Biological anthropology is an exciting discipline concerned with humans as biological beings living in cultural and natural settings. We are interested in questions pertinent and important to the scientific, social, and political agendas of the world. Material covered in this class will encourage you to pursue questions about the relationship of humans to the rest of the animal kingdom, the origin, maintenance, patterning, and significance of human biological variation, the nature of heredity, and human evolution. We will discuss the human and primate fossil records, human variation, race, and genetics. Students can expect a strong emphasis on scientific literacy, that is, how the process of scientific inquiry works. When you finish this course, you will have the tools to distinguish between reliable and unreliable sources of scientific information and a solid grounding in the fundamentals of biological anthropology.