• When you tape down your thumb, you’ll get a sense of how hard it would be to do many things if our hands were shaped differently. Even a simple task like placing a straw in a bottle becomes difficult!

Ask An Anthropologist

Ask An Anthropologist is an educational resource for students, teachers, parents, and life-long learners. We encourage anyone interested in anthropology to make use of its content.

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Becoming human brings together interactive multimedia, research and scholarship to promote greater understanding of the course of human evolution.

Learn about William Kimbel and the brainy branch of human evolution

The Brainy Branch

Our species, Homo sapiens, are incredibly unique among the species on Earth today.

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When Did Our Brains Get Big?

Big brains are one of the features that make us human. Find out when during our evolution our brains got big and why this change occurred.
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Walking Upright: A Tale of Two Legs

How do you move from one place to another? Well, most humans walk. Walking on two legs is a very human trait. Learn how the evolution of bipedal walking changed the course of our history.
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Changing Climates and Changing Faces

Climate change has been a hot topic in discussions on the future of our global community. But looking into the past is also important. What do we know about how the climate and the environment affected our early ancestors?