Cafe Sci Orlando announcements for 2008-12: The Neandertal Enigma
Chad MILLER
- December 3 event
--- Topic & speaker *
--- Directions and Parking Instructions
- About us
- Help us thrive
(asterisk = change since last announcement)
## December café: The Neandertal Enigma ##
For the month of December, we have a cafe meeting on Wednesday,
December 3rd, at 7pm.
Neandertals have long fascinated both scientists and the general public.
Due to their close evolutionary relationship to modern humans, they
captivate our imagination because they are us, but not us, and therefore
have stood as a guidepost for defining ourselves. Changing perspectives
on Neandertal biology and behavior are partial reflections of both advances
in scientific research and of our own preconceptions about humanity,
our identity, and our place in the world. This talk will introduce both current
anthropological evidence for Neandertal lifeways and paleobiology, but
also evaluate how the cultural and social lens through which the scientific
community views the fossil record filters and shapes scientific knowledge.
Dr. Cowgill is an assistant professor of anthropology specializing in bio-
logical anthropology. Her primary research focus includes late Pleistocene
human evolution, human growth and development, human variation, and
functional morphology. In particular, she is interested in understanding how
childhood activity patterns affect the developing skeleton during growth, and
how these forces shape the adult skeleton. She received her B.A. in anthro-
pology from the University of California at Berkeley in 2001 and a M.A. and
Ph.D. in anthropology from Washington University in St. Louis in 2001 and
2008. Dr. Cowgill has done extensive field research in Europe, the Middle
East, Africa, and the United States.
### Directions ###
Our cafe is held at Stardust Video and Coffee, which is in the area
north of Colonial (SR50) and east of Mills Ave (17/92), but south of
Winter Park.
- *From Mills*, drive east on Virginia Dr, past Leu Gardens, following
the curves -- Virginia, Forest, Corrine. At a the traffic light for
Winter Park Road, turn left/north.
- *From Colonial*, drive north on Bennett Road, toward Baldwin Park.
At the traffic light for Corrine Dr, turn left/west and at the traffic
light for Winter Park Road, turn right/north.
From that intersection, Stardust is immediately on the left. 1842 E
Winter Park Rd, Orlando, FL. (407) 623-3393 Beware that some GPS
maps send you too far north, to W Winter Park Rd. Stardust is only 50
feet from Corrine Rd.
### Parking Instructions ###
The parking lot will probably be crowded, so please park on Marble
Ave, which is next to (north, away from Corrine) Stardust's modest
parking lot. [ http://bit.ly/117cja ]
## About us ##
Café Scientifique is a worldwide grassroots effort to raise science
literacy by bringing science out of the lab and into the pub. It
started in England about ten years ago, modeled after the French /Café
Philosophique/, and has since spread to several dozen cities.
Meetings are free to attend, and we love questions.
A typical meeting runs about an hour. A scientific expert presents
some topic for about 20 to 30 minutes, we have a short break to
cogitate and order refreshments, and then we ask questions, discuss,
and generally have a good time.
## Help us grow and thrive! ##
We need you to help us keep a healthy number of people attending and
stoking our dialectic fires. You can help us in two ways in the next
week: Print out a PDF flier and post it so that others can see it.
[ http://archive.cafesciorl.com/2008-12-03-flier.pdf ] Or, tell others
about us. It may be easiest to point them to Cafe Sci Orlando's
web site, at cafesciorl.com .
Also, Chad loves folksonomies, and recommends using the tag
"cafesciorl" to refer online to this Café Scientifique. It's already in
use to pull photos from Flickr on the cafe web site. Take a look at
our web site to see it in action. Use that tag on your own on the 'Net
when referring to us.