Via the CBC, for all of those looking to include more indigenous content into their lesson plans, when the textbook publishers and the government appointed panels fail us:
A librarian at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education (OISE) at the University of Toronto has compiled a list of Indigenous education content available.
The resource compilation is a response to the recent cancellation of Truth and Reconciliation curriculum writing sessions that were to build upon Ontario’s curriculum by infusing Indigenous knowledge and pedagogy across all subjects and grades.
Educators and librarians doing it for themselves – we owe it to the next generations to curate a more expansive definition of world literature and history!
The United States: An Open Ended History is a free online history textbook adapted and expanded upon from open sources. Its chapters are designed to address most state standards, splitting the difference between overarching themes, concise summary, and the kinds of vivid, personal details that make history memorable to the average student. Please use and share freely – to supplement or replace what you have at hand.
One – A Not So-Distant Past: Native America (Until 1600)
The Neolithic Revolution – also known as the Agricultural Revolution – was the wide-scale transition of many human societies from a lifestyle of hunting and gathering to one of agriculture and settlement, making an increasingly larger population possible. These settled communities permitted humans to observe and experiment with plants to learn how they grew and developed. This new knowledge led to the domestication of plants.
The Neolithic Revolution involved far more than the adoption of a limited set of food-producing techniques. During the next millennia it would transform the small and mobile groups of hunter-gatherers that had hitherto dominated human pre-history into sedentary (non-nomadic) societies based in built-up villages and towns. These societies radically modified their natural environment by means of specialized food-crop cultivation, with activities such as irrigation and deforestation which allowed the production of surplus food. Other developments found very widely are the domestication of animals, pottery, polished stone tools, and rectangular houses.
These developments, sometimes called the Neolithic package, provided the basis for centralized administrations and political structures, hierarchical ideologies, writing, cities, specialization and division of labor, more trade, the development of non-portable art and architecture, and property ownership.
ACTIVITY – Join the Neolithic Revolution Advertisement
Create an advertisement urging human beings to settle down and join the Neolithic Revolution. Your ad should be artistic, creative, and appealing, but should also communicate the key changes/benefits that an agriculturally-based lifestyle will bring to those who adopt it – using at least 3/4 of the vocab words found in your textbook.
You must also utilize at least two of the following – the seven most common techniques of persuasion used in advertising:
Testimonial – a story from someone, usually famous, who has used the product
Glittering Generalities – words that cannot really be measured, like “great”
Transfer – using this product will make you “cool” or “attractive”
Plain Folks – a common person who can understand and empathize with a listener’s concerns.
Bandwagon – everybody’s doing it, you’re being left behind
Name Calling – bashing the competition
Card Stacking – shows the product’s best features, tells half truths, omits potential problems.
Aside from our genes, what makes humans different from other animals?
Humans (Homo sapiens) are the only extant members of the subtribe Hominina. Together with chimpanzees, gorillas, and orangutans, they are part of the family Hominidae (the great apes, or hominids). A terrestrial animal, humans are characterized by their erect posture and bipedal locomotion; high manual dexterity and heavy tool use compared to other animals; open-ended and complex language use compared to other animal communications; larger, more complex brains than other animals; and highly advanced and organized societies.
Early hominins—particularly the australopithecines, whose brains and anatomy are in many ways more similar to ancestral non-human apes—are less often referred to as “human” than hominins of the genus Homo.[5] Several of these hominins used fire, occupied much of Eurasia, and gave rise to anatomically modern Homo sapiens in Africa about 315,000[6] years ago. Humans began to exhibit evidence of behavioral modernity around 50,000 years ago, and in several waves of migration, they ventured out of Africa and populated most of the world.
The spread of the large and increasing population of humans has profoundly affected much of the biosphere and millions of species worldwide. Advantages that explain this evolutionary success include a larger brain with a well-developed neocortex, prefrontal cortex and temporal lobes, which enable advanced abstract reasoning, language, problem solving, sociality, and culture through social learning. Humans use tools more frequently and effectively than any other animal; and are the only extant species to build fires, cook food, clothe themselves, and create and use numerous other technologies and arts.
Humans uniquely use such systems of symbolic communication as language and art to express themselves and exchange ideas, and also organize themselves into purposeful groups. Humans create complex social structures composed of many cooperating and competing groups, from families and kinship networks to political states. Social interactions between humans have established an extremely wide variety of values, social norms, and rituals, which together undergird human society. Curiosity and the human desire to understand and influence the environment and to explain and manipulate phenomena (or events) have motivated humanity’s development of science, philosophy, mythology, religion, anthropology, and numerous other fields of knowledge.
Modern reconstruction of what a Neanderthal probably looked like in real life. In a sense, this species of human went extinct about 40,000 years ago – after living side-by-side with Homo Sapiens for tens of thousands of years. In another very real sense, they haven’t gone anywhere – if you have European ancestry, you likely carry Neanderthal DNA.
Though most of human existence has been sustained by hunting and gathering in band societies, increasingly many human societies transitioned to sedentary agriculture approximately some 10,000 years ago, domesticating plants and animals, thus enabling the growth of civilization. These human societies subsequently expanded, establishing various forms of government, religion, and culture around the world, and unifying people within regions to form states and empires. The rapid advancement of scientific and medical understanding in the 19th and 20th centuries permitted the development of fuel-driven technologies and increased lifespans, causing the human population to rise exponentially. The global human population was estimated to be near 7.7 billion in 2019.
The art of the Upper Paleolithic represents the oldest form of prehistoric art. Figurative art is present in Europe as well as in Sulawesi, Indonesia, beginning at least 35,000 years ago. Non-figurative cave paintings, consisting of hand stencils and simple geometric shapes, is at least 40,000 years old.
According to a 2018 study based on uranium-thorium dating, the oldest examples of Iberian cave art were made as early as 64,000 years ago, implying Neanderthal authorship, which would qualify as art of the Middle Paleolithic.
The emergence of figurative art has been interpreted as reflecting the emergence of full behavioral modernity, and is part of the defining characteristics separating the Upper Paleolithic from the Middle Paleolithic. The discovery of cave art of comparable age to the oldest European samples in Indonesia has established that similar artistic traditions existed both in eastern and in western Eurasia at 40,000 years ago. This has been taken to suggest that such an artistic tradition must in fact date to more than 50,000 years ago, and would have been spread along the southern coast of Eurasia in the original coastal migration movement. It is important to note that most of the art of this period is expected to have been lost, as it was submerged in the early Holocene sea level rise.
A. Grotte de Niaux.
This painting of a bison hunt is between 17,000 and 11,000 years old, dating from at the latest 9000 BCE. It is located deep inside a cave in southern France known as Niaux, meaning that ancient humans would have needed to carry lit torches to reach this site.
A scholar has described this giant artwork, saying: “The predominating animal is the bison, represented in the upper part of the panel. The bison standing out in the left central part is usually catalogued as a female, due to the shapes presented, such as the scarcely prominent hump. By contrast and in opposition to this is the male, found on the right-hand side and showing a more prominent hump.
The lower part of the wall represents several horses which, with painted hair, represent a member of the equine family with a great amount of hair, the Przewalski. The bestiary is finished off with two goats.”
B. Laas Geel.
Laas Geel are cave formations on the rural outskirts of Hargeisa, Somaliland (situated in the Woqooyi Galbeed region of the self-declared but internationally unrecognised Republic of Somaliland). They contain some of the earliest known cave paintings in the Horn of Africa. Laas Geel’s rock art is estimated to date to somewhere between 9,000 and 3,000 years BCE.
Laas Geel rock – the paleolithic art is preserved under the pronounced overhang near the top of the formation.
Although the Laas Geel rock art had been known to the area’s inhabitants for centuries, its existence only came to international attention after the 2002 discovery.
The Laas Geel cave paintings are thought to be some of the most vivid rock art in Africa. Among other things, they depict cattle in ceremonial robes accompanied by humans, who are believed to have been inhabitants of the region. The necks of the cattle are embellished with a kind of plastron. Some of the cattle are also portrayed wearing decorative robes. Besides long-horned cattle, the rock art also shows an image of a domesticated dog, several paintings of Canidae as well as a giraffe. The site is excellently preserved due to the location of the paintings which are covered by the granite overhangs.
C. Cueva de las Manos.
Cueva de las Manos is located in modern day Argentina. The art in the cave dates to between 11,000–7,000 BCE.
Canyon at the Pinturas River, view from the caves.
The images of hands are negative painted, that is, stencilled. Most of the hands are left hands, which suggests that painters held the spraying pipe with their right hand or they put the back of their right hand to the wall and held the spraying pipe with their left hand.
The age of the paintings was calculated from the remains of bone-made pipes used for spraying the paint on the wall of the cave, then discarded thousands of years ago on the cave floor.
D. Venus of Willendorf.
The Venus of Willendorf is an 11.1-centimetre-tall (4.4 in) figurine estimated to have been made 30,000 BCE. It was found on August 7, 1908 at a paleolithic site near Willendorf, a village in Austria. It is carved from an oolitic limestone that is not local to the area – meaning that it was probably traded for with people who lived far away – and tinted with red ochre.
Similar sculptures, first discovered in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, are traditionally referred to in archaeology as “Venus figurines,” due to the widely-held belief that depictions of nude women with exaggerated sexual features represented an early fertility fetish, perhaps a mother goddess – an item with supernatural powers that could help a man and woman conceive a child. The reference to Venus is metaphorical, since the figurines predate the mythological figure of Venus by many thousands of years.
Like other similar sculptures, it probably never had feet, and would not have stood on its own, although it might have been pegged into soft ground. Parts of the body associated with fertility and childbearing have been emphasized, leading researchers to believe that the Venus of Willendorf may have been used as a fertility fetish. The figure has no visible face, her head being covered with circular horizontal bands of what might be rows of plaited hair, or perhaps a type of headdress.
Other scholars hypothesize that the figurines may have been created as self-portraits by women. This theory stems from the correlation of the proportions of the statues to how the proportions of women’s bodies would seem if they were looking down at themselves, which would have been the only way to view their bodies during this period. They speculate that the complete lack of facial features could be accounted for by the fact that sculptors did not own mirrors. This reasoning has been criticized by still others, who note that water pools and puddles would have been readily-available natural mirrors for Paleolithic humans.
E. Bradshaw Rock.
Bradshaw rock art or Gwion Gwion art is found in the northwest Kimberley region of Western Australia. This particular piece is referred to by modern archeologists as tassel figures: identified by their characteristic tassels hanging from their arms and waists, various other accessories can be recognised, such as arm bands, conical headdresses and sometimes, boomerangs.
The Bradshaws are not the regions’ earliest paintings. The earlier art consists of crude animal drawings that are believed to be up to 40,000 years old. The Bradshaws have nothing in common with this earlier art and is dated between 26,500 and 20,000 years ago.
The height of the art is variable; most are between 40 and 50 cm in length with some examples up to 2 metres in height.
Artistically, Bradshaws are unusually advanced both in technique and style. Image processing has revealed that the outline of the Bradshaw figures are often painted first, then filled in. Engraving in the rock often follows the outlines of figures and may have served as a preliminary sketch which implies planning. Some faces of the figures are painted with anatomically correct features with enough detail to be considered portraits. Due to the fine detail and control found in the images, such as strands of hair painted in 1-2mm thicknesses, it has been suggested that feather quills may have been used as a technique to apply the paint to the rock walls; an imprint of a feather found at one site may support this possibility. No evidence has yet been found of any corrections or changes in composition during or after painting, while evidence of restoration has been found. In a detailed study of 66 Bradshaw panels, approximately 9% of the Bradshaw images have clearly been vandalized. Some were scratched with stones, some damaged by thrown stones, and some have been broken by hammering with large rocks.
What art will you leave behind as a testament to your presence on Earth? Create your own piece of “rock art” – though please don’t paint it on the classroom wall – depicting the important things in your life.
ACTIVITY – Interpreting Paleolithic and Neolithic Art
Humans have been producing art works for at least seventy-three thousand years.
Look at the following art, which dates back to the Paleolithic Age – the Old Stone Age, before humans discovered how to farm. For each piece, respond to the following:
Describe what you see with your eyes (figures, colors, size, etc)
Offer an interpretation – What was this artist trying to communicate? What was the purpose of this art?
What can we learn about this artist’s way of life from this art?
What modern artwork or form of expression does this ancient piece remind you of, and why?
A. Grotte de Niaux.
B. Laas Geel.
C. Cueva de las Manos.
D. Venus of Willendorf.
E. Bradshaw Rock.
What art will you leave behind as a testament to your presence on Earth? Create your own piece of “rock art” – though please don’t paint it on the classroom wall – depicting the important things in your life.
More information about each piece can be found here.
Who are the Berber? Briefly describe their culture.
What do Berbers call themselves, and what does it mean in English?
Write your name in the Berber alphabet.
An anthropologist is someone who examines culture, artifacts, religion, language, lifestyles, and traditions to describe and understand a group of people, either from the present or the past. How would an anthropologist describe your community’s culture and history?
The main ethnic group inhabiting the Maghreb – which literally means “the west” in Arabic, and includes Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia – are known as the Berber people. They and their ancestors have inhabited North Africa for more than 10,000 years, and possess a rich history and culture shaped by the varied geography of the area, as well as by their interactions with other groups, including the Phoenicians, the Romans, the Arabs, the Spanish, and the French.
The Berbers call themselves Imazighen, which means free or noble people in their own language. It is a fitting descriptor.
Historically, the Berbers have been successful in trade, navigating the harsh conditions of the Sahara and the Atlas Mountains, linking Sub Saharan Africa to the Mediterranean world when other groups struggled to do so. In ancient times, this wealth – as well as Berber prowess on horseback meant that groups such as the Carthaginians were paying them tribute in North Africa.
Unlike the conquests of previous religions and cultures, the coming of Islam, which was spread by Arabs, was to have extensive and long-lasting effects on the Maghreb. The new faith, in its various forms, would penetrate nearly all segments of Berber society, bringing with it armies, learned men, and fervent mystics, and in large part replacing tribal practices and loyalties with new social norms and political traditions influenced by the Arab world.
The Almohad Empire, a Berber empire based in Morocco that lasted from 1121 to 1269.
Traditionally, Berber men take care of livestock such as sheep, goats, cows, horses, and camels. Families migrate by following the natural cycle of grazing, and seeking water and shelter with the changing seasons. They are thus assured with an abundance of wool, cotton, and plants used for dyeing. For their part, women look after the family and produce handicrafts like clothing, rugs, or blankets – first for their personal use, and secondly for sale in local souqs, or markets. While many Berber still live according to these patterns, many more no longer follow these traditional patterns – they now have jobs, homes, and lifestyles similar to any of those found in your country.
The Berber are experts of irrigation, drawing water from mountain rivers and feeding it via gravity into green oases of productivity.
Traditionally, Berber men have raised livestock like these sheep, which provide wool, meat, and leather.
The goats are nearly as resourceful as the Berber themselves.
Staple crops of the modern Berber are wheat, corn, dates, and tomato.
The Berber inhabit a wide range of climate zones, including this harsh foothills of the Atlas Mountains, on the edge of the Sahara Desert. Rainfall and grass are sparse here, and the hearty goats herded by the Berber graze in the Argon trees that thrive in this arid landscape.
Berber women have traditionally created inticateky woven patterns on looms such as this one.
Berber women hand stitch the lushly detailed patterns seen on these kaftans. The work is exacting – and can earn a good income for the skilled artisan.
The Berber also cultivate alfalfa as a feed for livestock. This alfalfa is cut, bundled, and carried home from a family garden plot, usually by women.
Other Berber men work in tanneries, turning animal hides into leather in these vats of ammonia. The ammonia is sourced from the waste of animals.
Increasingly, the Berber are sedentary, but traditionally, many have been nomadic, following the green grass with their herds on a seasonal basis. This is mobile home of one family who still follows such a nomadic existence.
Like kids almost anywhere, modern Berber children love to play soccer – anywhere, any time.
Some Berber men create impressive tiled mosaics. These are the plain backsides of vibrantly-colored tiles, which will be held together with concrete. When flipped over, they will create a stunning geometric pattern – avoiding the depiction of the human form, as prescribed by Islam.
The traditional social structure of the Berbers is tribal. A leader is appointed to command the tribe through a generally democratic process. In the Middle Ages, many women had the power to govern. The majority of Berber tribes currently have men as heads of the tribe.
Berber hospitality centers on a sweet mint tea, offered upon the arrival of guests. Refusal of this offer is considered to be quite rude – take the tea! Let it cool! Have a sip!The Berber are known for creating beautiful, artist front doors for their homes, featuring striking patterns, carvings, metal work, and sometimes bright colors.
Imazighen (Berber) cuisine draws influence and flavors from distinct regions across North Africa and the Mediterranean world.
Principal Berber foods include:
Couscous, a staple dish made from a grain called semolina
Tajine, a stew made in various forms
Pastilla, a meat pie traditionally made with squab (fledgling pigeon) often today using chicken
Morocco is a former French colony, and French-style cafe culture has also influenced the country. Men in particular can be found at most hours of the day drinking espresso or tea, and possibly eating a pastry in one of the country’s thousands of cafes.
A tajine (Standard Moroccan Berber: ⵜⴰⵊⵉⵏ) is a Maghrebi dish which is named after the earthenware pot in which it is cooked. The earliest writings about the concept of cooking in a tajine appear in the famous One Thousand and One Nights, though the dish would have been already famous amongst the nomadic Bedouin people of the Arabian Peninsula, who added dried fruits like dates, apricots and plums to meat like mutton, chicken, or camel, giving tajine its unique taste. Tagine is now often eaten with french fries, either on the top or on the side.
Couscous (Berber : ⵙⴽⵙⵓ seksu, Arabic: كُسْكُس kuskus) is originally a Maghrebi dish of small (about 3 millimetres (0.12 in) diameter) steamed balls of crushed durum wheat semolina that is traditionally served with a stew spooned on top. It is a staple of the Moroccan diet, meaning that is eaten routinely and in such quantities that it constitutes a dominant portion of a standard diet for a given people, supplying a large fraction of energy needs and generally forming a significant proportion of the intake of other nutrients as well. In Tunisia, Algeria, Morocco, and Libya, couscous is generally served with vegetables (carrots, potatoes, and turnips) cooked in a spicy or mild broth or stew, and some meat (generally, chicken, lamb or mutton).
Pastilla (Moroccan Arabic: بسطيلة, romanized: bəsṭila) is a traditional Moroccan dish of Andalusian origin consumed in countries of the Maghreb. It is a pie which combines sweet and salty flavours; a combination of crisp layers of the crêpe-like werqa dough (a thinner cousin of phyllo dough), savory meat slow-cooked in broth and spices and then shredded, and a crunchy layer of toasted and ground almonds, cinnamon, and sugar. Pastilla is said to be “uniquely Moroccan, intricate and grand, fabulously rich and fantastical.”
In Morocco, Tunisia, Libya, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, and other parts of the Middle East, prickly pears of the yellow and orange varieties are grown by the side of farms, beside railway tracks and other otherwise noncultivable land. It is sold in summer by street vendors, and is considered a refreshing fruit for that season.
Writing in 1377, the scholar Ibn Khaldun offered a general description of the Berber that applies nearly as well in the twenty-first century:
“As for [their] moral virtues, one can cite: respect for one’s neighbours; the protection of guests; the observance of obligations and commitments; faithful adherence to promises and treaties; resolve in misfortune; indulgence towards the failings of others; renouncement of vengeance; kindness to the unfortunate; respect for the elderly; veneration for men of science; hatred of oppression; resolve before states; determination to win in matters of power; devotion to God in matters of religion.”
Indeed, nearly eight hundred years later the anthropologist Ahmed Skounti echoed these sentiments:
“The Imazighen (singular Amazigh) also known as the Berbers are among the original peoples of North Africa. Their myths, legends and history span 9,000 years, back to the Proto-Mediterraneans. They have achieved unity by keeping up their unique language and culture which are, like their land, both African and Mediterranean.
The Berbers of Morocco share this duality, reflecting the diversity of their nature and stormy history. Through contact with other peoples of the Mediterranean, they created kingdoms but also vast territories organised into powerful, democratic, war-mongering, tribal communities. Both aspects of this social political organisation have left a mark on recent historical events and the two millenia of the country’s history. As opposed to the pagan Mediterranean kingdoms of Antiquity, Berber empires developed inland and were Muslim. Judaism continued to be practiced, and the Sunni Islam majority gradually took
on a Berber hue with its brotherhoods, zaouias, marabouts. and rituals.
The roots of the Berber culture go deep down into Morocco’s proto-history. They are illustrated by a strong link with their land, a sense of community, hospitality sharing food and a specific relationship with spirituality. Its openness to many influences whether Mediterranean, African, Oriental, European or international have defined its current characteristics.
The Berber language, an Afro-Asian idiom, is the melting pot of the history and culture of the country. It has outlived most languages of Antiquity such as Ancient Greek, Phoenician, Latin and Egyptian. It used to be written but is now mainly oral. Though there are fewer now that can speak it, the language is nevertheless still used by a substantial number of Moroccans.”
The hamsa (Berber: ⵜⴰⴼⵓⵙⵜ tafust) is a palm-shaped amulet popular throughout the Middle East and North Africa and commonly used in jewelry and wall hangings. Depicting the open right hand, an image recognized and used as a sign of protection in many times throughout history, the hamsa is believed by some, predominantly Muslims and Jews, to provide defense against the evil eye. It has been theorized that its origins lie in Ancient Egypt or Carthage (modern-day Tunisia) and may have been associated with the Goddess Tanit. The Hamsa is also known as the Hand of Fatima after the daughter of the prophet Muhammad.
The Berber are known for their skills in working with silver. Its color is associated with purity and piety. The vibrant colors that highlight the silver are called enamel, which is a technique that probably arrived in Morocco in the 1400s, as many Muslims and Jews were expelled from Christian Spain.
Inseparable from poetry and associated with the dance, Amazigh music take many forms, but two popular folk forms include Ahwach and Rouaiss. – AHWACH: is a collective dance according to musical rhythms and with a accompaniment of songs. The group composed of flatists (aouad), percussion flat drums (bendir), percussion sionists of metal instruments (naqos) and dancers. ROUAISS a musical group that sings Amazigh poetry (amerg). The instruments used are the three-stringed lute (guembri), the monochord violin (rebab), the flat drum (bendir) and an instrument percussion metal (naqoss).
If men cover their heads, it is often with a wrapping as seen in this photo, which shields their heads and faces from the heat of the sun and the any sand on the wind.
Two men in traditional Berber clothing. The long tunic worn by both men and women is called a kaftan.
The djellaba is a long, loose-fitting outer robe with full sleeves that is worn in the Maghreb region of North Africa. Djellabas are made of wool in different shapes and colors, but lightweight cotton djellabas have now become popular. Among the Berbers, or Imazighen, such as the Imilchil in the Atlas Mountains, the color of a djellaba traditionally indicates the marital status (single or married) of the bearer: a dark brown djellaba indicating bachelorhood. Almost all djellabas of both styles (male or female) include a baggy hood called a qob (Arabic: قب) that comes to a point at the back. The hood is important for both sexes, as it protects the wearer from the sun, and in earlier times, it was used as a defence against sand being blown into the wearer’s face by strong desert winds. In colder climes, as in the mountains of Morocco and Algeria, it also serves the same function as a winter hat, preventing heat loss through the head and protecting the face from snow and rain. It is common for the roomy hood to be used as a pocket during times of warm weather; it can fit loaves of bread or bags of groceries.
Many women cover their heads in accordance with Muslim tradition, but many more do not.
No matter how traditional the dress, Berbers are not stuck in the past – this man carries a messenger bag containing his cell phone and other modern necessities.
Berber Writing
French and Arabic are the dominant languages for many Berber today, as evinced by this street art in Essaouira, Morocco, but Berbers also have their own traditional language that is distinct from either.The Berber alphabet has ancient roots. It is more properly called tifinagh.
The unique Berber alphabet is called tifinagh. Like the Berbers themselves, the writing has been attributed in turn to having Egyptian, Greek, Phoeno-Punic or South-Arabic origins, though none of these theories is definitive. Other research points toward the indigenous origins of Berber writing, linking it closely to cave art. The undecoded signs and symbols that accompany the depiction of humans, animals, weapons and ritual or combat scenes create a sort of visual vocabulary which may have later developed into the writing system.
Historically, Berber writing had limited uses, primarily in memorials and commemorative stone carvings. It was largely replaced by Arabic around the fifth or sixth centuries, and later by French in the twentieth century. Berber was originally written vertically from top to bottom, but today is oriented from right to left, like Arabic. The alphabet is composed of a distinctive geometric written form, in which 33 characters are created from three basic shapes: the circle, the line, and the dot.
This ancient alphabet serves as the basis for the formation of the modern tifinagh alphabet adopted since 2003 by Morocco in order to write the Berber language.
The yaz (ⵣ) symbolizes the “free man”, which is the meaning of the Berber word Imazighen, the Berbers’ own name for themselves. It can be seen here in graffiti, but also in more formal decorative settings, and in a flag that symbolizes Berber pride and culture.
THIS LESSON WAS MADE POSSIBLE THROUGH A GENEROUS GRANT FROM THE QATAR FOUNDATION.
(Information on the Berber alphabet was adapted from the work of Aline Star, anthropologist at the Institut National des Sciences de L’Archéologie et du Patrimoine. Rabat)
Early hominins—particularly the australopithecines, whose brains and anatomy are in many ways more similar to ancestral non-human apes—are less often referred to as “human” than hominins of the genus Homo.[5] Several of these hominins used fire, occupied much of Eurasia, and gave rise to anatomically modern Homo sapiens in Africa about 315,000[6] years ago. Humans began to exhibit evidence of behavioral modernity around 50,000 years ago, and in several waves of migration, they ventured out of Africa and populated most of the world.
Like other similar sculptures, it probably never had feet, and would not have stood on its own, although it might have been pegged into soft ground. Parts of the body associated with fertility and childbearing have been emphasized, leading researchers to believe that the Venus of Willendorf may have been used as a fertility fetish. The figure has no visible face, her head being covered with circular horizontal bands of what might be rows of plaited hair, or perhaps a type of headdress.
