Scientist
who discovered Lucy to give XVII distinguished JAR
lecture
In
1973, Donald C. Johanson, Ph.D., and a small team of scientists
shook the world when they discovered a nearly complete hominid
skeleton in the Awash Valley of Ethiopia.
Nicknamed
Lucy, the three-million-year-old fossil was the
first to offer evidence that early humans with very small brains
and apelike jaws walked erect at the end of the Pliocene era.
As the
UNMs XVII Journal of Anthropological Research (JAR) Distinguished
Lecturer, Johanson will discuss the current understanding of
early human origins in light of recent discoveries much older
than Lucy.
Johansons
lecture, Lucy: 30 Years Later, will be presented
Thursday, Oct. 9, at 7:30 p.m. in UNMs Keller Hall, located
next to Popejoy Hall.
A reception
will follow.
The lecture
is a fundraiser for the UNM Anthropology Department graduate
student support fund, established this year in honor of the
departments 75th anniversary.
Tickets
are $15 or $5 with a UNM student ID and are available at the
UNM Bookstore and PIT ticket offices, Raleys, Western
Warehouse and www.tickets.com, or call 925-5858. If available,
tickets will be sold at the Popejoy Box Office one hour prior
to the event.
In addition
to the lecture, Johanson will lead a free seminar New
Hominid Finds from Hadar, Ethiopia on Friday, Oct. 10
at noon at the UNM Hibben Center, rm. 105.
Johanson
is the Virginia M. Ullman Professor in the Department of Anthropology
at Arizona State University where he is also director of the
Institute of Human Origins.
He received
his Ph.D. from the University of Chicago in 1974 and is one
of the worlds leading human paleontologists. His 1982
book with M. Edey, Lucy: The Beginnings of Humanity,
was much acclaimed. Articles in National Geographic magazine
and World Book were influential in generating public interest
in human origins research.
Since the
early 1970s, besides continuing to conduct research in Ethiopia,
Johanson has directed projects in Olduvai Gorge, Tanzania, and
in Eritrea, Jordan and Iran.
For information
on UNMs Journal of Anthropological Research or the JAR
lecture, call 277-4544 or visit http://www.unm.edu/~jar.
Annual U.S. journal subscriptions are $30.