Evolutionary Anthropology BSc (Hons)

ALGY101 introduces students to the concepts, methods and evidence that archaeologists use to study and interpret the past. Students gain core skills essential to building and evaluating knowledge about the human past from material remains.

What does it mean to be human? When in our evolutionary past did ‘humanity’ emerge, and how do we recognise this in the fossil and archaeological records? What does the study of human evolution tell us about our place on Earth and the future of humanity?

In this module, you will develop a framework for addressing these big questions. You will be introduced to the record of ~7 million years of human evolution from our earliest ancestors to walk on two legs, to the development of farming and settled village life ~10,000 years ago. You will learn about such key events in our evolutionary past as the development of large brains, the making of tools, the control of fire, the emergence of language and art, and the spread of humans across the globe, as well as how to evaluate the archaeological (material culture) and fossil evidence for these developments.

This module focuses on identification of osteological elements with an introduction to the osteology and anatomy of locomotor adaptations of humans and non-human primates including a major part of the module being devoted to the anatomy of bipedalism, and in addition some elements of terrestrial / arboreal quadrupedalism and brachiation. In general, students will be expected to correctly handle real human skeletal specimens and develop their knowledge of the skeletal and muscular anatomy of anatomically modern humans and begin to apply this understanding to the study of the anatomy of fossil primates, the great apes and other primates. In terms of species, the module focuses on humans and the fossils of Australopithecine / Paranthropine and Early to Late Homo species and also incorporates evidence from the other great apes, lesser apes and the old and new world monkeys.

Students will learn about the key issues underlying contemporary research in the field of evolutionary anthropology through sets of directed readings given in advance of each seminar. Seminars will be led by each member of the evolutionary anthropology teaching team, ensuring that you receive a broad overview of different chronological periods, geographical areas, and theoretical perspectives. The module will provide essential background on the main contemporary debates in human evolution, introducing themes that will persist throughout your degree. The module will have a broadly anthropological focus, but will integrate data and conclusions from other relevant subject areas such as evolutionary genetics, psychology, and the environmental sciences.

This module introduces students to the design and implementation of archaeological projects (and thereby research design more generally). It is concerned with how archaeological questions are addressed through projects, the practices involved in the various stages of archaeological projects, including desk-based assessment, mapping, data collection and analysis, field recording, excavation strategy, interpretation and site/heritage management planning. There is a strong practical element to the module which focusses on the planning and execution of a project relating to a cemetery in Liverpool.

This module provides an introduction to the history and archaeology of the Near East and Aegean from ca. 4,000 to 800 BC, specifically the ancient cultures of the Near East, Levant and Greece. The module includes artefact handling sessions.

This module examines a number of global ‘grand challenges’ facing humans on the planet earth related to climate and environmental change. It will introduce students to core concepts of sustainability and human impacts upon the environment, as well as exploring the range of proposed solutions and mitigation strategies which are available to understand climate and environmental change. The module thus provides a core knowledge base for social and natural scientists who wish to understand environmental change.

The zone of life on earth, or the ‘biosphere’, is a highly dynamic system responding to external pressures including changing human activities. The biosphere obeys a numbers of simple natural principles, but these often interact to create complex and sometimes unexpected responses. Using a wide range of examples we will explore these interactions between organisms and the environment. We will examine how species organise into communities, and how energy and other resources flow through ecosystems. We will explore how ecosystems respond to change, including gradual environmental shifts, sudden disturbance events and the effects of human activities. We will also learn how the key principles of ecology can be applied to conservation. We will assess the current state of the biosphere, and evaluate the major current threats. We will also look towards the future of ecosystems, including whether we can restore degraded habitats, and recreate “natural” landscapes.

This course builds on the field experience you have gained as your end of Year 1 training, as we explore the process that follows activity in the field. We will examine the stages of post-excavation, and the creation of published and grey literature of the type generated for archiving by many field archaeology professionals.

The two assignments consider first your experiences on the fieldwork and what you have learnt, presented as a reflexive essay and other smaller components. The second assignment is where you use the skills gained during the teaching this semester to produce a grey literature style report on selected sets of deposits from the fieldwork.

Before the development of agriculture all humans lived by hunting, gathering and fishing. Today, this way of living has largely disappeared. Colonisation, urbanisation and globalisation have collectively disrupted and altered the lives of all but a very few hunter-gatherers. Despite the considerable impact of these external forces, hunter-gatherer communities remain a primary source of knowledge for building hypotheses about how earlier humans may have lived.

We as archaeologists are becoming increasingly aware of the limitations of the ethnographic record of historic and current hunter-gatherers for interpreting the past. Used with caution, however, this body of information can help us think about how prehistoric hunter-gatherers might have organised their lives and solved basic problems of making a living, raising children and resolving conflicts within and between communities. Over the next few weeks we’ll take a comparative approach which means looking at a variety of hunter-gatherer societies living from the tropics to the Arctic to see what they have in common and what areas of their lives differ. We’ll be looking for patterns in adaptations that might be useful for thinking about how prehistoric hunter gatherers may have lived, and how we can test those models given the many limitations of the ethnographic record. There is a deeper purpose to this course and that is to raise our awareness that there are, and were, different ways of living.

In this module students are introduced to the use of human skeletal assemblages as archaeology and material culture. Students will handle human remains and gain an understanding of how basic identification, ageing and sexing is done. This module also looks at current techniques such as stable isotope and DNA analysis and ethical regulations.

The module examines Stone Age Archaeology of the last million years, concentrating on the period of Homo erectus, the emergence of Homo sapiens, and the appearance of anatomically modern humans some 200,000 to 300,000 years ago. In geographic scope, the module deals chiefly with developments in Africa, the Middle East and Europe. It covers the first appearance of art, the interaction between anatomically modern humans and Neanderthals and the archaeology of the Upper Palaeolithic up to the glacial maximum about 20,000 years ago. Its principal aims are to examine Old World Archaeology from the prime time of Homo erectus (>500,000 years) to the time when Homo sapiens sapiens is fully established in Europe (about 40,000 years ago).

With a focus on the archaeology of the Eurasian steppe, this module explores the emergence and transformation of steppe pastoralist societies from their origins in complex hunter-gatherer communities to the formation of the first ‘nomadic’ empires. It represents a rare opportunity to encounter the extraordinary archaeological record of Siberia and Central Asia and to focus upon societies whose contribution to global culture has been routinely dismissed in both Euro- and Sino-centric stories of ‘civilisation’.

A combination of taught lectures and student-led seminars, the course will introduce to key concepts and general trajectories, whilst encouraging discussion of broad theoretical ideas and specific archaeological evidence.
Throughout the course, you will investigate critically the changing relationships between steppe societies and their neighbours and explore the transformative role played by pastoralist peoples in conflicts, communication and the rise of the Silk Roads.

The module is specifically designed as a broad entry point for students whose primary interests lie in the prehistoric archaeology and ancient history of Europe, Western Asia or China and it will also provide valuable baseline for those going on to study later periods of Eurasian history.

This module provides students with an introduction to the principles and practical applications of archaeobotany, the study of ancient plant remains retrieved from archaeological sites. Students will have the opportunity to learn hands-on how plant remains (wood and seeds) are analysed (including botanical identification and data analysis methods), what sort of information can be gained for reconstructing past plant food use, economies, landscapes and people-environment interactions, and how archaeobotanical research is integrated to fieldwork projects and post-excavation analysis. The module is delivered through a series of lectures and laboratory-based practical sessions. Assessment is through one essay (topic to choose from a range of subjects made available to students in advance), a portfolio of laboratory work, and one laboratory-based assignment (practical test).

The Upper Palaeolithic is considered by many as the time of the highest development of the hunter-gatherer way of life as seen through the lens of archaeology. Nowhere is this more evident than in western and central Europe. With the arrival of modern humans, archaeologists witness the extinction of the indigenous hominin line of the Neanderthals, the common appearance of elements of symbolic expression in the form of ‘art’ and personal ornamentation, the appearance of specialist and possibly time-delayed subsistence economies, larger social groups, the burial of individuals with a ‘wealthy’ suite of burial goods, complex and high-investment technology and ‘frequent’ stylistic change in the forms of material culture.

The reason for these changes and developments, however, is still a matter of heated debate. Through the course of this module we shall explore the nature of these changes as they can be observed in the archaeological record, in the context of our current understandings of climate change, chronology, and hunter-gatherer ethnography. In particular we shall the evidence to support these interpretations and whether these developments are;

i. intrinsic to the nature of modern human behaviour;
ii. an incremental development through time;
iii. a response to severe local climatic change;
iv. an outcome of the demographic change;
v. a combination of the above.

This module will also help students to develop a set of essential research skills: the critical analysis of archaeological data, the development of a synthetic background section to a particular research topic, and the use of concept maps to help thinking.

This module covers Later British/Irish Prehistory from the Neolithic to the end of the Bronze Age. Moving on from a brief introduction to European Prehistory in Year 1 (ALGY106 and ALGY131), we now focus on the key issues currently under debate in Prehistoric studies in Britain: Neolithic sedentism and mobility, how we think about Stonehenge, the new science of migration, settlement and land use, ritual traditions, climate change, and the nature of prehistoric society. This module considers how we have often constructed an uncritical understanding of the past, particularly its power structures, in our own image. As archaeologists of the post-colonial era, we instead investigate how a critical archaeology is working to discover the real ‘difference’ of the past. The aim is to gain a developed understanding of prehistoric social practice and a critical understanding of prehistoric studies.

The legislative and management structures related to heritage, and the purpose, scale and effectiveness of these varies greatly across the globe, and is constantly being changed in response to economic, social, cultural and legislative forces. This module examines current agendas, policies and practices in a historical perspective, and then concentrates on a critical review of current practice. Aspects of the varied UK systems are considered within a comparative international context, considering the management issues associated with sites, monuments and buildings, and objects, museums and archives. Heritage managers mediate between remnants of the past and political, cultural and economic structures in the present. Whilst the module contains much that relates to practice within current legislative, cultural and economic systems, it also reflects on the ethical and socio-political dilemmas often facing heritage management.

This module aims to prepare and empower students to participate successfully in professional work experience, such as a year in a placement or internship, or volunteering opportunity, and to develop, in a pro-active way, life-long skills, attitudes, and behaviours. Students will have the opportunity to engage in inter-disciplinary, team-based research, gain the knowledge, confidence, and self-awareness to source and successfully apply for professional work opportunities.

​ The evolution of the human mind is examined from a multidisciplinary perspective that integrates the often overlooked archaeological record with that of the better known theories and data drawn from other disciplines. Evolutionary anthropology is necessarily a broad subject, and the evolution of human cognition is informed by insights from many disciplines. This module aims to synthesize studies from anthropology, archaeology, psychology, ecology, evolutionary biology, and neuroscience into a complete picture of the leading hypotheses concerning human encephalisation and associated cognitive abilities. The module is rooted in the anthropology of hominins and non-human primates, but will also make use of a broader comparative approach where relevant, drawing on studies of more distantly related taxa.

This module considers display and public interpretation in museums and galleries on the one hand and publicly accessible sites and monuments on the other. This module examines current UK interpretation theories, policies and practices in an international comparative perspective. Heritage interpretation and display brings understanding of the past to peoples in the present, though what aspects of the past to reveal and emphasise can be highly political and controversial. The module concentrates on current practice, but it also reflects on the selectivity of heritage interpretation decisions, and the ways interpretation can exclude as well as include various sectors of society.

The module CLAH222 provides an opportunity for students to undertake a placement in a setting which matches their academic and possible career interests to develop materials and / or undertake tasks within a practical or vocational context, to apply academic knowledge from their degree and to develop personal and employability skills within a working environment.
Following an application process for work placements, this 15 credit module runs in semester two with a minimum of 24 hours of placement, plus supporting workshops and independent study. There is an element of flexibility in how the placement is scheduled based on the needs of the organisation and taking into consideration individual timetables. This could be half a day for six weeks or two half days for three weeks, for example.
Application for the module is via a competitive process, which usually takes the following form: students express interest in the module and preferred sectors of employment; details of the available placements are circulated towards the end of Year One; students submit 2 applications and Curriculum Vitae (CVs) for the employers to consider; the employers invite students to interview and they select the successful candidate(s).
The Careers and Employability Service supports students during the application and interview process. Once a student has been successful in the application process, a learning agreement will need to be drafted, Health and Safety pro-forma completed and, where applicable, Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) and other checks made on behalf of the student.

This module offers an introduction to the study of archaeological artefacts and the information they contribute to our understanding of the past. It will introduce a wide range of natural materials and explore the technologies by which they can be worked, shaped and transformed. With its significant practical component, the module offers a chance to gain valuable experience in object handling and to develop your skills in identification, description, analysis and interpretation of both assemblages and artefacts. In the process, you will consider how far it is possible to reconstruct the technologies by which different materials were processed, to determine their origins, and to infer the function of the artefacts they were used to make.

Throughout the course, you will be encouraged to recognise the complex relationships between technology and society and to appreciate the importance of asking meaningful research questions about archaeological artefacts which acknowledge this social context.

ALGY250 is essential for anyone interested in ancient material culture and provides the foundation for further specialisation in archaeological materials research in your final year through ALGY397 and ALGY314.

A 10,000 – word dissertation on an original archaeological/Egyptological research topic which is able to demonstrate that the student can: identify a research question, design and conduct a work plan to explore this question, assemble and analyse academic literature (bibliography) and primary evidence (original sources, datasets), and present a coherent set of data and theoretical arguments in order to analyse and interpret the question in hand.

This module will introduce students to the broader context of professional practice in the fields of heritage and archaeology in our contemporary society. Specifically, this module seeks to enhance students’ skills in identifying points of contention or interest between different sections of the community in relation to a series of key themes. The module will also enable students to think clearly through the potential ramifications of following particular courses of action related to the management of heritage assets – including archaeological remains, standing buildings and monuments, and landscapes both human and natural. These themes include the ownership of heritage assets, access to heritage assets, the presentation of heritage assets, issues of sustainability and the development of assets and, lastly, claims to authority over such assets by archaeological and heritage professionals. Teaching methods and assessment will concentrate on helping students to identifying potential conflicts of interest in the study and management of heritage, exploring the political and ethical nature of these conflicts of interest and presenting a specific case for action or resolution. The module will require students to become familiar with the detail of a series of current case studies.

Our aim in this module is firstly to develop a good knowledge of what is present and, secondly, an appreciation of the difficulties of interpreting objects and images that in many ways seem so similar to contemporary objects. The presence of ‘artworks’ has been recognized as a significant feature of the Upper Palaeolithic since the mid 19th century, whilst the existence of cave paintings and engravings dating to the Upper Palaeolithic was first acknowledged in the early 20th century. These artefacts and images have come to be seen as the evidence for human symbol activity: the communication of meanings between groups and individuals on the basis of mutually comprehensible and possibly abstract ‘images’ in situations of co-presence and possibly co-absence. An understanding of these objects and markings is therefore central to the study of human cognitive and social evolution.

Despite the long history of research in this field, there remain real research challenges in recording what is present, understanding how it was made, determining the makers of the imagery, and above all interpreting what it might have meant to Palaeolithic human populations. Recent scientific work in dating, paint analysis and the identification of elements of animal behaviour and human form has transformed what we can learn form these images and markings.

The module begins with the discovery of the art, looks at recent developments in dating and recording, and then explores a variety of issues in interpretation. An underlying theme is to look at each of these elements, through three overlapping narratives; the story of the practice of art recording; the story of artistic interpretation; and the story of the interpretation of meaning.

This module will help you develop a solid understanding of how archaeologists use scientific analysis to ask important questions about ancient materials, artefacts, technologies, and society. It is designed to build upon the knowledge and skills developed in ALGY250, enabling students with an interest in scientific research to familiarise themselves with a range of analytical instruments and methodologies, how they work and how they can be applied to the archaeological record. The module will equip students with the skills and experience necessary to select appropriate analytical methodologies for their research and to critically evaluate analytical research data published in the literature.

The module provides an excellent pairing with ALGY314, which offers a more practical introduction to laboratory
skills.

This module examines the archaeology of the southern Levant in the Iron Age as the context within which the Hebrew Bible took shape.  Lectures, readings and seminars address current issues of debate within the field, as well as emerging methodologies and recent evidence.

The African archaeological record is unique in its longevity and continuity from the first stone tools to the development of farming and early states. This course selects three intervals of technological and social change starting 500,000 years ago and ending with the development of plant and animal domestication.
The first transition is from Early to Middle Stone Age (between 500,000-200,000 years ago), the second from the Middle to Later Stone Age (70,000 to 20,000 years ago) and finally the shift from hunter-gatherer lifestyles to ones based around farming and cattle after 10,000 years ago.
Along the way we’ll consider how technologies change, what role climate change plays as a driver of innovation and explore the emergence of symbol-use and the appearance of rock art.

The module covers the Iron Age in Europe from 800 BC-AD 70. We will focus on Celts in the texts, prehistoric houses/settlement and agriculture, ritual deposition, mortuary traditions (e.g. chariot burials, bog bodies), and social change. With a focus on Britain, we will also look at the continental material (Netherlands, Denmark, France, Germany, Spain), on the development of the field, and the themes of settlement, traditions of artefact deposition, land use, burial traditions, and understanding society.

This is practice-based module introducing the laboratory analysis of archaeological materials. Through seminars and practicals you will be offered in-depth tuition in a range of common materials and have the opportunity to experience analytical and technological processes at first hand. You will learn to describe common materials under the microscope and to identify some of the basic indicators of human interaction with these materials (using appropriate analytical instruments). The module is an ideal choice for anyone looking towards a career in archaeological finds processing or research and provides an ideal pairing with ALGY397, offering the chance to put theoretical knowledge into practice.

How does our knowledge of the past help us understand the present and shape the future? This module aims at answering this crucial question by bringing together your interdisciplinary perspectives and the staff specialisations.
We will discuss some of the major societal questions that we face globally today, and reflect upon the relevance of knowledge about the past from comparative perspectives for wider debates about the present and future of humanity. The module will prepare you for life after graduation by providing you with transferable skills (including digital fluency, communication skills, critical thinking, teamwork, and increased cultural understanding) that are highly valued by employers across sectors. This module is taught through a series of workshops (mixed format presentations by staff, class discussion, group and individual work).