Human Biocultural & Social Evolution

• Gerhard Lenski

  American Sociologist argued that human society undergoes transformation and evolution and in the process develops technological advancement.
• Hunting and Gathering societies

  •The oldest and most basic way of economic subsistence.
• Hunting and Gathering societies


  People come close to being socially equal
• Hunting and Gathering societies


  Making use of tools to hunt animals and gather vegetation for food
• Hunting and Gathering societies


  Depend on the family to do many things
• Hunting and Gathering societies

  although women and men perform different tasks, most hunters and gatherers probably see the sexes as having about the same social importance (Leacock, 1978)
• Horticultural and pastoral societies

  large-scale cultivation using plows harnessed to animals or more powerful energy sources

  money as a common standard of exchange, and the old barter system was abandoned

  extreme social inequality, typically more than modern societies such as our own

  agriculture raises men to a position of social dominance

  religion reinforces the power of elites
• Agricultural societies and neolithic revolution

  •Humans began to farm and domesticate animals.

  •Animal domestication provided important contributions to the Neolithic people.

  •The development of agriculture also led to an increase in social inequality
• Industrial Societies

  •the production of goods using advanced sources of energy to drive large machinery

  •water power and then steam boilers to operate mills and factories filled with large machines

  •change was so rapid that it sparked the birth of sociology itself

  •weakening of close working relationships, strong family ties, and many of the traditional values, beliefs and customs
• Post-Industrial societies

  the production of information using computer technology

  less and less labour force

  the postindustrial society is at the heart of globalization

  technology has improved life and brought the world's people closer but establishing peace, ensuring justice, and protecting the environment are problems that technology alone cannot solve
• Four major civilizations

  Sumerian

  Indus valley

  Shang

  Egyptian