A full course of video lectures by Academician Vyach.Vs. Ivanov "Semiotic Anthropology" posted online

We have collected online anthropology courses for everyone who is interested in human studies and wants to understand why we have become the “crown of creation” and what explains the diversity of human behavior. All lectures are available free of charge at any time and are read in Russian.

Sociology as a science of common sense - a course of 7 lectures, available on the website of the Arzamas Academy, on sex, drugs and rock and roll as objects of attention of sociologists, as well as lectures by Grigory Yudin with answers to the cornerstone questions of sociology. You will learn how sociology is similar to martial arts, does it exist public opinion, how did Gallup predict the winner of the election, why is religion needed, how does science function, who benefits from ideology, and is society progressing?

How to understand Japan - 6 lectures by Alexander Meshcheryakov on the main Japanese symbols and how the attitude of the Japanese towards them changed under the influence of European civilization. The course, available on the Arzamas website, tells how the Japanese did not notice the most famous mountain in the world for a long time, and then made it part of their ideology, what the Japanese think about themselves, how the West made them feel ashamed of themselves and what they did to get rid of complexes, how gastronomic traditions influence the Japanese way of thinking, what should be the position of the Japanese in space and how it affects his well-being, what sakura means for the Japanese and why a Japanese garden is needed.

Anthropology of a communal apartment - 6 lectures by Ilya Utekhin at Arzamas are devoted to the bizarre arrangement of the world of a Soviet communal apartment. The author pays special attention to the rules of life in a communal apartment, talks about how to honestly share communal benefits, what is the personal space of a resident of a communal apartment and whether it is possible to save it. The lecturer also covers the topic of communal paranoia and clinical insanity, explains how denunciations are arranged and why people continue to write them.

Russian epic - You can listen to 5 lectures by Nikita Petrov on the website of the Arzamas Academy to find out what an epic is, whether Ilya Muromets really existed and how Stalin became the hero of the epic. The course highlights the discovery of the Russian epic in the 19th century, talks about whether historical events were reflected in the epic, whether the heroes had real prototypes, why love in epics is mostly tragic, why the heroes cut off the lips of their brides, how Dobrynya got rid of the dryer, and Ilya Muromets became a saint.

History of dandyism - in 5 lectures on the Arzamas website, Olga Vainshtein talks about how a revolution in the world of men's suits took place in the 19th century and what it led to. You will learn what the basic rules of a dandy are, how to stand out without attracting attention, why idle walks are needed, how the Comte d'Orsay won universal love and how businessmen took advantage of it.

Myths of South America – Arzamas Academy offers 8 lectures by Yuri Berezkin on how a rainbow snake links South America with Tropical Africa, corn from teeth with Indonesia, an unfortunate coyote with North America, and a child-eating cannibal with China. The author shares fascinating information about the first people who came out of the ground and slept through immortality, tells why neither in Africa nor in Europe they talk about people who cannot eat and about betrayals with crocodiles and bears, why in South America, Melanesia and Australia, women are not allowed to watch how men summon monsters, who the first ancestors are and where their world has gone.

Truth and fiction about gypsies - 5 lectures by Kirill Kozhanov on the Arzamas website about where our ideas about gypsies come from, where the gypsies themselves come from, how they relate to each other and what is important to know about them. The course covers questions about the powers of a gypsy baron, where the need to roam comes from and what are the gypsy routes, why they were loved in Europe in the 15th century, why they fell out of love later and how they wanted to destroy, and also what happens if you touch a gypsy skirt, what is the highest gypsy court and what is the most sacred oath.

Archeology of folklore: mythological motifs on the world map – an interesting course on Stepik for everyone who has read the myths and fairy tales of the peoples of the world with enthusiasm, and is now ready to look at their content through the eyes of a researcher. Yuri Evgenyevich Berezkin, professor at the EUSP Department of Anthropology, overlays data on the distribution of motifs and elements of folklore on the map and suggests drawing conclusions about cultural contacts and migrations in the distant past, about which we have little other evidence.

Culturology - the course on Stepik is taught by the teachers of the NWIMU RANEPA and pursues such goals as: the formation of a worldview culture of students through familiarization with the achievements of world culture and, above all, the national cultural tradition; development of cultural thinking skills, which implies the ability to operate with the main categories of the theory of culture. In the process of mastering the discipline "Culturology" a number of tasks are solved: from the formation of ideas about the essence of culture and the main types of cultural universals to mastering the methods of conducting discussions on cultural issues.

Anthropogenesis – 10 lectures by Candidate of Biological Sciences, Associate Professor of the Department of Anthropology, Faculty of Biology, Lomonosov Moscow State University. M.V. Lomonosov, Stanislav Drobyshevsky. The course, available on the PostNauka website, will focus on the origin of man and his variability as a species over time. You will learn how the ancient primates transformed, what features made it possible for them to grow a reasonable branch of evolution, and what changes allowed the ancient monkeys to become human.

Racial science - a course of 10 lectures by anthropologist Stanislav Drobyshevsky on the group diversity of man, the variability of man as a species in space. This course on the PostScience website will talk about what the human races are, how people differ from each other and why these differences arose. Humanity is not limited to school ideas about Negroids, Caucasians and Mongoloids. In fact, the Earth is inhabited by many more races, and the study of some of them is still a matter of the future.

Topic 1. Anthropogenesis

Question 1. Evolutionary ecology

The evolutionary history of man ended with the formation of a species qualitatively different from the rest of the animals inhabiting the Earth, but the mechanisms and factors that acted during the evolution of the ancestors of Homo sapiens did not differ in any way from the mechanisms and factors of the evolution of any other species of living beings. Only from a certain stage of development in the evolution of mankind social factors began to play a greater role than biological ones. Therefore, the basic principles general theory evolutions are quite applicable to the problem of anthropogenesis. The origin and evolution of man are considered, as well as the evolution of any biological species, from the point of view of the interaction of hereditary factors with the environment, that is, from an ecological standpoint.

Ecologists study the relationship between an organism and its environment in order to discover the principles that control it. However, these relationships themselves can be extremely diverse.

Biological evolution is a complex phenomenon, consisting of many processes, but they are based on the mechanism of natural selection.

The core of evolutionary theory is the principle of natural selection, i.e. differential reproductive success of biological beings. It follows from this that the evolutionary approach is focused on understanding the action of natural selection - its consequences for living matter and the conditions against which its action unfolds.

Principal among them is that when considering adaptive advantages, one should proceed from the level of individuals, and not their groups or species. Individuals are the basic material for evolution and therefore must be considered as an analytical unit of adaptive behavior.

The result of natural selection - the differentiated survival of biological beings - contributes to the development of adaptation. Adaptation is a term that, although often used in ecology, has several meanings or connotations.

In an evolutionary sense, the concept of "adaptation" should refer not so much to an individual as to a population and a species. Changes within an individual in response to certain changes in the environment occur within the limits of the reaction norm inherited by each individual.

By origin, pre-adaptive, combinative and post-adaptive adaptations are distinguished.

According to the scale of adaptation, they are divided into specialized, suitable for narrowly local conditions of life of the species (for example, the structure of the language of anteaters in connection with feeding on ants, adaptations of a chameleon to an arboreal lifestyle, etc.), and general, suitable for a wide range of environmental conditions and characteristic for large taxa.

Adaptation is the tendency to optimize the fit between an organism's behavior and its environment. Selection favors the "optimal solution" to the problems faced by the organism.

Those features of the individual, which give him evolutionary advantages over others, are clearly manifested during his growth and development. It can be said, therefore, that evolutionary changes occur through a transformation of individual development.

The biological species to which modern man belongs was born as a result of an evolutionary process. In the modern theory of evolution, there is significant amount various theories and hypotheses, controversial and contradictory.

Question 2. The place of man in the system of the animal world

From a biological point of view, man is one of the species of mammals belonging to the order of primates.

Modern great apes - chimpanzees, gorillas, orangutans, gibbons - represent forms that, about 10 - 15 million years ago, deviated from the line of development common with man.

Hominoids are modern people and their closest relatives, the great apes, which, according to tradition, are divided into large and small apes.

The term "hominids" (derived from the family name Hominidae) should be used to refer to all populations and species with which we share a common evolutionary history distinct from that of other primates. The term "human" ("humans") should be retained solely to refer to members of the only living subspecies of hominid - Homo sapiens sapiens - just like the term "human" to refer to the characteristics inherent in representatives of living human populations.

Question 3. Trends in the evolution of primates

Let us trace the main tendencies that have manifested themselves to some extent in all primates and which are associated with the inheritance of traits characteristic of the arboreal way of life.

Animals that spend most of their time in trees must have limbs adapted to move along the branches. Animals like the squirrel use sharp claws for this purpose; in primates, however, limb development took a different path.

Life in the trees is complex and full of surprises. Primates are forced to lead a very mobile lifestyle, and by virtue of this alone their limbs must be more developed and adapted to a variety of movements than in most other mammals.

Among the factors guiding the course of animal evolution, nutrition plays an important role. The origin of primates can ultimately be linked to the consumption of food found on trees. Almost all primates are either omnivores or herbivores.

The environment in which primates live, in contrast to terrestrial habitats, cannot be called the "world of smells." Unlike other terrestrial mammals, primates have a progressive reduction of the olfactory organs.

In animals living in trees, natural selection favored the development of vision. In all primates, the organ of vision has become the dominant exteroreceptor, which is reflected both in the size of the eyes and their location, and in the differentiation of the retina.

As stated above, comprehensive information about the environment is an essential condition for survival for tree-dwelling animals. In line with the development of sensory organs, both exteroceptive and proprioceptive, primates are undergoing an improvement in the areas of the brain associated with sensory perception. Primates must also have developed a very perfect control of movements and a sense of balance.

All those changes in the brain and sensory organs that are characteristic of primates, as well as the habit of primates to take a sitting position and explore objects with the help of limbs - all this is reflected in the structure of the skull.

Caring for newborns presents particular challenges for animals that live permanently in trees. Therefore, one can think that the smaller the number of offspring, the greater the chances of successfully growing it. All primates have a clear tendency to produce no more than two or three offspring at a time, and many produce only one.

Question 4. Modern great apes

Large modern great apes belong to the pongid family. These animals are of particular interest because a number of morphophysiological, cytological and behavioral features bring them closer to humans.

Humans have 23 pairs of chromosomes, while higher apes have 24. It turns out (geneticists are increasingly inclined to this) that the second pair of human chromosomes was formed from the fusion of pairs of other chromosomes of ancestral anthropoids.

In 1980, a strict scientific publication appeared in the journal Science (Science) with the following title: “A striking similarity (striking resemblance) of high-resolution stained for human and chimpanzee chromosome bands. The authors of the article are cytogenetics from the University of Minneapolis (USA) J. Younis, J. Sawyer and K. Dunham. Using the latest methods of staining chromosomes on different stages of cell division of two higher primates, the authors observed up to 1200 bands per karyotype (previously, a maximum of 300-500 bands could be seen) and made sure that the striation of chromosomes - carriers of hereditary information - in humans and chimpanzees is almost identical.

After such a great similarity in chromosomes (DNA), no one can be surprised by the “striking similarity of blood proteins and tissues of humans and monkeys - after all, they, proteins, receive a “program” from the parental substances encoding them, which are so close, as we have seen, those. from genes, from DNA.

Great apes and gibbons diverged 10 million years ago, while the common ancestor of humans, chimpanzees and gorillas lived only 6 or at most 8 million years ago.

Opponents of this theory argued that it was unverifiable, while supporters argued that the data obtained using the molecular clock corresponded to those prehistoric dates that could be verified using other means. Fossils found later confirmed our recent ancestors among fossil great apes.

Question 5. Large great apes

The extinct driopithecins and pongins undoubtedly included the ancestors of humans and modern great apes - those large, hairy, intelligent inhabitants of the rainforests of Africa and Southeast Asia. Fossil data on the ancestors of great great apes are scarce, except for finds that allow us to connect the orangutan with the group of fossil monkeys that included Ramapithecus. But biological research has shown that great apes and humans shared a recent common ancestor.

Modern great apes include the genera:

1. Pongo, an orangutan, has a shaggy reddish coat, long arms, relatively short legs, short thumbs and toes, large molars with low crowns.

2. Pan, a chimpanzee, has long, shaggy black hair, arms longer than legs, a bare face, large supraorbital ridges, large protruding ears, a flat nose, and mobile lips.

3. Gorilla, the gorilla is the largest of the modern great apes. Males are twice as large as females, reaching a height of 6 feet (1.8 m) and a mass of 397 pounds (180 kg).

Question 6. Social behavior of anthropoids

Communities of all animals leading a group lifestyle are by no means a random association of individuals. They have a well-defined social structure, which is supported by special behavioral mechanisms. In a group, as a rule, there is a more or less pronounced hierarchy of individuals (linear or more complex), members of the group communicate with each other using various communication signals, a special “language”, which leads to the maintenance of the internal structure and coordinated and purposeful group behavior. This or that type of social organization is associated, first of all, with the conditions of existence and the prehistory of the species. Many believe that the intra-group behavior of primates and the structure of their communities is much more more determined by phylogenetic factors rather than environmental ones.

The question of the relative role of ecological and phylogenetic determinants of community structure plays an important role in choosing a particular species of primates as a model, the study of which can lead to a deeper understanding of the structure of the society of ancient people. Both factors must be taken into account, of course.

Experimental studies of the behavior of great apes have shown a high ability to learn, form complex associative relationships, extrapolate and generalize previous experience, which indicates a high level of analytical and synthetic activity of the brain. Speech and tool activity have always been considered fundamental differences between humans and animals. Recent experiments on teaching sign language (used by deaf and dumb people) to great apes have shown that they not only learn it quite successfully, but also try to pass on their “language experience” to cubs and relatives.

Topic 2. Primates and humans

Question 1. Stages of evolution of primates and humans

Speaking about the evolution of primates, it must be remembered that until now, scientists have not come to a consensus regarding the details of the structure of the genealogical tree of primates, i.e., in order to unambiguously resolve the question of: “who descended from whom and when” we don't have enough facts. The main material for anthropologists is supplied by archaeological excavations.

In recent decades, methods of geochemistry, biochemistry, and genetics have been widely used in anthropology, however, it has not yet been possible to solve all the problems of human origin. We cannot imagine in detail the process of the formation of mankind, although its main stages are currently traced quite clearly.

Currently, the following main stages in human evolution are distinguished.

Dryopithecus - (Ramapithecus) - Australopithecus - skillful man - Homo erectus - Neanderthal man (paleoanthropist) - neoanthrope (this is already a modern type of man, Homo sapiens sapiens).

To understand evolutionary processes, it is necessary to know the length of the time intervals in which they occurred. This means taking into account several different aspects of geologic time.

Archaeologists call the first period in the history of mankind the Stone Age, in which three epochs are distinguished: the Paleolithic, the Mesolithic and the Neolithic. This division into epochs, as well as the more subdivided division of the Paleolithic into early, middle, and late, is based on man-made tools.

The early stages of the evolution of the great apes, which led eventually to man, as well as to modern great apes, are reconstructed with great difficulty. The main reason is the small number and fragmentation of finds in ancient layers (over 8-10 million years old). Based on the analysis of several finds, many anthropologists place the ancient anthropoid apes, the Drioptekians, at the basis of the human phylogenetic trunk.

Question 2. Driopithecus

Dryopithecinae ("tree monkeys") are early great apes that probably appeared in Africa during the Miocene and came to Europe during the drying up of the prehistoric Tethys Sea. Groups of these monkeys climbed oaks and subtropical trees and swayed from their branches. They seem to have fed on fruits, since their molars, covered with a thin layer of enamel, were not adapted for chewing rough food. The Dryopithecus belonging to this subfamily, which lived 11.5-9 million years ago, can be considered along with the African Kenyopithecus<...>one of the earliest members of the Hominidae family.

Dryopithecus had broad, low incisors, long lower canines, and short, primitive molars. There were two types of dryopithecus, representatives of one of them were larger than the other. Time - middle and late Miocene. Location - Europe.

Question 3. Ramapithecus, Australopithecus

Until recently, most paleontologists believed that Ramapithecus was the ancestor of hominids. It was usually considered as an independent genus of highly developed hominoids that lived in Afreurasia approximately from 14 to 10 (8) million years ago.

Estimated geological age - 10-12 million years. The discovered jaws differed from the jaws of classical driopteks by the shortening of the dental arch, which was believed to have a parabolic shape, rounded in front, with reduced fangs and incisors. The fangs did not protrude from the dentition, and the first lower premolars were not elongated, like in pongids, but bicuspid, like in humans. There were no diastemas - gaps in the dentition for the entry of large fangs.

A striking distinguishing feature of Australopithecus is upright walking. It is evidenced, first of all, by the structure of the pelvic girdle - the best indicator of distinguishing between bipedal and quadrupedal forms of primates. The high and narrow pelvic bone of the monkey with straight anterior and posterior edges differs sharply from pelvic bone a person with a shortened lower part and an expanded wing (similar to a fan with a short handle).

“Australopitecus afarensis (“southern ape from Afar”), the first “ape-man” known to us, probably descended from some late driopithecin about 4 million years ago. It got its name from finds in the so-called Northern Afar Triangle in Ethiopia.

Australopithcus africanus ("African southern monkey") settled on Earth about 3 million years ago and ceased to exist about a million years ago. It probably originated from Australopithecus afarensis.

“The mighty Australopithecus (Australopithecus robustus), which at one time was called Paranthropus (Paranthropus - “near-man”), was larger and better developed physically than the African Australopithecus.

Question 4. A skilled person (Homo habilis)

Homo habilis was a bipedal creature 120-140 cm tall. The upper and lower jaws were smaller than those of Australopithecus Boisei (zinja), but almost did not differ from the jaws of Pithecanthropus and modern man. The hand of a "skillful" person was capable of forcibly capturing great power; this was evidenced by wide nail phalanges and massive tubular bones brushes (Khrisanfova, 1967). Morphologically, Homo habilis is closely related to Austropithecus. Some researchers (Yakimov, 1976; Kochetkova, 1969) do not separate it from Australopithecus. Others combine the “skillful” man with Pithecanthropes, Sinanthropes and Atlanthropes into one species - Homo erectus (upright man).

Homo habilis lived in East Africa and possibly South Africa ("Telanthropus") and Southeast Asia ("Meganthropus").

Question 5. Early traces of material culture

Early man was slower and weaker than large predators and did not have such natural weapons as fangs and claws. Still, early hominids learned to compensate for these shortcomings. They began to shape pieces of stone, bone, and wood to cut, scrape, and dig. Unlike fangs and claws, such tools could be collected, stored or exchanged at will. Over time, these tools gave man unprecedented power over his environment.

The first tools were probably bone fragments, sharp sticks, and bark trays for collecting food. Such, mostly fragile tools have not been preserved. But the stone proved to be more durable. We know that early hominins in Ethiopia deliberately split small stones, perhaps in order to obtain hard, sharp edges for cutting meat.

More effective adaptation to the hunter-gatherer lifestyle was a consequence of the development of technical skills, which, in turn, became possible as a result of an increase in the parts of the brain associated with the ability to move and communicate. Thus, cultural evolution and the increase in brain size are directly related to each other.

Question 6. Homo erectus (Homo erectus) (Archanthrope)

The first remains of Homo erectus were found in 1891 in Java by Dubois, who introduced the generic name Pithecantropus for their designation. Later finds were made in Java by Koenigswald, Jacob a. Sartone, mainly in the area of ​​Sangiran. Fossil remains were found in two geological horizons: 1) Trinilian, belonging to the middle Pleistocene, the absolute age of which is estimated at 700 thousand years at the base and 500 thousand years at the top. The forms found in Trinil are very homogeneous, and the average volume of the braincase (for 5 skulls) is 860 cm 3 . They include, however, a recently found, well-preserved skull (sample VIII) with a braincase volume of 1029 cm 3 .

In Homo erectus, we clearly find both "primitive" and more "progressive" characters, and we can consider its morphological status as intermediate between Australopithecus and Homo sapiens.

Fire was apparently familiar to people even before the advent of Homo erectus. But it can be argued that it was Homo erectus who first began to systematically use fire for heating, cooking, protection from predators, and for hunting wild animals.

For mankind, all these achievements meant important changes - cultural development now acquired greater value than biological evolution.

Question 7. Homo sapiens (Homo sapiens)

In addition to the fossil remains of hominids, which we attribute to the genus Australopithecus and Homo erectus, many others have been found, and almost every newly discovered form has been given its own specific species or even generic name. However, all these forms have many common features, and therefore there is no particular reason to distinguish several species. This single species was named Homo sapiens. We present in a somewhat abbreviated form the definition of this genus given by Le Gros Clark.

Homo sapiens - a species of Homo; its characteristic features: a large volume of the brain box - on average more than 1000 cm 3; supraorbital ridges developed to varying degrees; the facial skeleton is characterized by orthognathism or weak prognathism. The fangs are relatively small and do not overlap after the initial stage of erasure; the skeleton of the limbs is adapted for upright posture.

Topic 3. Hypotheses of human evolution

Question 1. The main hypotheses of human evolution in the period of formationenia Homo sapiens

The most important arguments in favor of the "Neanderthal phase" theory were the following facts.

Firstly, all the remains of ancient people dated with any certainty are arranged in a certain sequence: Neanderthals always occur in layers earlier than the bones of neoanthropes.

Secondly, the remains of Neanderthals, as a rule, were found along with Mousterian tools, and people modern building associated with Late Paleolithic tools.

When considering the last phases of hominin evolution, it is important to keep in mind that between the populations, apparently, there was an intense gene flow, which, in contrast to the tendencies towards divergent development, led to a network-like evolution. It is most likely, however, that in Africa, under conditions of comparative isolation, Homo erectus evolved into Rhodesian man, and the man whose remains were found in the Solo River region was a direct descendant of the eastern Pithecanthropoids. The situation in Eurasia is somewhat more complicated.

Question 2. Neanderthal man (Paleoanthropist)

Homo sapiens neanderthalensis got its name from fossils found in the Neandertal Valley near Düsseldorf, Germany. The so-called classic Neanderthal from Europe had a large, elongated head; its brain was larger than ours, and the walls of the skull are thicker than ours, but thinner than those of Homo erectus. The Neanderthal was still somewhat similar to a human erectus with its powerful supraorbital ridges and sloping forehead. The Neanderthal had a distinct, bump-like occiput with a large base to which the neck muscles were attached. Wide front part strongly pushed forward and sloping back on the sides, which gave the zygomatic bones a "streamlined" shape.

Classical Neanderthals were short, extremely muscular and stocky, with large leg and arm joints. In body proportions, they are similar to the Eskimo, whose dense build helps them keep warm in cold climates. But, as will be seen from the following presentation, individual individuals and populations had their own characteristics.

Question 3. A modern type of person Homo sapiens (Neoanthrope)

“Quitely modern man - a subspecies of Homo sapiens sapiens - is widely represented by fossil remains found in sites that are 40 thousand years old, in places as remote from each other as the island of Borneo (Kalimantan) and Europe.

In some of the oldest skeletons, there is even a specific resemblance to one or another modern race: Caucasians, Negroids, Mongoloids or Australoids.

Some paleoanthropologists believe that a completely modern person appeared on one continent (most likely in Africa), and then spread to all the others, replacing the archaic local forms of Homo sapiens. Other experts argue that archaic local forms evolved into our subspecies independently of each other.

Question 4. Distribution of modern man

More ancient fossils have been found in Africa than on any of the other continents. So, in southern Ethiopia, they found Omo-I - an incomplete skull with many modern signs, whose age is probably more than 60 thousand years. At the mouth of the South African river Clasis, "modern" remains were found, which are 100 thousand years old, and a "modern" lower jaw 90 thousand years old was found in the Border Cave.

Fossil skulls of 40,000 years ago, which are of a completely modern type, are found in various parts of Asia - from Israel to Java. They all have a chin protrusion or other distinctly "modern" features.

Humans first appeared in North America, probably between 70,000 and 12,000 years ago. During periods of the greatest cooling at this time, the sea receded and a wide land barrier of Beringia was formed, which is now flooded by the Bering Strait.

Fossil traces and fossils, whose age has been established, indicate that modern man lived in Australia at least 40 thousand years ago.

Most likely, people first appeared here in the period from 55 to 45 thousand years ago, when the ocean level was 160 feet (50 m) lower than now, and many islands formed a single whole.

Question 5. Schemes, hypotheses, causes and factors of human evolutionaboutcentury

This subsection covers a number of theoretical issues of anthropogenesis. As already mentioned, anthropologists still do not have a unified view of which of the fossil forms was the immediate ancestor of the line of primates leading to Homo sapiens (maybe this form has not even been found yet), as well as at the time of separation from evolutionary human line tree. This is understandable, because there are quite a lot of gaps in the paleontological record that can only be filled with theoretical constructions. Different scientists have different ideas about the phylogeny of a person and, in accordance with their ideas, build his family tree.

An even larger range of questions arises related to the factors and causes of the evolution of hominids, and the most interesting of them is the cause of the emergence of prehuman. There are at least three main hypotheses in this regard. Until recently, the so-called “savannah theory” was generally accepted, linking the transition to upright posture with global climate changes on the planet. There are also variants of the “water hypothesis”, and finally, of great interest are the views set forth in the book by G.N. new hypothesis, which appears to be very convincing.

Question 6. Factors and criteria for hominization

Hominization is the process of humanization of the monkey, which began with the formation of the first specific human features, and ended with the appearance of a modern type of man. For the human line of evolution, the emergence of a fundamentally new way of behavior is specific - adaptation to labor activity.

The main factor and criterion of hominization, of course, is culture, primarily labor activity. From this point of view, the paramount role of the archaeological criterion is understandable.

The main systems of hominization are: upright posture, a large highly developed brain, a hand adapted to the labor function, as well as dentition - the structure of the dental system. All these morphological features to some extent reflect changes in behavior. That is, labor activity is included in the morphological criterion of hominids indirectly, through its “imprint” in anatomical structures.

It seems to us that the family of hominids should include all bipedal higher primates who, to one degree or another, adapted to the new environment and were forced to resort to the use, and then to the manufacture of artificial means of cultural adaptation.

Other components of the criterion can be: a sufficiently high level of cerebralization and the initial adaptation of the hand to the labor activity of the "power" direction.

Experts discuss a whole range of factors that could have one or another effect on the process of hominization and its pace: this is an increase in the level of radiation, geomagnetic inversions, volcanism, earthquakes, changes in the nature of nutrition, isolation, etc.

Question 7. Ecological theories of hominization

In the foothills of the Himalayas in India, Pakistan, Southeast Africa, the Middle East and Central Europe, the remains of a fossil large ape, the Ramapithecus, were found, which, in terms of the structure of teeth, turned out to be intermediate between modern apes and humans. Subsequently, it was determined that the Ramapithecus lived about 8-14 million years ago. At this time, as paleoclimatic data show, the Earth became a little colder and savannahs began to appear in place of the previously vast tropical forests. It was at this time that the Ramapithecus “came out of the forest” and began to adapt to life in the open. One can only guess what caused this ecological restructuring, perhaps the search for food, which became scarce in the jungle, or the desire to avoid some strong predators.

In the open space, a physical restructuring of the monkey's body was required: those individuals who could hold out longer on two legs - in a straightened position - received an advantage. In tall grass for looking out for prey and enemies, this position of the body is undoubtedly more advantageous. And some Ramapithecus rose to their feet.

Question 8. Savannah hypothesis

The emergence of a species with features that we regard as purely “human” was not an inevitable and predetermined result of a teleological evolutionary process, but was a theoretically explicable consequence of the existence of human ancestors in “suitable” ecological and evolutionary conditions. Hominids and humans established themselves on Earth because, subjected to the action of basic biological and evolutionary factors and processes, due to their inherent adaptive characteristics, they were able to "solve" the problems that arose before them in certain phylogenetic and ecological circumstances. The past of man, like that of any other species, must be analyzed in the context of those events and processes that developed at the same time, in the past, and not in the light of subsequent evolutionary phenomena.

As for the number of existing species of hominids, it is possible that not all of them have been discovered yet. Since species diversity only enlivens the paleoanthropological picture, the more they are discovered, the better!

The transition to bipedal locomotion was a completely inevitable event in the savannization of Africa, and, therefore, it is also ecologically determined. One can argue endlessly about why, in this case, the chimpanzee and gorilla did not and do not switch to a meat diet and upright posture, while arguing that some other non-ecological reasons must be looked for.

Question 9. Man - "monkey freak"?

Anthropologists pay attention to the fact that the teeth of prehuman and human differ sharply from the teeth of modern monkeys. Hominids, unlike anthropoids, have small teeth, there are no huge fangs that replace knives and daggers for monkeys, but on the other hand, human molars are larger than those of monkeys.

Living conditions were quite harsh, but human ancestors nevertheless lived, as already noted, in a very wide range of natural and climatic conditions. Practically - in all climatic zones of Africa. And most of all, it is surprising that the sites of the earliest man and his ancestors are concentrated in East and South Africa, while modern anthropoids (chimpanzees and gorillas) occupy completely different areas, mainly Equatorial and West Africa.

An analysis of the distribution of the oldest remains of anthropoids shows that at the end of the Tertiary and the beginning of the Quaternary period, the entire territory of Africa was inhabited more or less evenly by anthropoid apes.

Question 10. "Water" hypotheses

Hardy's hypothesis, if you look at it in detail, is very attractive. He refers to the fact that many species, after a long stage of "land" evolution, returned to the sea, where they again underwent extensive metamorphoses. Indeed, the animal world abounds in cases of such a return.

Among the order of mammals there are also many examples of adaptation to an aquatic lifestyle.

Hardy also dwells on the magnificent mane, which nature has endowed us with and which no great ape can boast of. According to Hardy, thick hair is very appropriate on the sun-sensitive head of a waterfowl.

Mentions Hardy and sweat glands, believing that they have evolved to quickly cool the body when the swimmer is out of the water for a while.

J. Lindblat believes that this was caused by the constant overcoming of freshwater bodies - by swimming or straightening up. The straightened position of the body also allows you to go deeper into the water to collect food.

At the same time, “upright walking puts us in one of the last places among mammals in terms of speed! Where can such a low speed be effective? I answer: in an environment in which neither what the getter feeds on, nor predators surpass him in speed. That is, in the water.

Question 11

A more common opinion is about the Middle or Early Upper Pleistocene time of the appearance of the sapiens line. As a probable ancestor in this case, various authors appear various forms: either one of the late progressive erectus (Vertessellesch), or early archaic sapiens (Swanscombe), or early progressive Neanderthal (Ehringsdorf).

Finally, there is an opinion about the late origin of sapiens. In this case, progressive Palestinian paleoanthropes or even "classic" Wurm Neanderthals are usually considered to be the ancestor.

Apparently, some signs of the "sapient" complex could have arisen in the evolution of individual groups of hominids for a long time and repeatedly. And in this sense, we have the right to say that sapientation has deep roots, although the oldest “real” sapiens are still not known until 0.1-0.07 million years ago.”

Question 12

The processes of sapientation, as evidenced by paleoanthropological data, took place in various regions of the Old World, although at different rates. Various circumstances, environmental features, the specifics of the social structure of the population, etc., could play a role here. Thus, both hypotheses - the multiplicity of centers of sapientation (polycentrism) or its limitation to one fairly large territory (wide monocentrism) - have points of contact. It can be assumed that, so to speak, "outpacing" it took place in East Africa, South-Eastern Europe and the Middle East.

Now a lot of controversy is caused by the problem of the priority of Africa or Europe. Judging by some data, sapiens could have appeared in the ancient ancestral home of mankind several tens of thousands of years earlier than in other territories.

Polycentrism is also supported by the almost simultaneous appearance of sapiens at the turn of the Upper Paleolithic - about 40-35 thousand years ago, moreover, in such remote from each other, and sometimes even marginal areas, such as Indonesia (Nia on Kalimantan), Western Europe (Cro-Magnon, Hanofersand) or South Africa (Florisbad).

The final stage of hominization - the process of sapientation - took mainly the last 100 thousand years. In this segment of anthropogenesis, significant changes occurred in the morphological organization, cognitive abilities, the rate of aging processes decreased, and life expectancy increased.

Topic 4. Social aspects of human formation and its future

Question 1. Social aspects of human origin

The formation of the species Homo sapiens - anthropogenesis - is closely connected with the development of society - sociogenesis. One of the most difficult questions is the role of biological and social factors in the evolutionary development of man. At first glance, it seems that they negate each other: after all, natural selection as a biological factor of anthropogenesis shaped the human body for better adaptation to the environment, while labor is a social phenomenon that ultimately leads to the transformation of the environment in order to satisfy human needs.

However, in the process of evolution, these two powerful factors of anthropogenesis acted in a dialectical unity: the mechanism of natural selection, which manifested itself most effectively in the early stages of anthropogenesis, formed and strengthened precisely those features of the biological organization of a person that most favored the further progress of labor activity and the development of society. In the course of the process of human socialization, a gradual “removal”, “self-elimination” of the shaping role of natural selection takes place at the same time. Anthropogenesis ended with the appearance of Homo sapiens, whose brain is able to assimilate any most complex social program.

Question 2. Factors of evolution and the ancestral home of Homo sapiens

There are two main points of view concerning the origin of modern man. According to one, H. sapiens arose in several places on the planet from various ancestral forms belonging to paleoanthropes (or even archanthropes). According to another, there was a single place of origin of mankind from some one common ancestral trunk. The first point of view is the hypothesis of polycentrism, the second is the hypothesis of monocentrism. However, in Lately more and more clearly emerges a complex, uniting all the main arguments of one and the other concept, the hypothesis, which has received the name of the hypothesis of broad monocentrism.

Question 3. The hypothesis of broad monocentrism

Man of the modern type arose somewhere in the Eastern Mediterranean and in Asia Minor. It is here that the most pronounced intermediate between Neanderthals and early fossil forms of H. sapiens (Cro-Magnon) bone remains are found. Numerous intermediate forms between paleoanthropes and neoanthropes (as all forms of fossil humans of the modern type are collectively called) are also found in southeastern Europe. In those days, all these territories were covered with dense forests inhabited by a variety of animals. Here, apparently, the last step on the way to Homo sapiens was made.

In the early stages of the development of society, there must have been a selection aimed at the emergence of the ability to put the interests of the tribe above all else, to sacrifice one's own life for the sake of these interests. This was the prerequisite for the emergence of sociality, as Ch. Darwin spoke about.

Without considering in detail the many remarkable technical and cultural achievements characteristic of our ancestors in the early stages of the existence of the H. sapiens species (reduced mainly to the improvement of tools for labor and hunting), we will dwell on three points.

The first is the unprecedented spiritual, mental development of Homo sapiens.

The second greatest achievement in the evolution of Homo sapiens was the discoveries that led to the Neolithic revolution - the domestication of animals and the cultivation of plants (about 10 thousand years ago).

The third major stage in the history of modern Man was the scientific and technological revolution, as a result of which man acquired power over nature (in the last 2 thousand years, and especially in the last 3-4 centuries).

Cultural evolution arose on the basis of biological. For some considerable time, both types of evolution coexisted, influencing the entire development of the genus Homo. At the same time, the influence of biological evolution decreased, while that of cultural evolution increased.

Question 4. Possible ways of human evolution in the future

With the emergence of Man as a social being, the biological factors of evolution gradually weaken their effect, and social factors acquire a leading role in the development of mankind. However, Man still remains a living being, subject to the laws that operate in living nature. All development of the human body follows biological laws. The duration of the existence of an individual person is again limited by biological laws: we need to eat, sleep and fulfill other natural needs that are inherent in us as representatives of the mammalian class. Finally, the process of reproduction in humans proceeds similarly to this process in wildlife, completely obeying all genetic laws. So, it is clear that man as an individual remains at the mercy of biological laws. It is quite a different matter with respect to the action of evolutionary factors in human society.

Natural selection, as the main and guiding force in the evolution of living nature, with the emergence of society, with the transition of matter to the social level of development, sharply weakens its effect and ceases to be the leading evolutionary factor.

The mutation process is the only evolutionary factor that retains its former importance in human society.

Isolation as an evolutionary factor has recently played a significant role. With the development of means of mass movement of people on the planet, there are fewer and fewer genetically isolated groups of the population.

The last of the elementary evolutionary factors - population waves - even in the relatively recent past played a significant role in the development of mankind.

Topic 5. Human morphology

Question 1. The variety of forms and factors of human variability

Each person is morphologically unique, since the hereditary program implemented in his ontogenesis is unique, and the environmental conditions that control the implementation of the genotype into the phenotype are also specific. Among morphological individuals, certain types can be distinguished according to the principle of similarity, i.e. generalized variants of variability.

The variability of the body structure is established by interpopulation, intrapopulation and individual comparisons. It has both geographical (in connection with environmental conditions) and historical conditionality.

Confirmation of the wide morphological variability of the human body is the asymmetry (dyssymmetry) of the body structure, the uneven quantitative and qualitative expression of its structures on the right and left. An example would be the location of unpaired organs: the heart, liver, stomach, spleen, and others, shifted away from the median plane of the body. A person is characterized by the predominance of the right upper and left lower limbs - right-handedness and left-footedness.

Question 2. Growth and development of the human body

The growth and development of organisms are complex phenomena, the results of many metabolic processes and cell reproduction, an increase in their size, processes of differentiation, shaping, etc. These problems are dealt with by specialists of various profiles: embryologists, morphologists, geneticists, physiologists, physicians, biochemists, etc.

There are two types of morphological studies of the human growth process: longitudinal and transverse. In longitudinal studies (individualizing method), the same children are measured annually or several times a year for a number of years. In cross-sectional studies (generalizing method), children of different ages are examined in a short period of time. Thus, an average picture of the growth processes for this group is recreated. The difficulty of longitudinal studies lies in the fact that during the selection of material, as a rule, some of the children drop out and it is practically impossible to examine the entire intended group. Therefore, some variants of a mixed longitudinal study are often used. Cross-sectional studies make it possible to establish normal growth rates and normal limits for each age, however, unlike longitudinal studies, they do not reveal individual differences in growth dynamics. Based on longitudinal studies, it is possible to identify the relationship between morphological and functional parameters, as well as to understand the role of endogenous and exogenous factors in growth regulation.

Question 3. Periodization of individual development

The development of a scientifically substantiated periodization of human ontogeny is extremely complex. It is obvious that any signs alone - morphological, physiological or biochemical - cannot be taken as the basis of periodization. An integrated approach is needed. In addition, periodization should take into account not only biological, but also social factors associated, for example, with the education of children or the retirement of the elderly.

In the most general form, the periodization of the ontogenesis of mammals in general and humans in particular was proposed by the school of A.V. Nagorny in the 60s. These authors divide the entire full cycle of individual development into two periods: prenatal (intrauterine) and postnatal (extrauterine).

Three periods are distinguished in postnatal development: 1) the period of growth, when all the features of the organism (morphological, physiological, biochemical) are formed; 2) a period of maturity during which all these features reach their full development and remain largely unchanged; 3) the period of old age, characterized by a decrease in body size, a gradual weakening of physiological functions.

Question 4. Biological age

When describing the main morphological features of a person in various age periods usually use averages. However, individual differences in the processes of growth and development can vary widely. These differences are especially pronounced during puberty, when very significant morphological and physiological changes in the body occur in a relatively short period of time. The existence of individual fluctuations in the processes of growth and development served as the basis for the introduction of such a concept as biological age or developmental age.

The formulation of the concept of "biological age" has more ...........

LECTURE SUMMARY ON THE DISCIPLINE

social anthropology
Lecture 1 - 2

The term "Anthropology" is of Greek origin and literally means "the science of man" (anthropos - man; logos - science). Its first use is attributed to Aristotle, who used this word mainly in the study of the spiritual nature of man. In relation to the physical structure of man, the term "anthropology" seems to be first encountered in the title of a book by Magnus Hundt, published in Leipzig in 1501: "Anthropology on the dignity, nature and properties of man and on the elements, parts and members of the human body." This essay is purely anatomical. In 1533, the book Anthropology, or Discourse on Human Nature, published by the Italian Galeazzo Capella, contains data on individual variations in man. In 1594, Kasman's essay "Anthropological psychology, or the doctrine of the human soul" was published, followed by the 2nd part - "On the structure of the human body in a methodical description."

In the works of Western European scientists, the term "anthropology" had a dual meaning - as an anatomical science (about the human body) and about the spiritual essence of man. At the beginning of the 18th century, when the word "anthropology" was just beginning to come into scientific use, it meant "a treatise on the soul and body of man." Subsequently, this term was interpreted in a general form in the same way, combining a comprehensive study of a person, his biological, social and spiritual properties. During the 19th century and to this day in many foreign countries ah (England, France, USA) accepted the broad concept of anthropology as a general science of man.

French encyclopedists gave the term "anthropology" a very broad meaning, understanding it as the totality of knowledge about man. German philosophers of the 18th - early 19th centuries, in particular Kant, included in anthropology mainly questions of psychology. During the 19th century and to this day in England, America and France, anthropology is understood as the doctrine, firstly, of the physical organization of man and, secondly, of the culture and life of various peoples and tribes in the past and present.

In Soviet science, a strict division of the terms "anthropology", "ethnography", "archeology" is accepted. Archeology is understood as a science that studies the historical past of mankind from material sources, ethnography is a branch of history that explores all aspects of the culture and life of living peoples, the origin of these peoples, the history of their settlement, movement and cultural and historical relationships. Anthropology, on the other hand, studies the variations in the physical type of a person in time and space.

The prehistory of the development of the science of man is quite large. Anthropological knowledge accumulated gradually, simultaneously with general biological and medical knowledge, and anthropological views and theories developed in close connection with social and philosophical thought. The gradual accumulation of anthropological information - data on human anatomy, on the physical characteristics of the peoples of various regions of the earth, general theoretical ideas about the origin of man - began from ancient times.

· Ethnography (translated from Greek. tribe, people) or ethnology (ethnology) - science studies the life and cult of the characteristics of the peoples of the world.

Ethnos - the origin of peoples. Ethnography - the resettlement of peoples. Philosophy - study the most general laws of society and knowledge.

· Culturology - the study of the function of culture, factors of development, the interaction of culture, the development of symbolic systems.

· Anthropology - culture as an indicator of human development.

The task of anthropology is to trace the process of transition from biological laws, to which the existence of the animal ancestor of man was subject, to social laws. Thus, anthropology occupies a special place in the circle of biological disciplines. Having the subject of its study of man, it cannot but go beyond the limits of questions of natural history; studying a person, it enters the field of knowledge where socio-historical factors operate. From this boundary position of anthropology in a number of sciences, its relation to related branches of knowledge also follows. Anthropology is inextricably linked with other biological sciences and at the same time it is in close contact with the social sciences. Anthropology in this sense, as it were, crowns natural science. The founder of anthropological science in Russia, A.P. Bogdanov, in a speech at a solemn meeting of Moscow University in January 1876, pointed out that natural science without anthropology remains incomplete and only "with anthropology, natural science is not some kind of special island, separated by an abyss from other sciences purely human, so to speak, that is, concerning the highest, the most fascinating aspects of its nature, its history and its existence for the mind.

Anthropology includes three main sections: 1) morphology, 2) anthropogenesis and 3) race science, or ethnic anthropology.

The section of morphology resolves issues related to: a) the individual variability of the physical type, b) its age-related changes from the early stages of embryonic development to old age, inclusive, c) the phenomena of sexual dimorphism, and, finally, d) the analysis of those features of the human physical organization, that arise under the influence of various living and working conditions.

The section of anthropogenesis focuses on the changes that the nature of the closest ancestor of man undergoes, and then of man himself during the Quaternary period. This is the morphology of man and his predecessor, viewed in time, measured by the geological scale. The section of racial science, devoted to the study of similarities and differences between human races, can be called, by analogy with the section of anthropogenesis, morphology considered in space, that is, on the entire surface of the globe inhabited by man.

Needless to say, these brief characteristics it should not be understood that morphology studies a person outside of time and space, racial science - outside of an epoch, and the section of anthropogenesis - outside of territory. Of course, knowledge of the place of origin of man is also important for the problem of anthropogenesis; in the same way, for racial science, it is necessary to study the history of the emergence of races and their genealogy, and, finally, for morphology, the connection of the patterns of variability discovered by it with facts that have come down from the distant past of mankind, on the one hand, and from various areas of distribution of people in the present, on the other, is essential . However, the most important task of the section of anthropogenesis is the study of the process of becoming a person and, above all, the sequence of the emergence of his properties and signs; in the section of morphology, the main problem is the study of the factors and manifestations of variability in modern man, i.e., the “mechanisms” of shaping themselves; and, finally, in the section of race science, the main goal is to find those causes that explain the spread of human races on the surface of the Earth.

The section of morphology consists of: 1) merology (from the Greek "meros" - part), which studies the variations of individual human organs and individual tissues, as well as their mutual connection, and 2) somatology (from the Greek "soma" - body), which studies the structure of the human body as a whole, i.e., patterns of variations in height, mass, chest circumference, proportions, etc. An important subsection of somatology is that branch of anthropology that aims to establish standards or norms for the size of the human body, i.e. the most common combinations of sizes, and develops calculation methods that allow you to establish how often certain deviations from these combinations occur. Anthropology thus makes it possible to organize, on a completely scientific basis, the mass production of items for individual use (shoes, clothing, hats, gloves, furniture, etc.), which is especially important in the conditions of the planned organization of the national economy. Morphology is of great importance for establishing the norms of physical development at different ages, as well as variations in physique and their connection with the physiological characteristics of the body.

The most important sub-disciplines for the morphology section are normal anatomy, embryology and human histology. It is essential to note the differences between normal anatomy and morphology. Normal anatomy studies a person as a certain generalized type and gives a summary characteristic of an “average” person. Morphology, on the other hand, focuses its attention on variations of type and seeks to comprehend the causes, regularities, and significance of these deviations from the average type.

The anthropogenesis section deals with questions about the place of man in the system of the animal world, his relationship as a zoological species to other primates, restoring the path along which the development of higher primates went, studying the role of labor in the origin of man, identifying stages in the process of human evolution, studying the conditions and causes development of modern man.

The section of anthropogenesis includes: 1) primate science, i.e. the study of modern and fossil monkeys and semi-monkeys, 2) human evolutionary anatomy, 3) paleoanthropology, i.e. the study of fossil forms of man. The necessary auxiliary disciplines for this section are: from the sciences of natural history - geology of the Quaternary and Tertiary periods, physiology of higher nervous activity; from the socio-historical sciences - the archeology of the Paleolithic; of the philosophical sciences -- psychology.

Racial science, or ethnic anthropology, studies the classification of racial types, their distribution across the Earth, the history of the formation of races, the causes of race formation and the patterns of changes in racial types. Among the related disciplines, with which racial science is especially closely in contact, one should name from the range of biological sciences - genetics and biometrics, and from the socio-historical sciences - archeology of the late Paleolithic and subsequent eras, ethnography, linguistics and history. The terms "racial science" and "ethnic anthropology" are often used interchangeably. Strictly speaking, ethnic anthropology is only a part of racial science that studies the anthropological composition of the peoples of the world and the problem of ethnogenesis. Anthropology as a whole, and in particular the sections devoted to the problem of the origin of man and his races, from the very birth of knowledge about human nature, have been the scene of a fierce ideological struggle between materialistic science, on the one hand, and idealistic and metaphysical worldview, on the other.

At the heart of the anthropological technique is anthropometry, or the measurement of the size of the human body. The need for a quantitative characteristic stems from the fact that all sizes exhibit continuous variability, and, as a rule, the limits of fluctuations in the sizes of one group of people go beyond the fluctuations of another. This phenomenon, called "transgressive variability", obviously leads to the need for numerical definitions. According to the object that serves as the subject of measurement, there are somatometry (actual anthropometry), or the measurement of a living person, osteometry - the measurement of the bones of the skeleton, craniometry - the measurement of the skull.

In the broad sense of the word, anthropometry includes anthropometry. i.e., a technique for “descriptive” or “qualitative” characterization of the shape of body parts, head, hair, facial features, pigmentation of the skin, hair, iris, and a number of other features. In anthropology, certain measurement techniques have been developed in detail, which must be observed with complete accuracy, without which the results of research are unreliable in themselves and are incomparable with the measurements of other researchers. In order to achieve the most accurate definitions of “descriptive” or “qualitative” features, various scales have been widely used in anthropology, for example, scale sets of skin color, eyes, hair, standards in the form of models of lips, nose, eye area, auricle, etc. The main goal of developing and using scales and standards is to maintain a single (“worldwide”) scale for scoring those features that cannot be directly measured. The foundations of modern anthropological methods were laid by the works of the famous French anthropologist, anatomist and surgeon Paul Broca (1824--1880), who in the 60-70s of the last century developed detailed programs for anthropological research, proposed a number of devices and instruments for measuring the human body , compiled tables for determining pigmentation, etc.

This technique received a significant improvement and expansion in the works of Rudolf Martin (1864-1925). His three-volume manual "Textbook of Anthropology in a Systematic Presentation" gives a detailed presentation of the methods of anthropometric and anthroposcopic research and a summary of digital data on variations in individual somatological, osteological and craniological features. Martin's anthropological methodology, with various modifications, has received the widest recognition and application, as well as various basic anthropometric tools improved by him. Martin's metal rod composite anthropometer is used to determine the height and proportions of the body; to measure the head and face, as well as in craniometric studies, sliding and thick compasses are also used, also of the Martin system.

When measuring the angles on the skull, an attached Mollison goniometer is used, mounted on the leg of a sliding compass. There is a significant set of special tools: tripods for strengthening the skulls, a mandibulometer for measuring the lower jaw, compasses for measuring depth dimensions, boards for measuring long bones etc.

To obtain reliable results in anthropological research, a number of general and special conditions must be observed. The most important of them is strict adherence to established measurement methods and accepted instructions. Even a slight deviation from the definition of one or another anthropometric point or a violation in the installation of the measured is enough for the results obtained to be incomparable with others.

It would seem that the definition of such a feature, which is simple in terms of measurement technique, as the length of the body, does not require special unification. However, experience has shown that measurements of the same subject give different figures depending on whether the examination was carried out in the morning or in the evening, whether the person being measured stood in a tense position or at ease, and for other reasons.

All these methods of anthropological research are the subject of a special course in anthropology - anthropometry. Methods of variational-statistical processing of measurement materials have been widely used in anthropology; using these methods, the most representative, i.e., the value of the trait most often found in the group under study, the range of variations, the statistical reality of differences between groups, the degree of their proximity to each other, etc. are determined. In anthropometry, various methods of reproducing an object or elements are used its structure, i.e. its size and shape. These are the methods of graphic reproduction of the contours of the body, the skull; special methods of anthropological photography; plastic reproduction of the form by making casts; obtaining prints of the skin relief, preparing blood smears and a number of other methods.

Based on the philosophy of dialectical and historical materialism, anthropology rejects the idealistic opposition of man to nature. “Be that as it may, when studying comparative physiology,” F. Engels wrote to K. Marx on July 14, 1858, “one begins to feel the greatest contempt for the idealistic exaltation of man over all other beasts. At every step you stumble upon the complete coincidence of the structure of man with the structure of other mammals; in basic terms, this coincidence is seen in all vertebrates and even in more latent form-- in insects, crustaceans, worms, etc.” At the same time, advanced anthropology equally resolutely rejects the mechanistic identification of man and animals. Anthropology can correctly reflect the laws in human development only if it is guided by the idea of ​​the qualitative originality of man, of the inadmissibility of transferring biological laws into human society.

Branches of anthropology

Applied anthropology. One of the features of anthropology is its ever-growing participation in human life, its complicity in solving the issues that our reality puts forward ... It is difficult to find a science whose data would serve man so faithfully and steadfastly for centuries. We come across the results of anthropologists' research literally every day, at every step. The solution to the problems of applied anthropology is as ancient as man himself, since our distant ancestor began to manufacture and use tools and household items. How to build a dwelling, how to create comfortable chairs and desks, how to equip a workplace at a factory, at a machine tool, sew a coat, make a boat or equip a concert hall - this is not a complete list of issues that applied anthropology solves.

Physiological anthropology. A quarter of a century ago, and in August 1964, the 7th World Congress of Anthropological and Ethnographic Sciences took place in Moscow. This international forum brought together thousands of scientists from many countries of the world, among whom were world famous: A. Valois, R. Koenigswald, Thor Heyerdahl, F. Tobyis, G. Debets, V. Bunak and others. But, obviously, the most remarkable in the work Congress was the official approval of a new direction in anthropology, which received the legitimate status of a scientific discipline - physiological anthropology.

The boundaries of physiological anthropology research are so wide, its problems are so closely related to such biological sciences as physiology, biochemistry, medical genetics, that it is often simply called human biology.

It studies the functional features of those structures that are the subject of study of morphology, and it is connected with racial science because the physiological characteristics of the organism vary in various combinations among many people belonging to different races and living in various natural and geographical zones. Physiological anthropology is associated with human genetics, with the study of such traits, the hereditary conditionality of which is well known. These are blood groups, serum proteins and enzymes, taste sensitivity, earwax composition, color blindness. This is the study of the functional relationships of human populations with the environment, in other words, human adaptation to various natural and climatic conditions, and much more.

Age anthropology. The issues of age anthropology are in the center of attention of scientists, this section of morphology has become, as it were, “fashionable” in recent years. The number of studies devoted to the study of the growth and development of children of a certain age (from 1 year to 18 years), the dynamics of the physical development of a modern person from birth to old age has increased in connection with changes in the social environment and demographic indicators. Anthropologists are working on the problem of children's constitutions, since the constitutional typology in relation to children is practically not developed, the dynamics of growth processes are largely related to the type of physique in the child. Related to this problem are questions about the effect of increased physical activity on the development and formation of the body in a broad age aspect: the relationship of constitutional types and body proportions, the ratio of biological age and constitution.

Sports anthropology. In our time, the importance of such a direction of general anthropology as sports anthropology has increased. It studies the patterns of morphological and functional changes that occur in the human body under the influence of sports activities. Its main method is the method of anthropometry or somatometry - measurements of a living person.

The problems facing researchers working in this field are relevant and multifaceted. To solve them, experience and knowledge are needed not only in their field, but also in related disciplines, such as anatomy and physiology, genetics and psychology, biometrics, biophysics.

The rapidly developing science of the origin of man pushes farther and farther into the past the starting point in the evolution of our ancestors.

Anthropology is interested in literally everything: the structure of the teeth, the relief of the skin, the color of the hair and eyes, the height, weight and shape of the head; who is the closest of human relatives, in what places on our planet racial divisions were formed, why the inhabitants of the highlands have a higher level of hemoglobin than those living in the plains, how to explain the process of acceleration in children and adolescents and the amazing biochemical polymorphism of human populations, etc.

In our time, without the knowledge of anthropology, neither medicine, nor archeology, nor sociology, nor, moreover, psychology is conceivable.

As an independent field of science, anthropology arose late - at the end of the 18th - at the beginning of the 19th century. However, the earliest attempts to understand the place of man in nature, his similarity with other organisms, his originality, variations of the human type in different countries, age-related changes to explain its origin are, apparently, as ancient as scientific knowledge itself in general. The main stages in the formation of anthropological knowledge coincide with the turning points in the history of human society. Transitions from one socio-economic formation to another, accompanied by a violent reassessment of values, the struggle between the old and the new worldview, the rise or fall of thousands of individual destinies, could not but lead to deep reflection on the essence of human nature. People wanted to know about the “purpose” of man, about the forces that brought man into the world and which, having armed him with reason, raised him above all living beings and at the same time made him a victim of innumerable disasters and social injustice.

Modern anthropology is characterized by an exceptional variety of topics, and in this respect it shares the general trend of modern natural science. In a relatively short period of time, anthropology has achieved significant success, many questions that seemed intractable in the recent past have found their explanation, have become much closer to the final solution.

With the current specialization and amount of knowledge, it is almost impossible for one person to cover all these industries. Even if we narrow the circle down to cultural or social anthropology, then not everything is clear here either. It is not easy to establish whether social and cultural anthropology are different or identical (that is, in the USA they simply prefer to call this branch cultural, and in England - social, but in fact we are talking about socio-cultural anthropology).

If these disciplines are identical, constituting sociocultural anthropology, then traditionally, ethnography and ethnology are engaged in approximately the same thing as this discipline in the West, in Russia, in addition, they are understood either as one and the same, or as different disciplines (descriptive and explanatory). Yes, and in the West, the term "ethnology" is common, and the science it designates differs little from sociocultural anthropology.

About the same thing is written by those who call their discipline ethnology or ethnography, and those who consider themselves a specialist in cultural anthropology. If social and cultural anthropology are different, then it is very difficult to separate the first from cultural studies, and the second from sociology.

According to one point of view, the difference between these branches of anthropology and such branches of science as cultural studies and sociology is that anthropological disciplines traditionally focus on the study of colonial and backward peoples, and those sciences focus on modern civilized societies. According to another point of view, which I adhere to, the model for understanding is physical anthropology, in the subject of which there are no ambiguities. Like anatomy and physiology, it studies the human body, but differs from anatomy and physiology in that they study the norm as opposed to pathology, while anthropology studies the variability of humanity, the multiplicity of forms.

Similarly, one can understand the difference between sociocultural anthropology and cultural studies, sociology, and ethnology. They study the norm, while sociocultural anthropology studies the variability of culture, society and ethnicity. In this sense, it is very close (if not identical) to comparative cultural studies, sociology and ethnology. Such an understanding broadens one's horizons and expands the anthropologist's classificatory schemes into modern forms. In a sense, this science is relativistic in nature. But the traditional point of view also has weight and meaning: after all, it enters as a part of comparative science, giving it evolutionary depth. It is necessary to proceed from this understanding in the construction of anthropological education. Since anthropology is a comparative science, it is clear that a multitude of languages ​​and cultures must form the basis for it. An anthropologist is, first of all, a polyglot and an internationalist. Knowledge of languages ​​gives him not only the opportunity to freely master vast literature, but also allows him to better understand the diversity of mentalities. As soon as anthropology covers the biological aspects of the study of mankind, it must master the English concept of science, that is, rigorous methods, mathematical in its basis. One of the latest discoveries in anthropology is maps of the distribution of genetic structures in the populations of the world, allowing the reconstruction of ancient migrations. These maps are based on the mathematical processing of many DNA analyses. And sociology, if considered as comparative sociology, belongs to the same cycle of sciences. Additional rigor is introduced by the technical means of modern science - computers with their purely logical language. Both computer science and the foundations of logic and mathematics form the foundations of anthropological education. However, there is also a humanitarian aspect in anthropology. It is connected, firstly, with the fact that anthropology studies not only society, but also culture, not only its general laws, but also specific manifestations, and they are unique. Unique phenomena are difficult to compare otherwise than evaluatively, in terms of personal and collective spiritual values, intentions, goals. But the humanitarian approach does not mean vagueness and arbitrariness of decisions. In the problems of anthropology, its initial relativism cannot be solved by mathematical methods, but relying only on intuition is not good either. For the humanitarian aspect of anthropology to be scientific, it requires serious reflection on the criteria and the definition of initial principles. Requires responsible choice. Therefore, in anthropological education, a prominent place should be occupied by subjects that develop a breadth of outlook, independence of judgment and an intelligent attitude to values. These are literature, art, their criticism and the history of human thought. This is participation in social movements of the country and the world, in social and cultural practice. Finally, there is another aspect in anthropology. Being a comparative and relativistic science, it is naturally connected with the study of development, progress, evolution, and, therefore, history. Historical anthropology is a French and Russian tradition. Interested in unique phenomena, such an anthropology sees in history the key to their evaluation. She perceives history in its most expanded and extended form - from its very beginnings. This is the aspect served by archeology and ethnography - the aspect to which archeology gives foundation and ethnography vitality.

Every year anthropology is enriched with new methodological techniques borrowed from other biological disciplines - physiology, biochemistry, genetics, so necessary for studying the variability of morphological, functional, genetic and biochemical characteristics of a person.

The sphere of anthropological research gradually includes such questions as certain patterns of growth and development of a person in accordance with the formation of his constitutional type, character, temperament; elucidation of the mechanisms of inheritance of many physical, mental characteristics depending on gender, age, social status, zonal climatic conditions, etc. The task of anthropologists is to study human populations, to give a biological and physiological characteristic to those groups that live in extreme conditions, examine and compare different ethnic, age, social groups in regions similar in biological conditions.

Lecture 1. Topic: The concept of anthropology. Its place in the system of sciences and practice. Lecturer: Ilina Irina Sergeevna State Budgetary Educational Institution of Higher Professional Education "Pacific State Medical University" of the Ministry of Health of the Russian Federation

The term is of Greek origin and literally means "the science of man" (anthropos - man and logos - word, doctrine, science) Aristotle was the first to use the term. Anthropology

Anthropology (or anthropological science) in a broad sense is a field of knowledge, the subject of which is a person. The present time is characterized by an ambiguous understanding of the content of anthropology: 1) as a general science of man, combining the knowledge of various natural sciences and the humanities; 2) as a science that studies the biological diversity of man (biological or physical anthropology)

Philosophical anthropology is the science of the essence and essential structure of man, of his main relationships: to nature, society, to people, to himself, about his origin, about the social and metaphysical foundations of his existence, about the main categories and laws of his being.

Religious anthropology is a section that considers a person in relation to the supernatural (divine) principle, from the standpoint of the theological worldview; the doctrine of the essence, origin and purpose of man, of the soul of man and his aspirations to God, based on sacred texts and doctrinal tradition.

Cultural anthropology is a branch of science focused on the study of the cultures of individual peoples and humanity as a whole. Cultural anthropology studies the processes of formation and development of man, society and culture. Social anthropology is a branch of science that studies man and human society, social institutions of various peoples. Assumes a broad humanistic view of the world, based on comparative (cross-cultural) studies and trying to describe all societies - both ancient and modern, comparing them with each other.

Physical (biological) anthropology is a complex natural science discipline that uses biological methods to study various types of people modern look. The subject of study is the diversity of human biological characteristics (variability) in time and space. Hence the two most general branches of science: historical and geographical anthropology. Historically, a more specific division of biological anthropology has developed: anthropogenesis; race studies and ethnic anthropology; proper morphology; ecological anthropology.

Aristotle (BC) was the first to use the term "anthropology" to designate a field of knowledge that studies primarily the spiritual side of human nature. In this sense, the term has been used for over a millennium - and is still used, for example, in theology, philosophy, art history, etc. French enlighteners of the 18th century. still understood anthropology as the totality of knowledge about a person. Anthropology was presented as a universal science about man, systematizing knowledge about his natural history, material and spiritual culture, psychology, language and physical organization. German philosophers of the 18th and early 19th centuries. included in this concept mainly questions of the human mental world - anthropology in their understanding was almost identical to psychology.

By the second half of the XIX century. Anthropology began to be understood as a field of natural science that studies human nature primarily by the methods of biology and comparative anatomy. This was due to the rapid development of the natural sciences throughout the 19th century and the spread of the ideas of evolutionism. Physical anthropology took shape.

As an independent scientific discipline, physical anthropology took shape in the second half of the 19th century. In the 60s. in the countries of Western Europe, the first anthropological societies were established, the first special anthropological works began to be published. In 1850, an ethnological museum was established in Hamburg; the archaeological and ethnological museum at Harvard was founded in 1866, the Royal Anthropological Institute - in 1873, the Bureau of American Ethnology - in 1879. In 1884, the teaching of anthropology at Oxford began. In Paris, on the initiative of P. Broca, in 1859, the Anthropological Scientific Society was founded for the first time, under which a museum and an Anthropological School were organized. In 1863 the Anthropological Society was founded in London. Later similar organizations appear in Germany, Italy and other countries.

Greatest development Anthropology received abroad in Great Britain and the USA. British anthropology developed on ethnographic material gleaned from outside the country - in numerous colonies. Anthropology in other European countries developed on the basis of local folklore and peasant culture, so it was aimed at studying relations within one society and was called ethnology. In the United States, anthropology was formed in a very specific cultural area - the study of the American Indians, i.e. original inhabitants of the continent.

The origins of anthropological research in Russia are associated with the names of V. Tatishchev, G. Miller, P. Pallas and other participants and leaders of various expeditions (to Siberia, to the north, Alaska, etc.), accumulating anthropological characteristics of various peoples of the Russian Empire during the XVIII-XIX centuries . The works of A. Protasov, S. Zabelin, A. Shumlyansky, D. Ivanov, P. Zagorsky and other Russian anatomists and physiologists in the 18th - 19th centuries. laid a solid foundation for the development of domestic anatomy. The study of human anatomy and physiology created the basis for further anthropological research.

Naturalist, founder of modern embryology, an outstanding geographer and traveler, Karl Baer () is also known as one of the largest anthropologists of his time, as an organizer of anthropological and ethnographic research in Russia. Of particular interest is his work “On the Origin and Distribution of Human Tribes” (1822), which develops a view of the origin of mankind from a common “root”, that the differences between human races developed after their settlement from a common center, under the influence of various natural conditions in their habitats. This work for the first time is not just a collection of anthropological information, but is an attempt at a demonstrative logical conclusion of a certain hypothesis. Since 1842, K. Baer headed the Anatomical Cabinet of the Academy of Sciences in St. Petersburg, where a small craniological collection was kept - a collection of craniums (skulls and their fragments) of a person and his evolutionary predecessors. Baer's merits are especially noted in the development of the program and methods of anthropological, primarily craniological research. K.M. Baer

The official year of the "birth" of anthropology in Russia is 1864, when, on the initiative of the largest Russian anthropologist Anatoly Petrovich Bogdanov (), the Anthropological Department of the Society of Natural Science Lovers (later renamed the Society of Natural Science, Anthropology and Ethnography Lovers - OLEAE) was organized.

The development of Russian anthropology in the 60s - 70s. rightly called the "Bogdanov period". OLEAE was engaged in organizing numerous natural-science expeditions, exhibitions, publishing and educational activities, and promoting the financing of science. The most important task of the Society was to promote the development of natural science and the dissemination of natural history knowledge. The work program of the Anthropological Department included anthropological, ethnographic and archaeological research, which reflected the views of that time on anthropology as a complex science of the physical type of a person and his culture. In 1867, an ethnographic exhibition organized on the initiative of A. Bogdanov took place in Moscow, at which anthropological materials were also presented. Expeditions were organized to the north of Russia, to its central, western and southern regions, to North Caucasus, Georgia and Central Asia. The main attention was paid to archaeological excavations and the collection of craniological collections. A. P. Bogdanov

The opening of the Anthropological Exhibition on April 3, 1879 in Moscow was a real triumph for young Russian anthropology. The years of preparation for the exhibition were the period of the most intensive research activity of A.P. Bogdanov. In 1867, his largest work, Materials on the Anthropology of the Kurgan Period in the Moscow Province, was published, followed by a number of others. At this time, he formulates his theoretical views in the field of anthropology and develops methodological issues. His greatest attention as a researcher was attracted by the study of the ethnogenesis of the Russian people according to craniology. In the 70s. 19th century anthropology, not only in Russia, but also in Europe, still remained outside the circle of university disciplines, although as early as 1864 A.P. Bogdanov proposed a project to read a public course in anthropology. The problems of the origin and classification of human races acquired a political acuteness, which could not but cause a wary attitude towards anthropology in official spheres.

Dmitry Gavrilovich Anuchin made a great contribution to the development of Russian anthropology. Being in the years on a business trip abroad, he prepared the Russian Anthropological Department at the World Exhibition of 1878 in Paris. The exposition of the department and the very achievements of Russian anthropology received the highest appraisal of European scientists - OLEAE was awarded a gold medal. In 1880, at the Moscow University, on the initiative of D.G. Anuchin, the first course in physical anthropology in Russia began to work. The first major work of D.G. Anuchina (1874) was devoted to anthropomorphic apes and was a very valuable summary of the comparative anatomy of higher apes. In a monograph on the anthropology and ethnography of the Ainu (1876), along with anthropological material, D. Anuchin widely used ethnographic, historical, and linguistic data. This integrated approach generally characterizes the direction that was initiated by D.G. Anuchin in Russia. A characteristic feature of all the activities of D. G. Anuchin was the desire to popularize science, while maintaining all the accuracy and rigor of scientific research. One of the results of his activities was the establishment in 1882 of the Anthropological Museum in Moscow, the basis for which were the collections collected for the Anthropological Exhibition of 1879. The series "Proceedings of the Anthropological Department", published under the editorship of D. Anuchin, contains a number of works devoted to the anthropological study individual peoples. D.G. Anuchin

The beginning of the "Soviet period" of Russian anthropology is also associated with the activities of D.G. Anuchin. At his request, in the spring of 1919, the department of anthropology was established at Moscow University, which since then has been the main institution in Russia that trains specialists in the field of physical anthropology. After the organization of the Institute of Anthropology in 1922, the work of Moscow anthropologists, headed by Viktor Valerianovich Bunak (a student of D. Anuchin), received a new direction. The use of biometric and geographical research methods, begun by Efim Mikhailovich Chepurkovsky (), is intensively developing. Under the leadership of V.V. Bunak, differentiated methods of morphological analysis are being developed. Studies of the anthropological composition of the population of Russia and the republics of the USSR were widely developed.

In the first decades of the XX century. Russian anthropology was a completely independent university discipline. Its basis was the almost uninterrupted scientific tradition of an integrated approach to the study of man (the famous "Anuchinsky triad" of sciences, inextricably linked: anthropology - archeology - ethnography). This period - the stage of formation of physical anthropology - includes the development of general and particular anthropological methods; specific terminology and the principles of research are formed; there is an accumulation and systematization of colossal materials relating to issues of origin, ethnic history, racial diversity and, at the same time, the unity of man as a biological species.
The subject of anthropology is man. More precisely: the subject of anthropology is the diversity of man in time and space. This diversity is made up of manifestations of a large number of very different features - anthropological features. Anthropology subject

1. scientific description of the biological diversity of modern man and interpretation of the causes of this diversity. 2. identification and scientific description of the variability (polymorphism) of a number of human biological traits and systems of these (so-called anthropological) traits, as well as the identification of the reasons for this diversity. 3. to study the processes and stages of the formation of a person as a species, as well as the nature of intraspecific variations, their anatomical and physiological characteristics, and other significant biological and social facts. Tasks of anthropology

Biology is a system of sciences about living nature. Studies the structure and functioning of a living system. Biology is a natural science for the study of man in the world around him. Psychology - studies the psyche of human and animal behavior. From the point of view of anthropology, the relationship of man in society is of interest. Ethnography (translated from Greek. tribe, people) or ethnology (ethnology) - science studies the life and cult of the characteristics of the peoples of the world, the resettlement of peoples. Philosophy studies the most general laws of society and knowledge. Culturology - the study of the function of culture, development factors, interactions of culture, the development of symbolic systems. Sciences related to anthropology:

Anthropology occupies a special place in the circle of biological disciplines. Having the subject of its study of man, it cannot but go beyond the limits of questions of natural history; studying a person, it enters the field of knowledge where socio-historical factors operate. From this boundary position of anthropology in a number of sciences, its relation to related branches of knowledge also follows. Anthropology is inextricably linked with other biological sciences and at the same time is in close contact with the social sciences.

Poltava - 2006

ON ANTHROPOLOGY

SELECTED LECTURES

O. TSEBRZHINSKY

CEBRZHINSKY O lay down Igorevich . SELECTED LECTURES ON ANTHROPOLOGY. - 2nd ed. -Poltava: ASMI LLC, 2006. -77 pages. Ill. - 4, tab. - 4, bibl. – 279 names

UDC572.
BBC 28.7.

@ O.I. Tsebrzhinsky, 2006

We thank the reviewers for constructive criticism and assistance: Candidate of Philosophical Sciences, Associate Professor KUSTAREVA Lydia Petrovna (Ukrainian Medical Dental Academy, Poltava) and Director of the Lviv Institute of Anthropological Reconstruction, Candidate of Medical Sciences Sergey Alexandrovich GORBENKO (Clery, France).

A concise synthetic presentation of individual topics of the university course on the foundations of anthropology. Includes a comprehensive consideration of the essence and origin of a person: biological (morpho-physiological, genetic-neurological, ethological-psychological) and social (ethnological, cultural, political-economic) characteristics of a person, his origin (factors and stages of anthropogenesis), reviews on modern racology and ethnology, the beginning of philosophical anthropology. A number of complex problematic topics and the latest achievements of science are considered, some issues are highlighted schematically. The central problem of anthropology is the problem of the origin of consciousness, which was reflected in a number of lectures. The presentation is based on the basics of courses in human biology, psychology, philosophy, cultural history, general history, but some issues are debatable and are covered in terms of the history of anthropology. Can be used by students of biological, socio-rehabilitological, psychological, historical specialties.

SUBJECT, METHODS, SIGNIFICANCE OF ANTHROPOLOGY. Anthropology (anthropos - man, logos - doctrine, science) is the science of man as a socio-cultural and natural-biological unity. Man is the subject of study of various branches of knowledge, although all sciences are sciences of man and, as K. Marx wrote, will merge into a single science of man.

Domestic anthropology is limited to human morphology, anthropogenesis, racial and ethnic characteristics. European and American science includes in anthropology, in addition to the anatomical and morphological characteristics of the organization of a person, his material, spiritual culture, psychology, language.

The tasks of modern anthropology are the study of the problems of the origin of man and, above all, his consciousness, the valeological and clinical aspects of ethnopsychology, the problem of man in terms of culture, sociality, and activity.

Anthropology is a synthetic science, it requires biological, humanitarian and philosophical approaches, and since the formation of mankind and its development is an evolutionary self-organizing system, a synergistic approach is necessary.

Anthropology is related to biology (comparative morphology, embryology, physiology, especially nervous activity, immunology, genetics, biometrics, paleontology, evolutionary theory), medicine, psychology, history (including archeology, ethnography), history of art and language, philosophy.

Until now, the leading methods of anthropology have been morphometric: anthropometry with biometrics, reconstruction of the appearance from the skeleton, skull. Since the 1970s, physiological, immunological, biochemical, and genetic methods have been introduced into anthropology. Now the most accurate reconstructions of anthropogenesis are obtained by comparing the structure of nucleic acids and proteins. different organisms. In addition, archaeological excavations, ethnographic observations, the geography of the settlement of peoples and the history of languages ​​(comparative linguistics), philosophical and psychological studies of man, and sociological studies of communications are necessary.

Modern humanity is in difficult demographic, socio-economic and cultural conditions. The progression of an increase in the number of individual populations and nations (and their cultures, spirituality, for example, the Chinese, Muslims, Indians; passionary activity according to L. Gumilyov) requires resettlement in already occupied territories. Social inequality economic development individual states and their regions creates political problems, which, like the previous ones, may have military or terrorist solutions. Greatest practical use anthropology now has in forensic science (personal identification by remains) and in history. The separation of elite and mass cultures (according to genetic and psychological perceptions, socio-cultural environment and upbringing) reduces humanistic values ​​(for example, the predominance of physical strength over mental strength or the negative use of the latter). The further evolution of human systemicity is hardly predictable, but requires social work, industrial technologies (replacement of human labor by computers and machines), including nutrition, the success of medicine, the global cultivation of mankind. Technical progress must be accompanied by cultural progress, and humanity must approach the ideals of humanism - the harmony of the social and biological (reverence for life, help to it - A. Schweitzer, Mother Teresa). Therefore, not only students of biological specialties, but also students of humanitarian and social science faculties need to know the basics of anthropology for their professional activities, to understand a particular person.

Anthropology is a synthetic science and has many unresolved problems, this concerns anthropogenesis (changes in the genotype and the formation of human neurophysiology), the development of culture (the formation of written speech, the mysteries of ancient civilizations, including the possibility of contact with extraterrestrial), human futurology and others. These lectures outline the most important problems and achievements of world anthropology with elements of biology, neurophysiology, psychology, history, cultural studies, philosophy, and present different points of view of leading experts. The central problem of modern anthropology is the origin of consciousness, which is reflected in the lectures.

HISTORY OF ANTHROPOLOGY. In ancient philosophy, man was thought of as part of the cosmos, in the form of a microcosm - a reflection and symbol of the Universe, understood as consisting of a body and a soul; while the macrocosm was understood anthropomorphically. Anthropomorphism is the likening of human mental properties to objects and phenomena of inanimate nature and celestial bodies, animals, mythical images. Anthropomorphism is characteristic of mythological and religious ideas at the early stages of the development of society. The Hindu doctrine of the transmigration of souls (metempsychosis) removes the boundary between man and other living beings. The Indian Vedas believed for the first time that man arose from a monkey (hence the monkey cult in India).

Aristotle considered the soul (he singled out the plant, animal souls and spirit) and the body as aspects of a single reality, while Plato considered them as different substances, and the soul recalls what it has learned in the world of ideas, in the “State” he proposes to regulate the selection of parental pairs. Aristotle called man a two-legged animal without feathers. Ancient science believed that natural conditions the life of the forefathers is the main factor of anthropogenesis. Lucretius Carus pointed out the importance of mastering fire. The anthropocentrism of Socrates, some patristics and scholastics, Wolf, Teilhard de Chardin considered man to be the center and the highest goal of the universe, the crown of creation, for it bears the divine soul. Marcus Aurelius believed that the essence of a person does not depend on external circumstances, for the main thing is the internal setting of the soul.

The anthropologism of Helvetius, Feuerbach, Chernyshevsky and Nietzsche, Dilthey, Simmel, Scheler saw in the concept of “man” the main worldview category, on the basis of which a system of nature, society and thinking should be developed. The French Enlightenment defined man as a rational social being. Franklin believed that man is an animal that makes tools, that is, man is an active being (Homo faber). Scheler, Plesner, Landmann destroyed the ontologization of language, play, and fear.

Schopenhauer and Nietzsche believed that man has fallen out of the chain of natural beings, that this is an unsuccessful product of nature, its degeneration. Therefore, biologically and socially man is not perfect, which is quite fair. Schopenhauer wrote about the innate morality of man.

Anthroposophy is Steiner's occult-mystical doctrine of man as the bearer of secret spiritual forces. Hence the goal is to reveal the hidden abilities of a person through meditation, rhythmology, music, etc.

Philosophical anthropology - the doctrine of the essence of man, has largely collected all the topics of previous teachings. Man is regarded as a spiritual, but bodily sentenced being, a product of culture and nature. There are biological (Gehlen, Portman), cultural (Landman), religious (Scheler), pedagogical (Bolnov) trends in philosophical anthropology. Marcuse viewed history as the production of man himself, in which he was close to Marx.

In Christianity, according to the Old Testament, God created man from clay, earth in his image and likeness and breathed into him an immortal soul. Hence the duality of man and his fall into sin. God gave man free will, freedom of choice, including between evil and good, preserving divine predestination. The Middle Ages contrasted body and soul; M. Bakhtin noted that in the culture of medieval Christian Europe there was a bodily opposition of the creative creative top and the animal bottom, and during carnivals this understanding changed to the opposite. The Middle Ages approaches the idea of ​​the individuality of the human person.

Renaissance thinkers believed that man evolved from apes. In the 17th century, Bernier singled out 4 races and indicated their distinguishing features. Then Botzius described the orangutan. In the classification of species by K. Linnaeus, people are put on a par with monkeys. The idea of ​​the origin of man from monkeys was developed by J.-B. Lamarck at the beginning of the 19th century, and then C. Darwin, who believed that the difference between man and animals is the presence of conscience. Darwin in his book "The Origin of Man and Sexual Selection" emphasized the role of the struggle for existence. Darwin was supported by Haeckel and Huxley (Vocht himself and then they established the similarity of higher primates and humans, the ape origin of humans), and Dubois at the end of the 19th century discovered the remains of primitive man on the island of Java. At the same time, Broca developed morphological criteria for the methods of anthropology, mathematically supplemented by Pearson. Gobineau; then Deniker, Voltman, then Gunther developed a racial classification of mankind. He created an anthropological collection and proved insignificance for the socialization of racial characteristics of Miklukho-Maclay at the end of the 19th century on the materials of his expedition to New Guinea.

The doctrine of hereditary human health and ways to improve it by artificial selection in humanity was formulated in 1869 by F. Galton, humanely developed in the twentieth century by N. Koltsov, Yu. Filipchenko, inhumanely used by fascism; now eugenics is being replaced by medical genetics.

Kant first raised the question of the active essence of man, but solved it idealistically (subject-object relations are reduced to cognitive activity, although schematism is close to practical activity, the latter is understood as ethical), wrote a work on anthropology. The problem of the active side of the ideal was further developed by Hegel, who believed that shame distinguishes man from animals. Activity relied only in the sphere of thinking.

K. Marx in his early works showed the differences between the life of animals and human activity. At the same time, an important role belongs to the category of goal - a person mentally creates the final product of labor and the stages of its making. F. Engels in his work “The role of labor in the process of turning a monkey into a man” emphasized the role of food, upright walking, not only the influence of nature on man, but also man on nature, for the first time pointed out the role of joint labor in the process of humanization, mastery of fire (the labor theory of anthropogenesis ). I.P. Pavlov pointed out the differences between humans and animals - animals have the first signal system (the direct effect of environmental factors on the body), a person, in addition to this, has a second signal system - speech, denoting objects and actions.

In the history of anthropology, extremes have arisen in the form of holism and reductionism. Reductionism reduces anthropogenesis and human characteristics to biological patterns, holism elevates integrity and creativity (creation) introduced from outside into human evolution. Some researchers suggest an extraterrestrial origin of man, his hybrid origin from monkeys and aliens, which only postpones the question of the factors and stages of anthropogenesis; in this case, humanity acts as experimental animals for aliens.

In the last two centuries, interest in parapsychology has increased, which studies extraordinary (paranormal) phenomena of the human psyche, explores ways of receiving and transmitting information without using ordinary sense organs (telepathy), human impact on physical objects and phenomena without the help of muscle efforts (telekinesis), possibly with the participation of electromagnetic and gravitational fields.

A great contribution to anthropology was made by Leakey (anthropaleontologist), Hrdlichka, Martin, Weidenreich (XX century). Among the leading foreign anthropologists, it should also be noted Pearson, Martin, Zaller, who developed anthropometric indicators and their measurements, tested on the materials of European museums.

In the last third of the 20th century, E. Wilson outlined the foundations of a new science - sociobiology, which studies the evolutionary-systemic unity of nature, man and society, which brings together natural science and humanitarian cultures. Naturalism identified 3 universal human instincts that affect sociality: reproduction and preservation of offspring, nutrition and self-preservation, growth and leadership.

Philosophical anthropology of M. Buber distinguishes between the well-being of a person in the world (antiquity, the Renaissance) or his abandonment (the arena of the struggle between God and the Devil, the infinity of the physical world). This relativity is manifested in the fact that a person does not know who he is. M. Scheler classified the historical answers to this question. First, it is Christian-Jewish anthropology (the divine creation of man, the dual nature of man, resurrection). Secondly, the solution from antiquity to the German classics is reason as a divine principle. Thirdly, the decision of the sensualists, pragmatists, positivists is man as a being with animal passions. Fourthly, a person poorly adapted to the environment as the decadence of an animal. Fifthly, according to F. Nietzsche and N. Hartmann, atheism makes a person's personality not predetermined, but increases his responsibility; a person does what he is capable of, but he does not have pre-given abilities for innovation.

The anthropic principle was developed by physicists of the second half of the 20th century, at first it was an assessment of the influence of the observer on the observed, then its essence became that life, man, and reason did not arise by chance. Gubin and Nekrasova believe that a person is born with an open program, has few hereditary instincts, and human consciousness is formed under the influence of the human environment. A person forms symbols that realize the hyperactivity and potential of a person. Nietzsche believed that everything bright, beautiful, talented causes hatred and dies, mediocrities give offspring. Each person belongs to some type of personality, according to C. G. Jung: introverted thinker, extraverted thinker, emotional introvert, emotional extravert, sensual introvert, sensual extravert, intuitive introvert, intuitive extravert. G. Gurdjieff distinguishes physical, emotional, intellectual, strong-willed, harmonic personality types. Types of consciousness (according to existentialism) - objective, reflective (enter the spirit), the flow of self-experience (soul). Each consciousness, F. Nietzsche believed, is the possibility of a big one (the human ideal of genius) or a small one (cunning, opportunism, conformism for the comfort of existence without thinking about the problems of being). The properties of a person are free will, love, creativity, that is, a person is a transcendent being. The uniqueness of a person is produced: firstly, by the hereditary mental make-up - temperament, secondly, by the experience and memories of childhood, thirdly, by the individuality of the biography, fourthly, by the inconsistency of life roles. This is done by the I (including according to Rozanov and Freud) with the protection of the mechanisms of repression, inversion, reorientation. The outer self is manifested by behavior, the inner self is the hidden core of the personality (dreams, experiences, something that cannot be verbally conveyed).

Human relations are distinguished: firstly, to another person (love, friendship, shame of revelation, indifference, hatred and others), secondly, to society (language, communication, teaching, cooperation, work, family, ethnicity, social life, power - traditional, hereditary, charismatic due to the personal qualities of the leader, bureaucratic anonymous and others), thirdly, to culture (requires awareness and inner shape, the content and essence of the phenomenon of the branch of culture, culture protects a person from himself, since "demons" are a necessary part of the psyche, and include cults, art, science; already in antiquity, rational Apollonian culture cannot exist without its opposite - Dionysianism), fourthly, to nature (theoretical-practical, mytho-poetic, while Christianity ousted the pagan from nature and transferred the spiritual-mystical to the other world, nature again became alien object of conquest). Culture and life, built on the principles of rational science, are inanimate and fraught with crises, this is evidenced by mass culture and the loss of external and internal culture by children cut off from society (W. Golding "Lord of the Flies"). Already a few years after the 1917 revolution, the God-bearing people or after the 1991 revolution, a new historical community - the Soviet people (Eurasianism), represented by its best representatives, deceived and robbed its neighbor, violating all 10 commandments and eliminating culture, as well as in civilized European countries with the coming of the masses to power (France, 1789; Germany, 1932). In the 20th century, mass culture (science, art, sects, spectacles) develops, freeing a person from the desire and need to think. An industry of consciousness is emerging, manipulating ordinary people and the crowd, by imposing ready-made recipes and ideas. Ortega y Gasset believed that the masses (a crowd of gray mediocre people or, according to Schopenhauer, a factory product of nature) outside of culture are busy creating their well-being.

Until the beginning of the twentieth century, anthropocentrism actually replaced God with man, which introduced positivism into humanism, replacing the complexity of man, discovered by F.M. Dostoevsky, with nihilism with utilitarianism and pragmatism - the ideal of the average person. The herd, according to F. Nietzsche, has instincts against the strong, independent, happy, exceptional, that is, the instinct of weakness. N. Berdyaev (the author of the book on the philosophy of inequality) did not understand the path of K. Leontiev, who foresaw a revolutionary catastrophe, just as the subsequent Russian philosophy did not understand N. Strakhov and went along other tragic paths. Modern anthropology begins with the doctrine of man in Russian philosophy (F. Dostoevsky, S. Frank, N. Berdyaev, L. Shestov). Man is the greatest mystery, he is not only a part of the world, but the whole world; human freedom is freedom of choice. After rationalism, it became obvious that the fate of a person is not guaranteed, does not follow from the laws, otherwise it would be death, not life. Man finds a way out of subjectivity in two ways: by objectification into society and by transcendence towards God.

The German anthropological school included directions: cultural-logical (O. Bolnov, E. Rothaker, M. Landman), religious-philosophical (I. Lotz, G. Hengstenberg) and the most important metaphysical or biological-anthropological (M. Scheler, H. Plesner, A. Gehlen). According to Scheller, a person understands his closeness with animals and looks for differences in anthropology. Scheler recalls the plant and animal souls; plants have an impulse to grow and reproduce without a return message from the organs to the center. Animals have a warning function, they have an instinct for behavior in repetitive situations. The higher animals have intelligence. The spiritual (reason with morality) distinguishes man from the animal, man surpasses himself and the world in a fit. H. Plesner identifies three laws of human existence: natural artificiality, mediated immediacy, utopian place. A. Gehlen, comparing man with animals, points to the biological shortcomings of man, who is an active being.

Psychoanalysis moved from biomedical problems to metaphysical ones. Z. Freud believed that a person is driven by two biologically predetermined urges - sexuality and destructiveness, which are localized in the unconscious. K.Jung believed that ontogenetically, phylogenetically consciousness is secondary, that is, the child's psyche is not a tabula rasa. E. Fromm criticizes Freud for the sides of the Oedipus complex (the son's unconscious love for matter and hatred for his rival father), for the Darwinian struggle for survival; in reality, the transition from matriarchy to patriarchy corresponded to the transition from the gods of natural forces to the polytheism of reason, then to the monotheism of power. Psychoanalysis reveals death, desire, law and collides into schizoanalysis.

M. Heidegger believed, following I. Kant, that the central philosophical problems are expressed in philosophical anthropology. The death of God, according to Nietzsche, for M. Foucault is the main event of modern culture, which revealed the finiteness of man. At the same time, a person becomes understandable when he disappears as a person; man becomes nature for himself to the extent that he is capable of madness. The madness of many thinkers, artists, scientists largely belongs to their works and cuts off creativity.

The works of Bromley, Its, Gumilyov, Lurie in Russia continued the research of Miklouho-Maclay in the field of ethnography. The works of Lipa, Dontsov, Obushny, Nelga in Ukraine created national ethnic concepts that replaced the idea of ​​a new historical community - the Soviet people (apparently, in the 70s-80s of the 20th century, prerequisites were created in the USSR for the creation of an ethnic community of the same name).

Anuchin, Bogdanov, Bunak, Nesturkh, Roginsky, Gerasimov, Lebedinskaya, Nikityuk and others made a great contribution to the development of anthropology in Russia. In Ukraine, the largest anthropologists - formerly Vovk, Petrov (Domontovich), Dychenko, Kruts, Lipa, now Szegeda, Koveshnikov, Shaporenko, Obushny, Nelga, Lozka. A resident of Poltava, a graduate of the Ukrainian Medical Dental Academy, S. Gorbenko was the only one in Ukraine who continued the work of Gerasimov and reconstructed the appearance of the ancient inhabitants of Ukraine, Yaroslav Ostromysl, cultural and historical figures of medieval Europe.

In the 20th century, L. Gumilyov, B. Porshnev, B. Didenko, N. Marr came up with other alternative concepts of socialization in the process of anthropogenesis, and paleolinguistic, neurophysiological and psychological prerequisites played an important role in this.

Man and humanity (represented by the best representatives) of the beginning of the 21st century are in an unprecedented crisis of awareness of their place in the world. First, man realized that he was not the crown of creation and evolution; there is a great possibility of life on other planets, a smaller one is the emergence of sociality and intelligence, and an insignificant one is the meeting of us with it. Secondly, man realized that he was not the master of the Earth, the Universe, although he disturbed the balance in the biosphere. Thirdly, man realized that he and humanity itself is finite, therefore the decline of man from the idea of ​​being to the world of existence released in him bestial malice, aggression, sensuality. Fourthly, determinism and probability create the abandonment of a person into a strange world, the abandonment of existence and destinies. Fifthly, modern man is a product of 100 centuries of cultural development, therefore he understands the collapse of the hopes of mankind and the reasonableness of pessimism. Sixth, mankind has overestimated the role of science in humanistic progress, which gives grounds for irrationalism. All knowledge of mankind about the world makes sense for civilization, they also require the removal of subjectivity in order to obtain it.

The cosmocentrism of antiquity was replaced by the theocentrism of the Middle Ages, which gave way in the minds of anthropocentrism with the humanism of the Renaissance and modern times. This period focuses on science, which is expressed in the rational Age of Enlightenment, which ends with irrationalism, bloody revolutions and totalitarianism. The globalization of the economy and the interaction of cultures have created a new paradigm - massocentrism, this is mass consciousness and mass hedonistic culture oriented towards a consumer society (post-industrial, post-communist, post-modern), politically this corresponds to democracy. At the same time (twentieth century) within the framework of a separate state, class (Eastern Europe and Asia), national (Germany), religious (Islamism in Iran) can temporarily dominate. The crisis of the ХlХ–ХХI centuries philosophy tried to replace the global cultural flow of human development with separate types (Danilevsky, Spengler, Gumilyov); although it is clear that all options are stored in a subform. L.N. Gumilyov believed that each ethnic group goes through a series of phases, the phase of growth or passionarity requires active leaders (passionaries) and the corresponding mood of people for migration, wars of conquest; then passionarity subsides, stable development occurs with economic prosperity, then the state may disappear. Therefore, modern English-speaking may be replaced by Chinese-speaking. Thus, the historical stages of anthropology: cosmocentrism, theocentrism, anthropocentrism, logocentrism, sociocentrism, psychocentrism.

The given bibliography reflects various trends in the history of anthropology, but many of these works require critical reflection. Truly, history teaches nothing, but woe to those who forget its lessons, Klyuchevsky believed.