The first peoples How does culture rise from forest to farm?

Makapansgat Culture Artifacts Cave art Venus Agriculture Domestication Ceramics Megaliths Mythology

Makapansgat

1. Can we consider the Makapansgat pebble art?

2. Is “Lucy” (an Australopithecine) a human being? Why or why not?

3. What is the “anthropological perspective”?”

Australopithecine and the Makapansgat pebble

The first peoples How does culture rise from forest to farm?

Makapansgat Culture Artifacts Cave art Venus Agriculture Domestication Ceramics Megaliths Mythology

Culture

1. What are the characteristics of “culture”?

2. What defines civilization?

3. What were the advantages of disadvantages of hunter-gatherer societies?

San, also known as Bushmen, hunter-gatherer of Southern Africa

The first peoples How does culture rise from forest to farm?

Makapansgat Culture Artifacts Cave art Venus Agriculture Domestication Ceramics Megaliths Mythology

Artifacts

1. What is a physical artifact? What are the differences between artifacts collected by anthropologists and archaeologists?

2. How do beliefs, values and ideas serve as cultural artifacts?

3. Why do we study symbols, rituals, arts, customs, and shared knowledge?

Clovis points (fluted projectile), Paleoindian period around 13,500 years ago

The first peoples How does culture rise from forest to farm?

Makapansgat Culture Artifacts Cave art Venus Agriculture Domestication Ceramics Megaliths Mythology

Cave art

1. What function or purpose did cave art serve?

2. What does cave art say about our ancient ancestors?

3. What does he level of sophistication (realism/ naturalism, perspective, color) say about the artists and their cultures?

Cave painting of aurochs, horses, and deer at Lascaux, France

The first peoples How does culture rise from forest to farm?

Makapansgat Culture Artifacts Cave art Venus Agriculture Domestication Ceramics Megaliths Mythology

Venus of Willendorf

1. What does the Woman of Willendorf (Venus) say about the representation of women?

2. How does she compare to other fetish-sized representations of the modern day?

3. Why is “Woman” preferred by scholars today, as opposed to “Venus”?

c. 28,000 B.C.E – 25,000 B.C.E.

The first peoples How does culture rise from forest to farm?

Makapansgat Culture Artifacts Cave art Venus Agriculture Domestication Ceramics Megaliths Mythology

Agriculture

1. Compare today’s cropland to that of the Neolithic eras. Where do fertile lands tend to dominate? Why?

2. Explain how agriculture leads to the development of the walled city.

3. How is agriculture a double-edged sword? How is it both freeing and limiting? Think today and as well as the past.

Climate change: how a warming world is a threat to our food supplies

The first peoples How does culture rise from forest to farm?

Makapansgat Culture Artifacts Cave art Venus Agriculture Domestication Ceramics Megaliths Mythology

Domestication

1. How does the evolution of grass allow for domestication by humans? How is grass singly important?

2. What is the significance of domestication?

3. What are the issues with domestication?

first domesticated plants about 10,000 years ago, between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers in Mesopotamia

The first peoples How does culture rise from forest to farm?

Makapansgat Culture Artifacts Cave art Venus Agriculture Domestication Ceramics Megaliths Mythology

Ceramics

1. How does the potter’s wheel become the wheel and axle of carts and wagons?

2. How does the use of pottery indicate that a culture is probably sedentary?

3. What do pottery styles tell us about a culture?

Sarasvati-Sindhu Valley potters shaped clay pots on a wheel, like this one used by an Indian potter today

The first peoples How does culture rise from forest to farm?

Makapansgat Culture Artifacts Cave art Venus Agriculture Domestication Ceramics Megaliths Mythology

Megaliths

1. What purpose do megaliths serve? Why spend the energy and resources to create them?

2. How and why does religion and ritual form?

3. How does ritual serve as communication?

4. How does ritual create norms?

a large stone that has been used to construct a structure or monument

The first peoples How does culture rise from forest to farm?

Makapansgat Culture Artifacts Cave art Venus Agriculture Domestication Ceramics Megaliths Mythology

Mythology

1. Why did ancient peoples describe the natural world anthropomorphically?

2. What separates mythology from philosophy and from religion?

3. What is the role of myth in daily life?

4. What myths do we create today?

5. What is the role of the storyteller?

Shetani spirit of East African mythology and popular belief (the Makonde people of Kenya, Tanzania, and Mozambique)