University Scholars & Global Scholars

Instructor: Dr. Jennifer Raff, Associate Professor of Anthropology
2–4:30 p.m. Tuesdays, Location TBD

How did we become human? The story that many of us have learned about our evolutionary origins tells us that our rise was inevitable — the result of our language, capacity to create culture, finally tuned technology and symbolic thought. We out-competed (or perhaps out-fought) rival hominin species to take our place as the pinnacle of the natural world. We are unique, inexorable, dominant.

But the story we have been telling ourselves is probably wrong. Thanks to DNA evidence and recent fossil and archaeological discoveries, we are finding ourselves in the midst of a paradigm shift in how we understand our history and our place in the world.

In this course, we will explore the question of human evolution through a multidisciplinary lens. We will analyze historical texts to learn how understandings of human origins have changed over time, often in response to political and cultural pressures as well as scientific evidence. We will study fossils, archaeology, and genetics, with a special focus on recent discoveries that have upended longstanding assumptions about our origins. We will examine how scientific research intersects with contemporary issues, including the ethics of skeletal collections and DNA research, the resurgence of scientific racism and neo-eugenics, and the future of research funding. Finally, we will turn a critical lens upon recent and contemporary media depictions of human origins, looking at how scientists and popular authors communicate these ideas to the interested public. 

Jennifer Raff is an award-winning author and associate professor of anthropology at the University of Kansas. Her first book, “Origin: A Genetic History of the Americas,” was a critical success, a New York Times bestseller, and recipient of multiple awards, including the 2023 Phi Beta Kappa Award in Science. In 2024, she was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship to support work on her second book.

Instructor: Dr. Kapila D. Silva, Professor of Architecture 
6:30–8:30 p.m. Mondays, Nunemaker 102

Since 1972, UNESCO has recognized exceptional natural and cultural sites around the world as having outstanding universal value that reflects the heritage of all humanity. The apparently innocuous idea of promoting the protection of cultural sites for posterity eventually grew to be a mammoth task involving conceptual convolutions and pragmatic dilemmas in conservation and management of these heritage places. UNESCO developed, and still develops, a doctrine on heritage management that redefined the idea of heritage and its management around the world.

Globalizing local cultures brings up a range of theoretical and ethical questions, such as what heritage is and its use; the ownership of heritage (Could we really universalize a specific local culture? Who owns it, by the way?); Eurocentrism and coloniality of the concept of World Heritage; Contested heritages (erasure of places of pain and shame;  visibility and invisibility of certain identities); authenticity of heritage, how to determine it, and by whom; classification of heritage and associated concerns; and the like.  

Placing local culture on a global platform also creates practical issues. World Heritage draws tourists’ gaze that negatively impacts local life by leading to overcrowding, gentrification, commodification of culture, and imbalanced economics. Requiring a community not to change leads to the fossilization of the naturally dynamic and evolving nature of a local place and life. The climate crisis has also threatened certain fragile sites of nature and culture, requiring solutions to be more resilient.

This seminar explores a wide range of issues -  theoretical and practical – that has plagued locations and communities around the world by being placed on a global platform, and it examines how UNESCO as well as local communities strive to maintain a balance between the pros and cons of managing World Heritage. We will examine the criteria and the process of recognizing a site as a World Heritage site, and participants will identify places that may be worthy of being recognized as World Heritage and make a case for such recognition. Participants will speculate on the issues that may arise at those places being designated as World Heritage sites and outline some strategies that may mitigate the negative impact of such concerns. 

Kapila Silva is an associate dean and Chancellors Club Teaching Professor at the KU School of Architecture and Design. He has published several books on the management of World Heritage Sites in the Asia-Pacific region, and has received many awards for his research and teaching excellence.