Africa from MIS 6-2: The florescence of modern humans

Abstract

Africa from Marine Isotope Stages (MIS) 6-2 saw the crystallization of long-term evolutionary processes that culminated in our species’ anatomical form, behavioral florescence, and global dispersion. Over this ~200 kyr period, Africa experienced environmental changes on a variety of spatiotemporal scales, from the long-term disappearance of whole deserts and forests to much higher frequency, localized shifts. The archaeological, fossil, and genetic records increasingly suggest that environmental variability profoundly affected early human population sizes, densities, interconnectedness, and distribution across the African landscape – that is, population dynamics. At the same time, recent advances in anthropological theory predict that such paleodemographic changes were central to structuring the very records we are attempting to comprehend. The book introduced by this chapter represents a first concerted effort to assess modern human population dynamics throughout Africa, whether these changed with environmental fluctuations, and how they contributed to our species’ evolutionary trajectory.