Coll 002
Biology, Language and Culture
Spring Term, 2001
Tu-Th 1:30-3:00
Moore 216		  
Instructors:
Mark Liberman
Alan Mann
Greg Urban

Course materials,
course structure
and grading

Discussion questions

  

TA:

 

Office hours

Jenny Jacobs

This course will provide a general introduction to several adjacent areas of research: (1) human biology and evolution, (2) the concept of culture in relation to society, and (3) the structure and diversity of languages. The emphasis will be on human diversity in all of its aspects (biological, linguistic, and cultural), and on how human beings around the world have made sense of that diversity, and sought to further it or reduce it in various ways. A key focus of the course will be the cultural concept of "race."

The on-line part of this course is divided into two parts:
  • this more-or-less static web site, including the syllabus and other background information,
  • an interactive CourseInfo site, open only to students in the course.

  Date Title Lecturer Readings
1. Tu 1/16 Introduction Alan Mann  
2. Th 1/18 What is race? (.html) (.ppt) Alan Mann Smedley, Audrey. 1999. "Introduction" and "Some theoretical considerations", In Race in North America, Westview Press: Boulder, Colorado
Cartmill, Matt. 1999. "The status of the race concept in physical anthropology", American Anthropologist 100:651-660.
Hiernaux, Jean. 1964. "The concept of race and the taxonomy of mankind" In The Concept of Race, A. Montagu, ed. The Free Press of Glencoe, Collier-Macmillan, Limited: London.
Leiberman, L., Littlefield, A. and Reynolds, L.T. 1999. "The debate over race: thirty years and two centuries later" In Race and IQ, A. Montagu, ed. Oxford University Press: New York.
3. Tu 1/23 What is culture? (.html) (.ppt) Greg Urban Sahlins, Marshall. 1977. "Critique of Vulgar Sociobiology," pp. 3-16 in The Use and Abuse of Biology: An Anthropological Critique of Sociobiology. Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press.
Lévi-Strauss, Claude. 1952. Race and History, pp. 5-49. Paris: UNESCO. 1952. [part1] [part2]
4. Th 1/25 What is language? (.html) (.ppt) Mark Liberman Miller, George. 1996. The Science of Words, chapters 1 and 2. W.H. Freeman & Co.: New York.
Pinker, Steven. 1999. "The Infinite Library", chapter 1 of Words and Rules. Basic Books: New York.
Studdert-Kennedy, Michael. 1998. "The particulate origins of language generativity", chapter 13 in Hurford et al., eds., Approaches to Language Evolution. Cambridge University Press.
5. Tu 1/30 Evolutionary Background to Human Population Variation (.html) (.ppt) Alan Mann Molnar, Stephen. 1998. "The biological basis for human variation". In Human Variation: Races, Types, and Ethnic Groups. Prentice Hall, New Jersey.
Stearns, Stephen. 1999. "Introducing evolutionary thinking". In Evolution in Health and Disease, S.C. Stearns, ed. Oxford University Press: New York.
6. Th 2/1 Definitions, measurement, adaptive/stochastic bases (.html) (.ppt) Alan Mann  
7. Tu 2/6 Humans in the natural world; taxonomy and adaptation (.html) (.ppt) Alan Mann Livingston, F.B. 1960. "Anthropological implications of sickle cell gene distribution in West Africa", In Readings on Race, Stanley Garn, ed., Charles C. Thomas: Springfield, Ill.
Molnar, Stephen. 1998. "Human Biology II: Hemoglobin variants and DNA markers" In Human Variation: Races, Types, and Ethnic Groups, Prentice Hall: New Jersey.
8. Th 2/8 Historical linguistics (.html) (.ppt) Mark Liberman

Hock, H.H. 1991. Principles of Historical Linguistics, chapter 18 "Comparative Method". Mouton de Gruyter: Berlin:New York.
Embleton, Sheila. 1986. Statistics in Historical Linguistics, chapter 2. Studienverlag Dr. N. Brockmeyer: Bochum.
Dixon, R.M.W. 1997.The Rise and Fall of Languages, chapters 1-4. Cambridge University Press.

9. Tu 2/13 Phylogenetic inference (.html) (.ppt) Mark Liberman  
10. Th 2/15 Genealogy, kinship, and family (.html) (.ppt) Greg Urban Sahlins, Marshall. 1977. "Critique of the Scientific Sociobiology: Kin Selection," pp. 17-67 in The Use and Abuse of Biology: An Anthropological Critique of Sociobiology. Ann Arbor: The University of Michigan Press.
11. Tu 2/20 The human evolutionary lineage (.html) (.ppt) Alan Mann Caspari, R. and Wolpoff, M. 1995 "The pattern of human evolution" In Man and Environment in the Palaeolithic, Ullrich, H., ed. E.R.A.U.L.: Liege.
Tattersall, I. 2000 "Once we were not alone", Scientific American 282:56-62.
12. Th 2/22 What is a Modern Human? Alan Mann Templeton, Alan. 1999. "Human races: A genetic and evolutionary perspective", American Anthropologist 100: 632-650.
13. Tu 2/27 Evolutionary psychology (.html) Mark Liberman Tooby, J. and L. Cosmides.1992. "The Psychological Foundations of Culture", chapter 1 in Barkow et al., eds., The Adapted Mind. Oxford University Press.
Gazzaniga, M.S., R.B. Ivry and G.R. Mangun. Cognitive Neuroscience, chapter 13 "Evolutionary Perspectives". W.W. Norton: New York.
14. Th 3/1 Human specialization for language (.html) (.ppt) Mark Liberman

Pinker, S. 1994. The Language Instinct, chapter 1, "An instinct to acquire an art." W. Morrow: New York.
Holloway, R. 1996. "Evolution of the human brain", in Lock and Peters, eds., Handbook of Human Symbolic Evolution. Clarendon Press: Oxford.
Tomasello, M. and J. Call. 1997. Primate Cognition, chapter 10, "Theory of mind". Oxford University Press.
Dennett, D.C. 1995. Darwin's Dangerous Idea, chapter 1, "Tell me why", and chapter 13, "Losing our minds to Darwin." Simon and Schuster: New York.
Kauffman, S.A. 1993. The Origins of Order, chapter 1, "Conceptual outline of current evolutionary theory." Oxford University Press.
Depew, D.J. and B.H. Weber. 1997. Darwinism Evolving, chapter 16, "New models of evolutionary dynamics." MIT Press.

15. Tu 3/6 General discussion All instructors  
16. Th 3/8 Teaching language to apes (.html) (.ppt) Greg Urban Pinker, Steven. 1995. Ch. 11: "The Big Bang." In The language instinct. New York: HarperPerennial.
Savage-Rumbaugh, E. Sue, and Duane M. Rumbaugh. 1993. "The emergence of language." In Tools, language, and cognition in human evolution. K. R. Gibson and T. Ingold, eds Cambridge [England] ; New York, NY, USA: Cambridge University Press
    Spring Break    
  Tu 3/20 Midterm Exam    
17. Th 3/22 Models of genetic and cultural evolution: part 1
(.html) (.ppt) 		Mark Liberman Axelrod, R.A. The Complexity of Cooperation. "Evolving new strategies", pp. 15-19; "Promoting Norms", pp. 44-68; "Disseminating culture", pp. 148-177.
18. Tu 3/27 Descent theory
(.html)(.ppt) 		Greg Urban

Fortes, Meyer. 1953. "The Structure of Unilineal Descent Groups." American Anthropologist, 55: 25-39..
Kottak, Conrad Phillip. 1996. "The Cultural Construction of Race." In Mirror for Humanity: A Concise Introdution to Cultural Anthropology, pp. 57-73. New York: McGraw-Hill.
Video: Jane Elliot, "Brown eyes, blue eyes."

19. Th 3/29 Marriage theory Greg Urban Kottak, Conrad Phillip. 1996. Selection from chapter 9: "Kinship, Descent, and Marriage.." In Mirror for Humanity: A Concise Introcution to Cultural Anthropology, pp. 173-182. New York: McGraw-Hill.
Gough, Kathleen. 1959. "The Nayars and the Definition of Marriage." Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute 89: 23-24.
LaFontaine, J. S. 1988. "Child Sexual Abuse and the Incest Taboo: Practical Problems and Theoretical Issues." Man vol. 23(1): 1-18.
Carden, Maren Lockwood.1998. "The Practice of Perfection." In Oneida: Utopian Community to Modern Corporation, pp. 37-88. New York: Syracuse University Press.
20. Tu 4/3 Models of genetic and cultural evolution: part 2
(.html) (.ppt)		 Mark Liberman  
21. Th 4/5

Nature and origins of human racial variation I (.html) (.ppt)

 Alan Mann  
22. Tu 4/10 Nature and origins of human racial variation II
(slides cited for 4/5)		 Alan Mann Marks, J. and Gill, G.W. 2000. "Should Anthropology abandon the concept of race?" In Taking Sides: Clashing Views on Controversial Issues in Anthropology, Endicott, K.M. and Welsch, R.L., eds. McGraw Hill/Dushkin: Connecticut.
Early, Gerald. 1995. "Understanding afrocentrism: Why blacks dream of a world without whites", Civilization 2: 31-39.
23. Th 4/12 General discussion All instructors  
24. Tu 4/17 Gender and the body Greg Urban Lorber, Judith. 1994. Chapters 1 & 2: "Night to His Day" and "Believing is Seeing" In Paradoxes of gender. New Haven: Yale University Press.
Herdt, Gilbert. 1981. Selection from Ch. 4: "Gender and Socialization" in The Sambia: Ritual and Gender in New Guinea, pp. 75-91. Ft. Worth: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich College Publishers.
Chaplin, Joyce. 1997. "Natural Philosophy and an Early Racial Idiom in North America: Comparing English and Indian Bodies." The William and Mary Quarterly, 3d Series, Vol LIV, No. 1., pp. 229-252.
Brodkin, Karen.2000. "Global capitalism: What's race got to do with it?" American Ethnologist 27(2): 237-256.
25. Th 4/19 History of the concept of race Alan Mann Gould, S.J. 1994. "The geometer of race," Discover 15: 64-69.
Marks, J. 1995. "Racial and racist anthropology" In Human Biodiversity, Aldine: New York.
Entine, Jon 2000. Forwards and Chapters 1, 20, and 24, In Taboo: Why Black Athletes Dominate Sports and Why We're Afraid to Talk About It. PublicAffairs: New York.
(Various Authors). 1995. Reviews of The Bell Curve; The Evolution of Racism; Human Biodiversity; Race Evolution, and Behavior. Evolutionary Anthropology 6: 99-109
26.

Tu 4/24

 Cultural control of genes Greg Urban Fagan, Brian. 1992. Chapter 9: "A Plenteous Harvest" In People of the Earth: An introduction to world prehistory, 7th ed. New York: Harper Collins.
John Rennie 1994. "Grading the Gene Tests," Scientific American, June: 88-97.
Rabinow, Paul 1996 "Introduction" and Chapter 1: "Toward Biotechnology." In Making PCR: A Story of Biotechnology. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.
26. Th 4/26 Language: Biology, Culture, Race? (.ppt) (.html) Mark Liberman  
  Tu 5/1 Review Session All instructors  
  5/10 Final Exam
(11:00-1:00)