Glendale Community College Anthropologist Daniel Lieberman Interview Analysis THE ASSIGNMENT:
For this assignment, you will listen to an interview with anthropologist Daniel Lieberman from the radio show Fresh Air, and write a short paper in response.
The interview:
The interview can be found by clicking here. (Links to an external site.)
You may listen to the interview online, or download it to listen to it later. You will also see an option that will allow you access to the written transcript of the interview, should you need or want it.
Please be aware that the “interview highlights” that you see on the website include only small summaries of parts of the interview. This is not the complete transcript or interview and does not contain enough detail to allow you to complete this assignment for any points. You must listen to the entire interview or read the entire transcript.
What to Write:
Write a paper that addresses the following questions. The paper should be double-spaced, with standard font and margins, and be about three full pages in length. Papers under 800 words in length will not be considered to meet minimum length requirements for full credit.
Briefly describe your diet over the last two days. Based on what Lieberman said, in what significant ways did it differ from the diets humans adapted to eating through natural selection?
Based on what Lieberman says, how does natural selection explain our enjoyment of sugar and simple carbohydrates? How does it also explain the negative health effects of the sugar and simple carbohydrates many of us eat in a typical American diet? Be specific about those negative effects.
What is the rationale of the “paleodiet”? For what reasons is Lieberman skeptical of it? More generally, what is the problem with the idea that matching the behaviors human bodies evolved to perform will always lead to greater wellbeing? (Think about natural selection and “fitness” – it might help to look back at exactly how your textbook defines this term!)
Finally, pick some fact or analysis from another topic in the interview (e.g., stress, immune system, birth intervals, cancer, exercise and physical stress), and explain why you find it interesting (or surprising, or confusing, etc.) in relation to the material we have studied in Anthropology 101.