In Growing Up Human, Brenna Hassett explores how our evolutionary
history has shaped a phenomenon every reader will have experienced -
childhood.
Tracking deep into our evolutionary history, anthropological science has
begun to unravel one particular feature that sets us apart from the
many, many animals that came before us - our uniquely long childhoods.
Growing Up Human looks at how we have diverged from our ancestral
roots to stay 'forever young' - or at least what seems like forever -
and how the evolution of childhood is a critical part of the human
story.
Beginning with a look at the ways animals invest in their offspring, the
book moves through the many steps of making a baby, from pair-bonding to
hidden ovulation, points where our species has repeatedly stepped off
the standard primate path. From the mystery of monogamy to the minefield
of modern parenting advice, biological anthropologist Brenna Hassett
reveals how differences between humans and our closest cousins lead to
our messy mating systems, dangerous pregnancies, and difficult births,
and what these tell us about the kind of babies we are trying to build.
Using observations of our closest primate relatives, the tiny relics of
childhood that come to us from the archaeological record, and the bones
and teeth of our ancestors, science has started to unravel the evolution
of our childhood right down the fossil record. In our species investment
doesn't stop at birth, and as Growing Up Human reveals, we can compare
every aspect of our care and feeding, from the chemical composition of
our milk to our fondness for formal education from ancient times
onwards, in order to understand just what we evolved our weird and
wonderful childhoods for.
