.

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Disadvantages of Bipedalism

7/10/2016

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In a blog early on (http://anthropologicalconcepts.weebly.com/blog/bipedalism-one-step-closer-to-becoming-homo-sapien) I spoke of how being bipedal was a huge step for our evolutionary ancestors. I covered the advantages of this evolutionary breakthrough in said blog, but I did not go into the disadvantages. This blog will cover just that. And these are disadvantages that we live through or are going to live through thanks to the thing that helped keep our species alive. By this I mean I will speak of pain, stress, or damage that being bipedal can cause.
It seems to be normal for the birthing process to be painful for human females, but it was not always. As I stated in my blog describing the difference between the male and female skeletal structure (http://anthropologicalconcepts.weebly.com/blog/male-or-female), the shape and position of the human female pelvis is what makes birthing painful. The human birthing process is “weird” by other animal's standards. The average time a human female spends in labour is a good nine or more hours, while all other primates give birth within two hours. Another evolutionary problem that makes birth painful is the size of the skull. The reason this is also evolution's fault is because bigger brains means bigger skulls. This is also why, when human babies are born, they are helpless because they have not completely...formed in a way. If they were to stay long enough to be more cognitive, like let us say a baby chimpanzee, the head would be too big to get through the birth canal and will most likely kill the mother. “we need a wide pelvis to bear big-brained babies but a narrow one to walk or run efficiently.”
There is something only humans can do because of our bipedalism, but with this something it causes stress but can cause pain later in life. What I am talking about is lifting heavy objects. You may have heard the phrase “lift with your knees not with your back.” While that is optimum, the knees are not very happy about it. After a while with lifting or just running the cartilage and joint fluid (lubricant) that is between the femur and tibia can wear down, and when it does that leads to knee pain because the bones will now be rubbing directly against each other. This in turn cases arthritis. Even if your knees get the focus when lifting heavy things, just walking, not even running, can affect the lumbar (lower back) region. Reason for this is when walking the curve of the lumbar region (image below) absorbs the shock. This is a good thing because without the shock absorbing lumbar it would be incredibly painful to walk. The entire back would hurt if it were straight; that or we would still be quadrupedal. There are also cases of slipped discs (“a vertebral disc that is displaced or partly protruding, pressing on nearby nerves and causing back pain or sciatica.”), but that mainly happens because of injury or weakness; also these can happen anywhere in the vertebrae, not just the lumbar region.

This last condition applies not so much to the bone, but to the veins. It is called varicose veins (images below). Although many factors can effect the probability of getting this condition, one main one is being bipedal. Reason being is humans are fairly tall for being bipedal, “the circulatory system has to move blood from the legs to the heart. In some cases, the valves in the veins of the legs break down and blood pools, causing the veins to bulge.” Do not fret, it happens to about fifty to fifty-five percent of women and even less in men at forty to forty-five percent, but this statistic is only for those in the United States. As I stated at the beginning of this paragraph there are many factors, so the likeliness for someone to get these types of veins without these factors is very minute. The first factor is going to happen to all of us, which is getting older, but with this you would have to take into account medical history (this included being born with weak veins or having family members with vein problems), obesity (which puts extra pressure on the veins), or lack of movement (“Sitting or standing for a long time may force your veins to work harder to pump blood to your heart. This may be a bigger problem if you sit with your legs bent or crossed.”). This condition cannot be cured, but it can be treated.

With everything that can and does go wrong because of the main source of transportation for humans, it almost does not seem worth it. Almost. When you think about it, it is worth the risk of being bipedal. Some may think that evolution “screwed us over,” but without being bipedal, we would most likely either not have evolved as much as we have, or would have been eaten to extinction (yay for being able to look over tall grass). I think the pro's of being bipedal greatly outweigh the con's.
Please feel free to comment on what you thought of the blog, or other physical anthropological subjects you would like me to cover.

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Hanabi-Ko

7/4/2016

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From a very young age, no more than a year old, Hanabi-Ko was taught basic sign language (“FOOD, DRINK and MORE, to emotional signs like: SAD, LOVE, GOOD, and SORRY to more sophisticated signs like: OBNOXIOUS, FAKE, and POLITE, and epithets like: STUPID DIRTY TOILET”) by her adoptive mother Penny. When she was about 5 she got a brother, Michael who was rescued after seeing his mother killed (her caretaker was hoping they would fall in love in a romantic way, but because they were together since a young age, they became siblings instead of lovers). The two of them were taught sign language together; Hanabi-Ko helping Michael with the corresponding signs to the corresponding situations.
     At around the age of 11 Hanabi-Ko was seen as being able to be gentle with the smallest of creatures, in this case tiny tree frogs around her yard. She captured one, and cradled it gently under her arm (keeping it safe from Michael). After holding it for a while, she sets it down on some rocks in an area to protect it from “possible rough play.” This was the first example of her “innate gentleness and nurturing spirit towards small, vulnerable creatures, and her regard for other species.” but it certainly was not her last. A year after her gentle frog play, she received a kitten, whom she named “All Ball (All Ball because they did not have a tail).” Hanabi-Ko loved All Ball, always playing with them, but this joy did not last long. Only 6 months after her 12th birthday, the day she received her kitten, All Ball was hit by a car. Hanabi-Ko was heartbroken, signing about her friend's death for days after getting the bad news. It was a while until she was ready for another kitten. But in 1985 she chose two kittens, who she named Lips Lipstick, because unlike All Ball, they had a pink nose and mouth, and the second kitten she named Smoky because they looked like a cat in one of her books. Smokey passed away 20 years later due to natural causes, but recently, in 2015, she chose two more kittens, Miss Black and Miss Grey.
     In 1991 Koko selected a possible love for her named Ndume who was 10 at the time. I will now stop beating around the bush, this special blog is about the lovable, adorable, talking gorilla, Koko, whose birthday happens to be today. Her full name means “Fireworks Child.” The awareness the work she has done with her caretaker, Penny, has caused great changes in how people saw gorillas. It was because of the results of the unique communicative possibilities Koko gave rise to The Gorilla Foundation. Michael's rescue was because of The Gorilla Foundation who gave him a home. Sadly on June 29th of 2000, Michael passed away due to a major cardiovascular diseases found in gorillas (humans too) called fibrosing cardiomyopathy. That said, after learning sign language Michael was able to tell his story, and it is because of his ability to do so, he raised awareness of gorilla hunting. With the passing of Michael, Koko is the only talking gorilla left.
     However, we need not to worry about Koko. She still has her kittens to look after, Ndume (whose name translates to “Male” in Swahili), and her long time friend, Dr. Francine Penny Patterson who is not only responsible for teaching Koko sign language, but is also the founder of The Gorilla Foundation, best known for “Project Koko.” Here is a link to the website if you would like to know more about Koko: http://www.koko.org. And below I have included a documentary titled “A Conversation with Koko the Gorilla.”
     I will end with this. I wish Koko a very happy 45th birthday, with many coming...and with them probably kittens on the way. I hope you have enjoyed this Koko centered special blog entry.

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Claude Levi-Strauss

7/3/2016

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Levi-Strauss is a big name in the anthropological community. He is not a physical anthropologist, but some of his theories and books read that way. Indirectly he was sort of involved with evolution, but more of the process our brains went through to get to where we are today. In the following blog I will discuss what kind of anthropologist he was, his thoughts on language, kinship, and magic.
     With the tree of subjects in anthropology, from physical, to linguistic, to archaeology, to cultural, it does not seem there is more than these main branches. But if you have been following this blog you know that from these branches there are so many more. Structural anthropology branches off from cultural. Levi-Strauss was the founder of this school of anthropology. The way he designed this idea was according to his “theories, universal patterns in cultural systems are products of the invariant structure of the human mind.” In layman terms he is saying that our minds are never changing and that is how the systems of culture are produced. Let us take the Native American culture as an example. Sure, the Europeans tried to turn them into God fearing “modern” peoples, but nowadays, even though much of their culture has been lost to the times, there are still things in modern Native American Culture in which their ancestors would be comfortable partaking in. Structural anthropology is as if saying “you can take the human out of the wild but you can't take the wild out of the human,” or something to that extent.
     So where does language tie into this? This is not linguistic anthropology. Yes, this is not linguistic, but the kind of language Levi-Strauss was interested in was the type that had to do with kinship. When it comes to a cultures, and I mean any culture, what is the one thing that ties them together? Skin colour? No; with the rise in immigration throughout a myriad of counties, cultures have a whole array of colours. And it is not foods either. The thing that ties cultures together is language. If the peoples of a culture spoke entirely different languages, there would be no culture. Reason being is that a paramount of culture is being able to share information, either through speech or written words. Although, that said, this is the cultural part of Levi-Strauss' mind set, not the structural anthropological. When language is looked at from a structural point of view Levi-Strauss compares language to myth, "Myth is language, functioning on an especially high level where meaning succeeds practically at 'taking off' from the linguistic ground on which it keeps rolling." His reasoning for this is because myth has attributes that can only be in myth, so he sees it as its own language. What I mean by this is unlike poetry which can get lost in translation, myth can be translated into many languages but still keeps the core of “myth." “According to Levi-Strauss, this is due to the nature of the structural components which make up a myth which are irreducible and recurrent across myths.”
     At the beginning of this blog I mentioned “magic.” The type of magic Levi-Strauss spoke of is not what you would think of. This type of magic, Levi-Strauss theorizes, were the first steps towards religion. What he means by this is for magic to work, you have to believe in it; so belief ties magic and religion together. Some of our (as in the human race) earliest experience in religion would be with the shaman. This magical doctor who uses all matter of liquids and powders, and those who go to them somehow get better; the major factor in this is belief. With this in mind, Levi-Strauss “seems to think that psychoanalysis and the shamanistic performance he describes are structured the same way. He seems to feel that psychoanalysis can learn from shamanistic performance.” He criticized psychoanalysis for basically only observing and grouping their patients together (OCD, ADHD, ect.), but not curing them.. All in all, I am glad I have delved into a completely different school of anthropology. It is so amazing to think that the theories of one man could have such an effect on such a wide practice. I have said it once, and I will say it again, as long as there are humans, there will always be a need for an anthropologist.
   Please feel free to comment on what you thought of the blog, or other physical anthropological subjects you would like me to cover.

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Gene Flow

6/26/2016

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If you tuned in last Sunday you now know what genetic drift is (http://anthropologicalconcepts.weebly.com/blog/genetic-drift) and that it is bad, that in mind, gene flow is the exact opposite and is very good. It is thanks to gene flow the human race is so diverse with different traits. In the following blog I will discuss how gene flow happens, give examples of it, and exactly why it is good. But first, what is gene flow?
The basic definition of gene flow is an exchange of genes between populations (image below). Another term that is sometimes used is migration, but this term also means “movement of people,” whilst gene flow is the exchange of genes. Last week I addressed the founder effect, in gene flow the separation of people from their home community is vital. Unlike the founder effect in which you have people within the same community mating, in gene flow they would mate with people from other communities. This is an important force of evolution, “the flow of alleles in and out of a population due to the migration of individuals or gametes.”

Seeing how this a blog entry on a physical anthropology focused site, you would think gene flow only happens in humans; it does not. Gene flow can be seen in all types of animals, even plants. Plants for example, the way they mate is by sending their pollen via the wind, insects, or birds “to pollinate other populations of the same species some distance away.” In the case of humans, it should be evident seeing how many types of humans we have. An over used, but very good, example of gene flow is of US soldiers who had children with Vietnamese women during the Vietnam war. This one act “altered the gene pool frequencies of the Vietnamese population.” The gene flow of many African Americans in the US is a wonderful example of how gene flow influences microevolutionary (“evolutionary change within a species or small group of organisms, especially over a short period.”) changes in modern human populations. African Americans mostly have West African descent, that said, there is also a good portion of their genes that have European American. “By measuring allele frequencies for specific genetic loci, we can estimate the amount of migration of European alleles into the African American gene pool.” This method of estimating is very interesting because through this estimation they found the data from western and northern states (“including New York, Detroit, and Oakland”) it shown the percentage of foreign genes (non-African) as 20 to 25 percent. But in the southern states it was a much lower percentage, 4 to 11 percent (which is not really surprising with the history of discrimination towards African-American in the United States).
     In the case of mutation in gene flow is good (as opposed to mutation in genetic drift). This is an important factor for the diversity in populations. Light coloured eyes for example. Most of Europe has light coloured eyes, and seeing how we all originated in Africa, it is easy to see how these light eyes are a mutation. It all started with one person with light eyes, someone to say to themselves “they will be my mate.” Even if their children, or their children's children did not have light eyes, that gene is in them; this is how most of Europe has ended up with light eyes...it all started with one person. These light eyes are yet another example of gene flow. How else could the majority of Europe have them if it was not for gene flow?
     For humans gene flow is one of the things we have to thank for the survival of our species. What I mean by this is with gene flow our bodies have furthered its adaptability. Recently the human race has gotten very touchy about social rules of who they can and cannot mate with, but, in our millions of years of evolution the past thousand or so years is a spit in the bucket, thus why I use “recently.” That said, it is nice to see how we are over coming these social “norms.” Seeing a light skinned man with a dark skinned woman, or vice versa is becoming more acceptable in modern days (light skin is another example of gene flow and adaptation; see this blog entry for further information about that: http://anthropologicalconcepts.weebly.com/blog/-evolution). It is because of this wonderful force that when new genes are brought into a population, we can gain diversity. “Of course, migration patterns are a manifestation of human cultural behavior, and this emphasizes once again the essential biocultural nature of human evolution.”
     Please feel free to comment on what you thought of the blog, or other physical anthropological subjects you would like me to cover.

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Mosquitos vs. Homo sapiens

The Evolution of Food

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Meanings and Origins of Evolutionary Ancestors Names

Evolution Nose What It's Doing

Fun Fact about...Margaret Mead

Disadvantages of Bipedalism

Hanabi-Ko

Claude Levi-Strauss

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