Course Code: CORE15

Course Title: UNDERSTANDING CULTURE, SOCIETY AND

POLITICS
Course Type: CORE
Pre-requisite: NONE
Co-requisite: NONE
Quarter: 1st
Course Topic: LOOKING BACK AT HUMAN BIOCULTURAL AND
SOCIAL EVOLUTION
Module: #3 Week: 5-6
Course Subtopic: Biological and Cultural Evolution
Cultural and Sociopolitical Evolution
Course Description: At the end of the course, students should acquire
ideas about human cultures, human agency,
society and politics; recognize cultural relativism
and social inclusiveness to overcome prejudices; and
develop social and cultural competence to guide their
interactions with groups, communities, networks,
and institutions.
Course Outcomes (COs) and Relationship to Student Outcomes
Course Outcomes SO
After completing the course, the student must a b c d
be able to:
2. Illustrates human material remains and
artefactual evidence in interpreting cultural
I I D
and social, including political and economic,
processes.
* Level: I- Introduced, R- Reinforced, D- Demonstrated

LOOKING BACK AT HUMAN BIOCULTURAL AND SOCIAL EVOLUTION

BIOLOGICAL AND CULTURAL EVOLUTION

By: Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc., (2020)

Australopithecus afarensis and Au. garhi

The best-known member of Australopithecus is Au. afarensis, a species
represented by more than 400 fossil specimens from virtually every region of
the hominin skeleton. Dated to between about 3.8 and 2.9 mya, 90 percent of
the fossils assigned to Au. afarensis derive from Hadar, a site in Ethiopia’s Afar

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Triangle. Au. afarensis fossils have also been found in Chad, Kenya, and
Tanzania. The main fossil sample of this species also comes from Hadar, and
the specimens found there include a 40-percent-complete skeleton of an adult
female (―Lucy‖) and the remains of at least nine adults and four juveniles
buried together at the same time (the ―First Family‖). The animal fossils found
in association with Au. afarensis imply a habitat of woodland with patches of
grassland.

Homo habilis,
(Latin: ―able man‖ or ―handy man‖) extinct species of human, the most ancient
representative of the human genus, Homo. Homo habilis inhabited parts of
sub-Saharan Africa from roughly 2.4 to 1.5 million years ago (mya). In 1959
and 1960 the first fossils were discovered at Olduvai Gorge in
northern Tanzania. This discovery was a turning point in the science
of paleoanthropology because the oldest previously known human fossils were
Asian specimens of Homo erectus. Many features of H. habilis appear to be
intermediate in terms of evolutionary development between the relatively
primitive Australopithecus and the more-advanced Homo species.

Homo erectus,
(Latin: ―upright man‖) extinct species of the human genus (Homo), perhaps an
ancestor of modern humans (Homo sapiens). H. erectus most likely originated
in Africa, though Eurasia cannot be ruled out. Regardless of where it first
evolved, the species seems to have dispersed quickly, starting about 1.9 million
years ago (mya) near the middle of the Pleistocene Epoch, moving through the
African tropics, Europe, South Asia, and Southeast Asia. This history has been
recorded directly if imprecisely by many sites that have yielded fossil remains
of H. erectus. At other localities, broken animal bones and stone tools have
indicated the presence of the species, though there are no traces of the people
themselves. H. erectus was a human of medium stature that walked upright.
The braincase was low, the forehead was receded, and the nose, jaws, and

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palate were wide. The brain was smaller and the teeth larger than in modern
humans. H. erectus appears to have been the first human species to
control fire, some 1,000,000 years ago. The species seems to have flourished
until some 200,000 years ago (200 kya) or perhaps later before giving way to
other humans including Homo sapiens.

Homo Neanderthalensis, (Homo neanderthalensis, Homo sapiens

neanderthalensis),
Also spelled Neandertal, member of a group of archaic humans who emerged
at least 200,000 years ago during the Pleistocene Epoch (about 2.6 million to
11,700 years ago) and were replaced or assimilated by early
modern human populations (Homo sapiens) between 35,000 and perhaps
24,000 years ago. Neanderthals inhabited Eurasia from the Atlantic regions of
Europe eastward to Central Asia, from as far north as present-day Belgium and
as far south as the Mediterranean and southwest Asia. Similar archaic human
populations lived at the same time in eastern Asia and in Africa. Because
Neanderthals lived in a land of abundant limestone caves, which
preserved bones well, and where there has been a long history of prehistoric
research, they are better known than any other archaic human group.
Consequently, they have become the archetypal ―cavemen.‖ The
name Neanderthal (or Neandertal) derives from the Neander Valley
(German Neander Thal or Neander Tal) in Germany, where the fossils were first
found.

Homo sapiens,
(Latin: ―wise man‖) the species to which all modern human
beings belong. Homo sapiens is one of several species grouped into the
genus Homo, but it is the only one that is not extinct. See also human
evolution.

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 ACTIVITY 3:
CHARLES DARWIN EVOLUTION OF MAN

Instructions: Complete the following stages in the evolution of man by

Charles Darwin. Write your answers on the box.

Name: _____________________________ Grade &Section: ________________

1

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 CULTURAL AND SOCIOPOLITICAL EVOLUTION
By: Lumen Learning (2020)

The Neolithic Revolution: From Hunter-Gatherer to Agriculturalist

The beginning of the Neolithic Revolution in different regions has been dated
from perhaps 8,000 BCE in the Kuk Early Agricultural Site of Melanesia Kuk to
2,500 BCE in Subsaharan Africa, with some considering the developments of
9,000-7,000 BCE in the Fertile Crescent to be the most important. This
transition everywhere is associated with the change from a largely nomadic
hunter-gatherer way of life to a more settled, agrarian-based one, due to the
inception of the domestication of various plant and animal species—depending
on the species locally available, and probably also influenced by local culture.It
is not known why humans decided to begin cultivating plants and
domesticating animals. While more labor-intensive, the people must have seen
the relationship between cultivation of grains and an increase in population.
The domestication of animals provided a new source of protein, through meat
and milk, along with hides and wool, which allowed for the production of
clothing and other objects.There are several competing (but not mutually
exclusive) theories about the factors that drove populations to take up
agriculture. The most prominent of these are:
 The Oasis Theory, originally proposed by Raphael Pumpelly in 1908, and
popularized by V. Gordon Childe in 1928, suggests as the climate got
drier due to the Atlantic depressions shifting northward, communities
contracted to oases where they were forced into close association with
animals. These animals were then domesticated together with planting of
seeds. However, this theory has little support amongst archaeologists
today because subsequent climate data suggests that the region was
getting wetter rather than drier.
 The Hilly Flanks hypothesis, proposed by Robert Braidwood in 1948,
suggests that agriculture began in the hilly flanks of the Taurus and
Zagros mountains, where the climate was not drier, as Childe had
believed, and that fertile land supported a variety of plants and animals
amenable to domestication.
 The Feasting model by Brian Hayden suggests that agriculture was
driven by ostentatious displays of power, such as giving feasts, to exert
dominance. This system required assembling large quantities of food, a
demand which drove agricultural technology.
 The Demographic theories proposed by Carl Sauer and adapted by Lewis
Binford and Kent Flannery posit that an increasingly sedentary
population outgrew the resources in the local environment and required
more food than could be gathered. Various social and economic factors
helped drive the need for food.
 The Evolutionary/Intentionality theory, developed by David Rindos and
others, views agriculture as an evolutionary adaptation of plants and
humans. Starting with domestication by protection of wild plants, it led
to specialization of location and then full-fledged domestication.

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Effects of the Neolithic Revolution on Society
The traditional view is that the shift to agricultural food production supported
a denser population, which in turn supported larger sedentary communities,
the accumulation of goods and tools, and specialization in diverse forms of new
labor. Overall a population could increase its size more rapidly when resources
were more available. The resulting larger societies led to the development of
different means of decision making and governmental organization. Food
surpluses made possible the development of a social elite freed from labor, who
dominated their communities and monopolized decision-making. There were
deep social divisions and inequality between the sexes, with women’s status
declining as men took on greater roles as leaders and warriors. Social class was
determined by occupation, with farmers and craftsmen at the lower end, and
priests and warriors at the higher.

Early Civilization and the Rise of the State

By: Khan Academy (2020)
The first civilizations appeared in major river valleys, where floodplains
contained rich soil and the rivers provided irrigation for crops and a means of
transportation. Foundational civilizations developed urbanization and
complexity without outside influence and without building on a pre-existing
civilization, though they did not all develop simultaneously. Many later
civilizations either borrowed elements of, built on, or incorporated—through
conquest—other civilizations. Because foundational civilizations arose
independently, they are particularly useful to historians and archaeologists
who want to understand how civilization first developed.

Gray world map showing probable areas of independent development of

agriculture, in green, in the Middle East, sub-Saharan Africa, China, Peru,
Mexico, and North America. Possible routes of diffusion across the globe are
drawn in blue.

Geography alone cannot explain the rise of the first civilizations. The process of
agricultural intensification had been going on for thousands of years before the
first civilizations appeared, and it is important to remember that while

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agricultural surpluses were necessary for civilization, their existence in a given
place did not guarantee that a civilization would develop. As civilizations grew,
they required increased intensification of agriculture to maintain themselves.

Early civilizations were often unified by religion—a system of beliefs and

behaviors that deal with the meaning of existence. As more and more people
shared the same set of beliefs and practices, people who did not know each
other could find common ground and build mutual trust and respect.
It was typical for politics and religion to be strongly connected. In some cases,
political leaders also acted as religious leaders. In other cases, religious leaders
were different from the political rulers but still worked to justify and support
the power of the political leaders. In Ancient Egypt, for example, the kings—
later called pharaohs—practiced divine kingship, claiming to be
representatives, or even human incarnations, of gods.

Both political and religious organization helped to create and reinforce social
hierarchies, which are clear distinctions in status between individual people
and between different groups. Political leaders could make decisions that
impacted entire societies, such as whether to go to war. Religious leaders
gained special status since they alone could communicate between a society
and its god or gods.
In addition to these leaders, there were also artisans who provided goods and
services, and merchants who engaged in the trade of these goods. There were
also lower classes of laborers who performed less specialized work, and in some
cases there were slaves. All of these classes added to the complexity and
economic production of a city.

Writing emerged in many early civilizations as a way to keep records and better
manage complex institutions. Cuneiform writing in early Mesopotamia was first
used to keep track of economic exchanges. Oracle bone inscriptions in Ancient
China seem to have been tied to efforts to predict the future and may have had
spiritual associations. Quipu—knotted strings used to keep records and
perform calculations—appeared in South America. In all the places where
writing developed—no matter its form or purpose—literacy, or the ability to
read and write, was limited to small groups of highly educated elites, such as
scribes and priests.

Democratization
By: Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc., (2020)
Process through which a political regime becomes democratic. The explosive
spread of democracy around the world beginning in the mid-20th century
radically transformed the international political landscape from one in which
democracies were the exception to one in which they were the rule. The
increased interest in democratization among academics, policy makers, and
activists alike is in large part due to the strengthening of international norms
that associate democracy with many important positive outcomes, from respect
for human rights to economic prosperity to security.

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Transitions to and from democracy
Tend to occur globally and in waves, meaning that they have been clustered in
both space and time rather than distributed randomly. The American political
scientist Samuel Huntington identified three main waves of democratization.
1) The first, lasting from 1826 to 1926, accompanied the expansion
of suffrage, principally in western Europe and the United States. The
collapse of many European democracies after World War I marked the
first reverse wave, lasting from 1922 to 1942.
2) The second main wave 1943 to 1962 occurred through the occupation
of the Axis countries by the Allied powers following the end of World War
II, the attempts at democratization in newly independent former British
colonies during the postwar period, and the spread of democracy in Latin
America. The second reverse wave (1958–1975) came with the reversion
to military rule in much of Latin America and the collapse of young
democracies in Asia and Africa.
3) The third main wave began with the overthrow of the military regime in
Portugal in 1974. During the following 25 years, there was a dramatic
expansion of democracy worldwide. Democracy first spread through
southern Europe and Latin America, then to eastern Europe and Asia,
and finally to Africa. During this period the number of electoral
democracies grew from roughly one-fourth to nearly two-thirds of all
countries. Most analysts agree that the third wave has crested if not
reversed. Rather than reverting to authoritarianism, however, many
third-wave democracies have become mired in hybrid or mixed regimes
that combine elements of both democracy and authoritarianism.

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 Performance-Based Assessment 2
Survivor Philippines

Instructions: Imagine yourself as a contestant of Survivor Philippines,

what are the 7 strategies you will do to get to the end and get the price
P1 Million pesos?
Name: _____________________________ Grade &Section: ________________

_______________________________________________________
OPTIONAL
Paper Size: Short Bond Paper
(Handwritten/Ttypewritten)
Font Style: Times New Roman/ Calibri (Body)
Font Size: 11

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 SELF-ASSESMENT

Encircle
your
Answer

FORM
Read each statement and check ( ) the box that reflects your work today.

Name: Date:
Section:
Strongly
Disagree Agree
Agree

1. I found this work interesting.

2. I make a strong effort.
3. I am proud of the results.
4. I understood all the instructions.
5. I followed all the steps.
6. I learned something new.
7. I feel ready for the next assignment.
www.ldatschool.ca/executive-function/self-assessment/

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 Reference Book:
Ederlina D. Balena, Dolores M. Lucero, Arnel M Peralta Juanito Philip
V. Bernard, Jr. Understanding Culture Society and Politics

Online References:
 Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc., (2020), Australopithecus afarensis
and Au. Garhi, Homo habilis, Homo erectus, Homo Neanderthalensis,
Homo sapiens, Homo Neanderthalensis
Retrieved from: Britannicawww.britannica.com › topic ›
 Lumen Learning (2020), The Neolithic Revolution | World
Civilization - Lumen
Retrieved from: Learningcourses.lumenlearning.com › suny-hccc-
worldcivilization › chapter
 Khan Academy (2020), Early civilizations (article) | Khan Academy
Retrieved from: www.khanacademy.org › humanities › introduction-
what-is-civilization
 Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc., (2020), democratization |
Definition, Theories, & Facts |
Retrieved from: Britannicawww.britannica.com › ... › Politics & Political
Systems

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