Anthropologists have traditionally viewed a coupling of aggression and predation as the evolutionary milestone that brought about ambush hunting approximately two million years ago. But Rough and Tumble challenges this view, since aggressive attack was a hopeless tactic for humans who were smaller and slower-footed than their prey. The author uses fossils, archaeological evidence and studies of humans and other primates to argue that it was the advent of new hunting technologies that allowed humans to stalk and kill large game.

Widely regarded as one of the most important anthropologists of the 20th century, Bronislaw Malinowski (1884-1942) is renowned for his pioneering studies on the Trobriand Islands of New Guinea. Describing and examining the ways in which the islanders structured and maintained the social and economic order of their tribe, this book contributes significantly to the understanding of the articulate relationship between law and society. First published in 1926.

In an illustrated introduction to the world-class collection of Cambridge University's Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, the authors set the artefacts in historical and social contexts and explain their use and significance.

A professor of geography at UCLA, Jared Diamond looks back to humans' former lifestyle through his own fieldwork in traditional societies that still exist or were recently in existence, such as the highland peoples of New Guinea, Andaman Islanders, African Hadza and North American Inuit. Diamond highlights the many crucial lessons to be gleaned from 'primitive' societies, pointing to life decisions that may help us live longer, healthier lives, enjoy old age, and raise self-confident children.

A sign language that cut across language barriers played a crucial role among the various Indian nations, and it survives today. This book contains a comprehensive description of the language, from phonology to discourse, and compares it with other sign languages.

First published in 1978, this short book takes the form of five short lectures addressing large questions of primitive thought and myth and offering an accessible overview of many of Levi-Strauss' central ideas. New foreword by Patrick Wilcken.

'Surfaces evade easy definition', writes Amato, 'They raise classic questions of epistemology and aesthetics'. Bringing together history and art history, philosophy and natural science, archaeology and architecture, he argues that surfaces are far more than superficial facades, and that they define our relationship to the world. Structured around our increasing power to shape surfaces, the study progresses from the evolution of the human body's own surfaces and the earliest tools to the power of modern science to tailor nature.

Covering the period between our ape ancestors' adoption of bipedalism and the beginnings of modern human culture and language, this readable, informative and well illustrated volume assembles photographic documentation of more than 200 remains of early hominids, including the famous 'Lucy' discovered by Johanson in 1974. This is preceded by an overview of the key issues in modern paleoanthropology, such as the dating of fossils, the definition of different human species and the analysis of the earliest art and stone tools.