The diversity of human behavior proves that this behavior is not programmed in the human body in any precise way. However, the fact that all humans can and must learn culture, and that no other beings do or can learn culture fully, means that there is something about human beings that makes culture possible and necessary. Culture, that is, is constructed on a foundation of physical characteristics which, while they do not determine behavior in detail, set the general outlines for the kinds of behavior that humans can and must perform. This feedback relationship between biology and culture makes humans bbiiooccuullttuurraallbeings – not merely biological, but not merely cultural either.
The distinctive human physical traits are not entirely uniquely human but are generally shared by a category of species known as pprriimmaatteess, which includes apes like the chimpanzee and gorilla, monkeys of various kinds, and the most “primitive” of
Bourdieu, Pierre. 1977.
Outline of a Theory of Practice. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press.
Biocultural
The mutual interaction between physical/biological and behavioral/cultural factors, in which physical traits make certain behaviors possible, and behavior feeds back to influence physical traits.
Primate The term for the classification of mammals, including prosimians, monkeys, apes, and humans, that share a collection of physical characteristics including a distinct tooth pattern, five- fingered hands, a tendency toward erectness of the spine, large eyes and good vision, and a relatively large brain in relation to body weight, among others.
See Chapter 11
primates classified as pprroossiimmiiaannss. Primates are grouped together in the first place on the basis of these common characteristics, such as:
■ Hands with five fingers and (usually) fingernails instead of claws, with an opposable thumb that makes grasping possible. The fingers have sensitive tactile pads on the tips, and the hands and feet (which are also “grasping” in orangutans) come at the end of very flexible limbs capable of a wide range of motion.
■ Teeth that are varied and generalized, with cutting teeth in the front and grinding teeth in the back. There is even a regular pattern of teeth, consisting of two incisors, one canine, two premolars, and two or three molars on each side, top and bottom. The variety of teeth makes a varied and omnivorous diet possible.
■ Large brains relative to body weight, with special development of the frontal and back areas. There is also an emphasis of eyes over noses on the face. Vision is acute, while the sense of smell is weaker. The result is a flattened face with large eyes.
■ A tendency toward spinal eerreeccttnneessss, with the head “on top of” rather than “in front of” the spine. This gives primates a relatively upright posture and a tendency toward bbiippeeddaalliissmmor walking on two feet.
■ Relatively long lifespan, with a lengthy period of immaturity or “childhood,”
during which youths are highly dependent on and very interactive with parents as well as other members of the group.
The combined effect of this constellation of traits is a kind of “freedom” or “openness”
of behavior, an adaptability which most other species lack; primates are not highly physically specialized for any single way of life, which means that they – and we – are capable of diverse ways of life. The biocultural approach, and the evidence dis- covered through this approach, suggest not only that human physical characteristics make human behavioral characteristics (culture) possible but that culture is not an
“all or nothing” thing. Humans have a great deal of it, but other species may have some measure of it too, depending on how human-like their biology is.
Prosimian
The category with the classification Primatethat includes the least derived or
“most primitive” species, such as lemurs, lorises, bush babies, galagas, and so on. Most have long tails and protruding snouts, but they exhibit other basic features of primates.
Erectness
The tendency to have an
“upright” posture based on a spine that is vertical rather than parallel to the ground.
Bipedalism
The ability and tendency to walk on two feet.
In 1949 Japanese scientists began observing a troop of small monkeys called macaques on the Japanese island of Koshima and providing them with food. In 1953 one young female, whom the researchers called Imo, was seen carrying a sweet potato to a stream where she rubbed it in the fresh water. On subsequent trips to the stream, she waded deeper into the water and held the food with one hand while washing it with the other. Within three months, three other individuals began practicing the behavior, and by the end of five years 75 percent of the younger members of the group were habitual potato-washers. Only the old males did not adopt the behavior. But sweet potatoes are a big food that allows them to eat fast BOX 2.2 PRIMATE CULTURE?
Beings with bodies like primates are prone to engage in behaviors like primates.
The most fundamental primate behavior is living in social groups. Other animals (and even plants) live in groups, but social groups are distinguished by their internal diversity of rules and roles – that is, different parts to play or “kinds of individuals”
to be. One particularly clear and important expression of social behavior is d
doommiinnaanncceeor hierarchy, in which some individuals have more status or social power than others. This can of course be based on sheer strength, but it typically is not. Such factors as age, sex (males are often but not always dominant), family relations, and “alliances” with other individuals can all enhance status and the likelihood of achieving leadership and enjoying its benefits, such as more and better food and mates. Indeed, as Frans de Waal’s chimp “ethnography” Chimpanzee Politics(1998) suggests, primates engage in distinctly “political” actions when they are seeking or exercising power. There are even data to support the notion that sex roles in some primate societies are learned. Hamadryas baboons, for instance, live in male- dominated harems, while savannah baboons do not. When Hans Kummer (1995) transplanted Hamadryas females into savannah troops, the females initially acted submissive, only to discover that the males did not herd and bite them, and they quickly became as “free” as native female savannah baboons; on the other hand, freedom-loving savannah females placed in Hamadryas troops were bitten and herded by males and eventually “learned their place,” although they still remained rebellious and hard to control.
There is reason to believe that primates not only enjoy being social but need to besocial. The famous primatologist Robert Yerkes went so far as to claim that one primate is no primate at all (Lorenz 1963: 100). A series of experiments by Harry Harlow (1959) supports this position. He took baby rhesus monkeys and raised them in isolation. The result was often a “neurotic” monkey who cringed in the corner of
Dominance
The social relationship in which certain individuals have higher prestige or power in the group, allowing them to enjoy more or better resources as well as the deference of lower ranked members.
and flee. So observers decided to give them small foods like wheat or rice which the macaques would have to laboriously pick out of the sand. Imo once again outsmarted the scientists, inventing a new behavior in which she scooped a handful of sand and grains and carried it to the water, tossed it all in, and quickly skimmed the food off of the surface. This new solution also spread among most members of the group (Kawai 1965). No other population of macaques had ever been observed engaging in this behavior. What appeared to be going on here was the innovation and then learning and sharing of a new behavior as an adaptation to a novel environmental circumstance – the key qualities of culture. Since that time scientists in the field have noted many other kinds of “cultural” behaviors, such as tool-use and tool-making, and even some that appear to be “symbolic.” For instance, in 1993 a young male chimpanzee dubbed Kakama was watched moving through the forest in Uganda with his mother and clutching a small log. At first he handled it the way a female handles a baby. He went to considerable trouble to bring the log along as they traveled, eventually stopping to build a nest in the branches, in which he placed it. Over the course of two hours, Kakama took the log everywhere he went, carrying it on his back or on his hip.
At one point it fell to the forest floor, but he retrieved it. Wrangham and Peterson concluded that they “had just watched a young male chimpanzee invent and then play with a doll” (1996: 254–5).
de Waal, Frans. 1998 [1982]. Chimpanzee Politics: Power and Sex among Apes, revised edn.
Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.
his cage and even rocked back and forth the way some disturbed humans do. When introduced to other monkeys, the response tended to be either fear or aggression but hardly ever successful social interaction. And if an isolated female became a mother (difficult enough, since mating behavior itself appears to be learned), she usually had little or no idea what to do with the infant; she would either be neglectful or actually aggressive toward it, often ending in its death.
Nonhuman primates demonstrate a range of other behaviors that are familiar and similar to humans. Among these behaviors are the following.
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1.. AAggggrreessssiioonn aanndd tteerrrriittoorriiaalliittyy. Primates tend to defend a specific territory or “home range” within which they move about but generally remain. Essentially, each local group within the species has its “borders” which it patrols and polices. Other local groups of the same species that infiltrate these borders may encounter aggressive resistance. An important aspect of primate aggression is intergroup or intraspecies aggressive behavior (IAB), which is defined as aggressive or violent interactions between two or more spatially separate, distinct, and identifiable groups by indi- viduals acting as members or representatives of such groups. Johan van der Dennen (2002) has identified sixty-four species practicing IAB, of which fifty-four are primates. Most such aggression is “ritualized” and not fatal. Individuals will “display”
with threatening gestures or sounds and perhaps tussle for a few moments until one realizes he is the loser of the encounter and runs away or displays submissive behavior, which ends the face-off. However, not all aggression concludes so peace- fully, and the more human-like the primate, the more human-like the aggression. Jane Goodall, the pioneering primatologist who has observed chimps in the wild since the 1970s, reported what could only be called a war between two groups of chimps that had recently split apart. Over a period of years, the larger group hunted down the smaller splinter group and killed the males and killed or captured the females until the latter group was exterminated. She even calculated that approximately 30 percent of male chimp deaths were due to violence (Goodall 1986).
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2.. CCoommmmuunniiccaattiioonn aanndd ssoocciiaall iinntteerraaccttiioonn. While all animals communicate, primate communication is also unique in many aspects. For one, primates communicate visually much more than other species, given their evolved vision. When a primate encounters a novel situation, it explores the situation by lookingrather than smelling.
Primates also interact with each other and their world by touch more than most species, employing the sensitive pads on their fingers. One classic primate behavior is grooming or running their fingers through each other’s hair. This is no doubt both hygienic and pleasurable, but it also has a social component: grooming shows and establishes affiliation, even affection. Friends groom each other, adults groom infants, and males groom females as part of courtship. Grooming behavior indicates or creates social ordering: lower ranking individuals tend to groom more dominant ones, unless the dominant one is seeking allies, in which case dominant ones may groom subordinates to win their favor. Chimps in particular will put their arms around others or pat them on the back to comfort them. They even appear to hold or shake hands and kiss hands, especially as an introduction between strangers. Bonobo or
Goodall, Jane. 1986.The Chimpanzees of Gombe:
Patterns of Behavior.
Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
See Chapter 4
pygmy chimps are famous for their much more sexual touching which has little or nothing to do with reproduction; this touching even takes place within the same sex. Finally, primates communicate “orally” or with sound. Apes have even been shown experimentally to communicate “linguistically” (that is, to use “language symbols” like sign language or meaningful shapes and objects).
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3.. EEaattiinngg aanndd hhuunnttiinngg mmeeaatt. It was believed prior to the 1970s that chimpanzees were primarily vegetarian and that they might occasionally eat a small animal or bird but would not deliberately and systematically kill larger animals for meat. However, as Goodall witnessed, they not only eat and relish meat but also hunt for meat. In particular, they hunt monkeys, which are not easy to catch for the larger and more terrestrial chimps. Hunting such prey requires cooperation and coordination, foresight and planning. The hunters usually divide the assignment between those who will give chase through the branches and those who will pursue along the ground below. Together they try to steer the prey to a congenial spot for capture. A successful hunt is often followed by sharing or “politicking” with the resultant meat.
Hunters may bring meat back to share with females and young, and they may share it with (or steal it from) other males to form or secure alliances. Successful males may occasionally keep all their catch to themselves, but the dietary advantage of such behavior is set against the social disadvantage of the selfish and “unfriendly” aspect of it.
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4.. TTooooll uussee aanndd pprroodduuccttiioonn. For a long time, it was supposed that humans are the only primates that use tools; in fact, the accepted definition of human was based on tool-use A few species here and there appeared to use tool-like objects as well, including otters that bash open mollusks with a stone, but these are not full tools.
A tool is a natural object that is not only used but is made or modified for use to accomplish some task that the body cannot do or cannot do as effectively. So, when we smash a can of beans with a rock to open it, that is tool-like, but when we sharpen the rock to make a cutting edge for slicing open a dead zebra, we are making a true tool. Goodall was the first to document that chimps use and make simple tools.
Chimps like to eat termites, but termites retreat inside their hard hills. Another animal would wait patiently or dig or try to insert a claw or tooth into the hole – that is, use its body – but chimps will search for a good-sized and -shaped branch or stem, trim and fashion it just so, and stick it into the hole, pulling it and the clinging termites out. This kind of “fishing” behavior requires not only mental skills like imagination and foresight but a dexterous and grasping hand. Since that time, primatologists have watched chimps and a few other primates using stones or sticks to hammer nuts, leaves to scoop water, and chewed leaves to soak up juices from their meat. Even more interestingly, they have noticed regional diversity within a given species of primate; that is, chimps in one location have been seen learning and practicing one set of behaviors, while members of the same species in other locations have their own distinct local “cultures.” In the laboratory, chimps have shown powerful cognitive abilities in using and combining objects to achieve goals (e.g.
stacking boxes to reach bananas hanging from the ceiling, or using keys to unlock
chests with food inside). There is little doubt that the more we give primates to think about and do, the more they will surprise us with their intelligence and ability.
Finally, just as culture as a general phenomenon or capability is apparently not all- or-nothing, neither is human culture in particular all-or-nothing. Rather, what we see in the fossil and archaeological record is that as humans developed into their present- day physical form, something like present-day culture gradually but inexorably emerged. For instance, the most ancient well-documented category of pre-human species is called AAuussttrraallooppiitthheeccuuss, which includes the famous Australopithecus afarensis, known popularly as “Lucy.” Living three or four million years ago, these pre-humans already had some key human traits like upright bipedal walking and smaller teeth but also some primitive traits like a small brain (no larger than an ape).
There is no firm evidence that they made or used tools.
Around 2.5 million years ago, a new species, designated HHoommoo hhaabbiilliiss, commenced the category or genus called HHoommoo, which would eventually include modern humans. This species, its descendants, and their key physical and behavioral characteristics are as follows.
1
1.. HHoommoo hhaabbiilliiss. They possessed a larger brain than Australopithecus afarensis, up to half of modern size (600–700 cubic centimeters versus 1,200–1,400 for moderns).
They showed the first firm evidence of stone tool-use and manufacture, based on a simple stone chopper, called OOllddoowwaann, made by hammering one stone with another to produce a cutting edge.
2
2.. HHoommoo eerreeccttuuss. First appearing around 1.8 million years ago, HHoommoo eerreeccttuuss is another advance in brain size, reaching two-thirds or more of modern brain mass (1,000 cc). They were also the first species of fossil humans to migrate out of Africa, eventually reaching most of Eurasia (where they are popularly known as “Peking Man” and “Java man”). They developed a more sophisticated stone tool technology called AAcchheeuulliiaannin which the entire surface of the stone was chipped to yield a symmetrical “bifacial” tool. They apparently used fire and may have also constructed rudimentary shelters.
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3.. AArrcchhaaiicc HHoommoo ssaappiieennss..By around 600,000 years ago, the first HHoommoo ssaappiieennss appeared, although they were not quite the modern human species of today. Their brains were equal to or larger than modern, and their bodies were similar enough to be placed in the same species. They lived in many parts of Eurasia, where they had regionally diverse behavior and in some cases probably language. The best known of the archaic Homo sapiens populations is the NNeeaannddeerrttaallss, a local group that inhabited Europe and the Middle East starting about 130,000 years ago. They had large bodies and brains, and their behavior was remarkably sophisticated.
They made new and better tools, called MMoouusstteerriiaann, which included a variety of implements specialized for particular purposes, with more “finishing” of the tools.
Most notably, there is evidence from various sites of intentional burials, suggesting some symbolic abilities and perhaps some “beliefs” about death and after death. Some anatomists conclude that they had the anatomy for speech.
Australopithecus A genus of the category Hominid, closely related to and earlier than genus Homo, to which modern humans belong.
Homo habilis
An extinct human species that lived from over 2 million years ago until less than 2 million years ago.
They are also known as the first stone toolmakers.
Homo
The genus that contains the modern human species (Homo sapiens) as well as several other extinct human species.
Oldowan
The earliest known stone tool technology, associated with Homo habilisand named for the location of its discovery, Olduvai Gorge in East Africa.
Homo erectus
An extinct human species that lived from
approximately 1.8 million years ago until a few hundred thousand years ago or perhaps even more recently.
Acheulian
The stone tool technology associated with Homo erectus, which involves a more complex flaking of bifacial implements.
Homo sapiens The species name for modern humans.