The Department of Anthropology presents:
Andrew Marshall
Friday, November 14, 2013
4:00 PM
340 West Hall
“Ecological and evolutionary perspectives on the adaptations of Bornean primates”
Primatologists contribute to biological anthropology by improving our understanding of why humans look and behave as we do. Studies of the behavior and ecology of wild primates provide a link between morphological form and ecological function, permitting informed interpretation of fossil hominin remains. In addition, research on non-human primates occupying a variety of habitats sheds light on how species adapt to different conditions, helping us to construct plausible hypotheses about how the environment might have influenced the course of human evolution. In this talk I will review some results of my fieldwork in Indonesian Borneo, focusing on how studies of primate ecology and evolution can contribute to our understanding of the processes that drove the evolution of our own species. I will also discuss ongoing projects that demonstrate, on the one hand, the power of ecological forces in shaping primate evolution, and on the other, the limits of purely adaptive explanations of primate ecology.
