Aims

At the end of the course the student will be able :
- to excavate a site revealing human remains in a convenient and proper way;
- to prepare these remains while waiting for their analyses and to supervise these analyses by opening up a fruitful dialogue with the anthropologist responsible for their examination;
- to understand, analyse and interpret an anthropological expert's report.

Main themes

- To describe and analyse the different elements of the human skeleton as well as the way they are connected to each other.
- To proceed to the clearing of human remains during an archaeological excavation in order to ensure preservation and further examination.
- To study the methods of morphological and biometrical analysis of the skeleton.
- To study human evolution since the differentiation of the family till modern man as well as the principal issues of ethno-genesis.

Content and teaching methods

Starting from skeletal material exhumed by the archaeologist, general notions of the human skeleton anatomy will be acquired. On the basis of this the student will be actively exposed to the main methods of measuring the different parts of a skeleton in view of their analysis and interpretation. The student will learn to manipulate the measuring tools and to use the most current statistical calculations. Finally, some notions of human palaeontology will be acquired in order to draw up the process of the evolution of man till the appearance of modern man. This part of the course will be concluded by a critical analysis of different theories attempting to account for the general outlines of ethno-genesis.

Other information (prerequisite, evaluation (assessment methods), course materials recommended readings, ...)

Prerequisites : none in particular.
The assessment will be founded on the theoretical knowledge and the practical know-how acquired in the manipulation of anthropological and statistical tools and the analysis of results obtained in this way.
The book " Elements de paléo-anthropologie " by A. Thoma will be used as a reference text. It is available at the ARKE department.

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