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Human Variation Report

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My interviewee, my mother was particularly interested in the topic of human variation and the concept of race. My family is from the Deep South, so I knew the topic of race would spark a great conversation. To begin the conversation, it took me a long time to explain to my mother how everyone’s origin is in Africa. After the lengthy discussion of human evolution, and how to look at the topic outside of the religion aspect, my mother fully understood the idea of everyone’s origin in Africa and our common ancestor of Chimpanzees. Throughout the conversation, my mother was able to grasp the idea of race and its importance to our society. With an increase in police brutality and even the upcoming presidential election, race has become an overwhelming …show more content…

Melanin Mondays are days on social media where women of color are celebrating their beautiful brown skin and their high content of melanin. I tied the social media movement with the “Human Variation and Race” lecture to explain to my mother the purpose of melanin. Melanin is responsible for most of the variation in lightness and darkness of skin (Foley). Jokingly, my mother responded saying, “Well you are really light, and so does that mean you have no melanin?” Of course, I wanted to joke back with her, but I wanted her to fully understand the concept of melanin and the role it plays with race. I had to explain to her that everyone has the same number of melanocytes, but vary in the melanin that the cells produce (Foley). I simply explained to her that since I have light skin, little melanin shows at the surface of my skin. I then elaborated on the term melanin, and it explained how it is a biological adaptation. Studies have shown that those who live closer to the equator tend to have darker skin. I then went on to explain to her how a high melanin content protects people from sunburn or illnesses associated with it, nutrient photolysis, and how melanin is found in other parts of the body (Foley). She was easily able to tie in melanin with race, with the basic idea that African Americans obviously have more melanin. Towards the end of the …show more content…

Anthropology encompasses all of the major fields that America focuses on such as Biology, Medicine, Computer Science, and so much more. Anthropology studies the processes of these major fields, their development, and the involvement of humans in these fields. I have concluded that Anthropology is the five W’s of human existence, it is the, “Who, What, When, Where, and Why.” It explains every aspect of human life, yet the field is still on the backburner. As my mother and I continued our conversation, I realized that if society paid more attention to Anthropology we could use the research to explain many of the issues that plague society

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