Intro to Anthropology Vocab

• -Large-brained, mostly tree-dwelling mammals with three-dimensional color vision and grasping hands. Humans are primates.
• -An order within class Mammalia. Large-brained arboreal mammals with stereoscopic color vision and grasping hands (and sometimes feet). Includes, prosimians, monkeys, apes, and hominids.

The holistic study of the human species. Anthropology includes the study of human biology, human physical evolution, human cultural evolution, and human adaptation.

A specialty that studies the human fossil record.

Change through time, usually with reference to biological species, but may also refer to changes within cultural systems.

Ideas and behaviors that are learned and shares. Also, the system made up of the sum total of the ideas and behaviors that is unique to a particular society of people. Nonbiological means of adaptation.

The study of the structure, function, and evolution of the skeleton.

The traditional name for biological anthropology.

A subfield of anthropology that studies humans as a biocultural species.

A subfield of anthropology that studies the human cultural past and the reconstruction of past cultural systems.

The study of disease and nutritional deficiency in prehistoric populations, usually through the examination o skeletal material.

Modern human beings and our ancestors, generally defined as the primates who habitually walk erect. Technically, the members of family Hominidae.

Hominidae-In a cladistic taxonomy, a subfamily that icludes chimpanzees, bonobos, and humans. (In such a taxonomy, Hominidae would include the African great apes and humans.)

A subfield of anthropology that focuses on human cultural behavior and cultural systems and the variations in cultural expression among human groups.

A subfield of anthropology that applies anthropology to legal matters. Usually used with reference to the identification of skeletal remains and the assessment of time and cause of death.

The state in which an organism is adjusted to and can survive in its environment through its physical traits and behaviors. Also, the process by which an organism develops this state through natural processes.

A specialty of anthropology that studies nonhuman primates.

Suggesting specific data that would be found if a hypothesis were true, a step in the scientific method involving the testing of hypothesis.

The idea that present-day geological and biological process can also explain the history of the earth and its life. Compared to catastrophism.

The evolution and spreading out of related species into new niches.

The idea that an intelligent designer played a role in some aspect of the evolution of life on earth, usually the origin of life itself. Generally, a thinly disguised version of scientific creationism.

Educated guesses to explain natural phenomena. In the scientific method, hypotheses must be testable. Compared to theory.

The idea that the history of the earth is explained by a series of global catastrophes, either natural or divine in origin. Compare with uniformitarianism.

The process of conducting scientific inquiry. Requires he generation, testing, and acceptance or rejection of hypotheses.

A classification based on similarities and differences. In biology, the science of categorizing organisms and of naming them so as to reflect their relationships. Compare with cladistics and see phenetic taxonomy.

Any mistake in an organism's genetic code.