ANEB V3970

Very light, very forgiving in terms of deadlines, and he is a loosey-goosey grader who will prefer to just give you an A if he thinks you made any effort whatsoever. One or two texts with some selected chapters are also included. Weekly 2 page or so precis about scientific papers he sends out and a final paper on any topic of your choosing (no restrictions on length, style, etc.). No exams, no "studying" required.

Weekly paragraph on the upcoming presentation's readings. Participation is a huge component of this class, and as mentioned you have to present at least one topic. Because there were so few kids in our class, students had the option of either taking on a second topic, or to write a 20 page final paper on their own topic.

This man is a hidden gem at Columbia and he is perhaps one of the funniest damn people I've ever met. It's like having George Carlin for a professor. His style is very unstructured with a make-it-up-as-we-go mentality, which can be tough for folks who are used to being told how to hold a pencil every step of the way. He embodies the Socratic method: he assigns current scientific papers to read as they pop up--so just watch the email flurries--and then proceeds to guide a group conversation to slowly reach an underlying conclusion/answer to questions he asks in the beginning of class. He will hand out a syllabus that amounts to a stream of consciousness that he then says you can completely ignore. If you allow the process to work, then you will learn far more and have a deeper understanding of the broader field than most any other class can offer. Holloway loves to criticize bad science and political correctness trends in the field that have stymied progression and understanding--and he's damn good at it! He will bring skulls, cranial endocasts, and jar of jellybeans to every class. Do yourself a favor and take a class with him.

Professor Manser was great for this seminar. It was a pretty small group of kids, and most of us knew each other from other classes (I took it in the fall of 2012). The first week we were able to choose a topic we wanted to present on (from a list of topics). The first hour of the seminar would be the student's presentation, and the last half would be a discussion. The topics were always interesting and very informative (topics ranged from human migration patterns to genetics of taste). Professor Manser would usually leave the discussion for the students to participate, but would always comment if there was a lull in the conversations. Overall, great course to take, not sure if it's the same with Prof. Holloway, but I can't imagine it's too different.

A lot of reading and precis for all readings. There is a 20-page paper on any subject of your choosing, which you present for 20 minutes during class at the end of the semester.

This class is extremely unstructured—definitely different from the physical anthro classes of Jill Shapiro. Holloway handed out a syllabus (sort of) on the first day of class, and we promptly ignored it for the rest of class. The class discussions started off with random thoughts and then consisted of our random tangents, with some allusions to the readings here and there. He e-mailed us a ridiculous number of articles, all somehow related to human variation, and we had to write precis (short summaries and reactions) for all of them. There were also three books that we had to read and summarize before the end of the semester. Deadlines were completely flexible—you were fine as long as you got everything in by the end of the semester.

Grading doesn't seem to be a set object with him, neither does homework. He loosely assigns readings (some weeks more clearly than others) and requires a weekly reaction paper. You can write whatever you want in these, go on tangents, as long or short as you want, and he'll read it and mark it and give it back to you. There's a final paper and a presentation of it. Doesn't seem to be worried about grades, or syllabi either.

Very well known in the field of physical anthropology, Holloway is an expert on skulls, endocasts, and other brain info that can be taken by measuring the skull. This means that A) he knows most all there is to know about the skull and much about physical anthro in general, and B) he is respected in the field and will get to examine real cool finds, such as Homo florensiensis. In the biological basis of human variation, he teaches the seminar with a very hands off approach, and I'm sure all his classes are this way. The class consists of about 15 of us sitting around and bullshitting about variation and evolution. He doesn't actively teach or guide the conversation really. What he is good at is knowing what to read and where to go to pursue your own interests in physical anthropology. The readings that he vaguely assigns are all very interested, relevant, recent, and allow for multiple points of destination. Some of the kids in the seminar are physical anthro fans and are probably benefiting alot from being in class with Holloway, while I'm sure others just sit in class bored and will probably get fairly good grades as well. I also have to say, for someone who measures brains, he has one of the weirdest head shapes I've ever seen. It's as if he doesn't have an occipital lobe.