Evaluating Evidence in Biological Anthropology: The Strange and the Familiar: 83 (Cambridge Studies in Biological and Evolutionary Anthropology, Series Number 83)

Cambridge University Press, 11/14/2019
EAN 9781108476843, ISBN10: 1108476848

Hardcover, 228 pages, 25.1 x 17.8 x 1.5 cm
Language: English

Biological anthropology is a diverse field, with countless research methods and techniques in different sub-disciplines. This book takes a critical perspective to the current state of the field, exploring theory and practice in paleoanthropology, bioarchaeology, and ecology. Contributors challenge how evidence is discovered, collected and interpreted, and explain that researchers gain insights by de-familiarizing themselves from well-known methods and taking a different perspective - 'making the familiar strange'. The book covers how researchers' biases and assumptions affect the interpretation of topics such as human evolution and population movements; race, health, and disability; bodies and embodiment; and landscapes and ecology. A final chapter includes a critical assessment of new thinking about technology, in addition to the multilayered and complex nature of both research questions and evidence. This is an insightful text for researchers and graduate students in anthropology, biology, ecology, history and philosophy of science.

Introduction
(re)discovery of the strange and the familiar
theory and methods for a twenty-first-century biological anthropology Sang-Hee Lee and Cathy Willermet
Part I. The Strange and Familiar
New Landscapes and Theoretical Approaches
1. Women in human evolution redux Dänae G. Khorasani and Sang-Hee Lee
2. Hegemony and the Central Asian Paleolithic record
perspectives on Pleistocene landscapes and morphological mosaicism Michelle M. Glantz
3. Anthropology now
how popular science (mis)characterizes human evolution Marc Kissel
4. The strangeness of not eating insects
the loss of an important food source in the United States Julie J. Lesnik
5. Methods without meaning
moving beyond body counts in research on behavior and health Robin G. Nelson
Part II. (Re)discovery of Evidence
New Thinking About Data, Methods, and Fields
6. (Re)discovering paleopathology
integrating individuals and populations in bioarchaeology Ann L. W. Stodder and Jennifer F. Byrnes
7. Parsing the paradox
examining heterogeneous frailty in bioarchaeological assemblages Sharon N. DeWitte
8. Seeing RED
a novel solution to a familiar categorical data problem Cathy Willermet, John Daniels, Heather J. H. Edgar and Joseph McKean
9. Paleoanthropology and analytical bias
citation practices, analytical choice, and prioritizing quality over quantity Adam P. Van Arsdale
10. (Re)discovering ancient hominin environments
how stable carbon isotopes of modern chimpanzee communities can inform paleoenvironment reconstruction Melanie M. Beasley and Margaret J. Schoeninger
Discussion and conclusion
move forward, critically Cathy Willermet and Sang-Hee Lee.