The earliest hominids roamed Africa more than 3 million years ago, while the earliest evidence for modern humans can again be found in Africa starting around 300,000 years ago. Since then, humans have been migrating across Africa and throughout the world and have admixed, split into different populations, and while doing so, colonised the entire planet. Migrations to various environments created countless opportunities for humans to diversify in spectacular ways, so that they could adapt to novel and challenging environments.
First, we will discuss key concepts for the study of human evolutionary history to understand the methods involved and why understanding our evolutionary past has wide relevance for us today. We will offer a fascinating practical session so that students can explore how the study of human fossils leads to a better understanding of the distant origins of our species.
We will travel across the world and unravel the human genome to get a glimpse into how and why humans have evolved. We will explore how past migrations and other key evolutionary events have shaped human biology leading to diversity in traits such as human skin colour, response to pathogens, and tolerance to lactose. Finally, we will illustrate the power of recent ancient DNA research to open a wider window into modern humans’ encounters with the Neanderthal and Denisovan “cousins”, and towards the evolution of our incredible present day diversity.
Learning outcomes
- Understand how the fossil evidence informs us of human origins and migrations;
- Appreciate the impact of migrations and other population events on human diversity;
- Assess how key human traits have evolved through adaptation to various environments;
- Understand the impact of ancient DNA studies on wider debates in human evolution.
