Search citation statements
Paper Sections
Citation Types
Year Published
Publication Types
Relationship
Authors
Journals
Physical anthropology changed many of its theoretical premises after World War II under the influence of the synthetic theory of evolution. Earnest Albert Hooton (1887-1954) and Wilton Marion Krogman (1903-1987) were excellent examples of leading workers whose research orientations differed, but whose students were important parts of the new consensus. These theoretical innovations undermined the racial morphological typology which underlay much of Hooton's work on racial history, and radiographs of the sizes of bone, marrow, muscle, and fat in the human brachium undermined his work and researches of other constitutionalists and increased the prestige of alternative work on body composition. Krogman, however, initially worked on the growth of the skull and dentition of the great apes and was a leader in human growth studies all his life. He was the most important writer in the United States on forensic applications of human skeletal biology. Since neither growth studies nor forensic applications depended much on typology, Krogman's publications were generally more modern than Hooton's. In terms of parsimony, Hooton's works can be criticized in terms of his cumbersome typology, but not his ideas on arborealism and the adaptive radiation of the primates. Krogman's interest in roentgenographic cephalometry may have been motivated by a concern for parsimonious explanations of craniofacial growth. Indeed, research in the new physical anthropology can truly be said to stand on the shoulders of these two giants.
Physical anthropology changed many of its theoretical premises after World War II under the influence of the synthetic theory of evolution. Earnest Albert Hooton (1887-1954) and Wilton Marion Krogman (1903-1987) were excellent examples of leading workers whose research orientations differed, but whose students were important parts of the new consensus. These theoretical innovations undermined the racial morphological typology which underlay much of Hooton's work on racial history, and radiographs of the sizes of bone, marrow, muscle, and fat in the human brachium undermined his work and researches of other constitutionalists and increased the prestige of alternative work on body composition. Krogman, however, initially worked on the growth of the skull and dentition of the great apes and was a leader in human growth studies all his life. He was the most important writer in the United States on forensic applications of human skeletal biology. Since neither growth studies nor forensic applications depended much on typology, Krogman's publications were generally more modern than Hooton's. In terms of parsimony, Hooton's works can be criticized in terms of his cumbersome typology, but not his ideas on arborealism and the adaptive radiation of the primates. Krogman's interest in roentgenographic cephalometry may have been motivated by a concern for parsimonious explanations of craniofacial growth. Indeed, research in the new physical anthropology can truly be said to stand on the shoulders of these two giants.
Public health practitioners and social scientists frequently compare height against one‐size‐fits‐all standards of human growth to assess well‐being, deprivation, and disease risk. However, underlying differences in height can make some naturally tall populations appear well‐off by universal standards, even though they live in severe states of deprivation. In this article, I describe the worldwide extent of these population differences in height and illustrate how using a universal yardstick to compare population height can create puzzling disparities (eg, between South Asia and sub‐Saharan Africa) while also underestimating childhood stunting in specific world regions (eg, West Africa and Haiti). I conclude by discussing potential challenges of developing and implementing population‐sensitive standards for assessing healthy development.
In the eighteenth century, workers in general biology, medicine, and physical anthropology knew little about human physiology. As a result, they heavily stressed mystical, essentialist classifications of organisms, constitutional types, and diseases. Comparative morphology and diagnostic systems prevailed. At different times and for somewhat different reasons, these older paradigms were abandoned and newer ones adopted. Late in this scientific revolution, in the midtwentieth century, the new physical anthropology was born.In his book The Structure of Scientific Reuolutions, Kuhn (1977) noted that scientific disciplines sometimes experience drastic transformations of theory and methods. At such a time, conflicts of ideas become intensified. Once the older generation of conservatives has retired and a new consensus is reached, research is devoted to solving puzzles based on the new paradigm or conceptual orientation. The present paper examines and contrasts a series of paradigms in physical anthropology, and discusses reasons why the older formulations gave way to newer ones a t critical points in the history of the field.At one of these junctures, Washburn (1951) wrote "The New Physical Anthropology," an essay which is the obverse of the title of the present paper. In his review, Washburn predicted that experimental anatomy and a reduction in the number of somatic measurements would be typical of future work in the discipline. These forecasts have not been borne out, and he certainly underestimated the luxuriance of ideas and measurements which modern researchers use.In a later paper, Washburn (1953) outlined the strategies of the older physical anthropology, and contrasted them with newer paradigms. His formulation can serve as a springboard for the present discussion, which deals more fully than he did with the philosophical assumptions of early physical anthropology and its intimate intellectual ties with general biology and medicine. Washburn noted that the old physical anthropology mainly undertook a relatively static, typological classification of human races past and present, constitutional variants, and fossil and living primates. Descriptions of differences were often ends in themselves rather than consequences of theoretical presuppositions. In other words, the facts should speak for themselves. The methods used were about 80% anthropometric measurements and 20% morphological observations. Interpretations of data were based more on historical conjectures than on well-ordered theories taken from genetical, developmental, or evolutionary biology. Although Washburn's description is apt, it fails to account for the historical origins of the older physical anthropology, or for its close connections with eighteenth and nineteenth century biology and medicine.Actually, these three fields were closely linked because the same researchers often worked in all of them. As a result, the paradigms of biology, medicine, and physical anthropology were similar, but have since been modified and abandoned at differ...
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.
customersupport@researchsolutions.com
10624 S. Eastern Ave., Ste. A-614
Henderson, NV 89052, USA
Copyright © 2024 scite LLC. All rights reserved.
Made with 💙 for researchers
Part of the Research Solutions Family.