The Great Apes: A Short History

Description

A unique, beautifully illustrated exploration of our fascination with our closest primate relatives, and the development of primatology as a discipline This insightful work is a compact but wide-ranging survey of humankind's relationship to the great apes (chimpanzees, bonobos, gorillas, orangutans), from antiquity to the present. Replete with fascinating historical details and anecdotes, it traces twists and turns in our construction of primate knowledge over five hundred years. Chris Herzfeld outlines the development of primatology and its key players and events, including well-known long-term field studies, notably the pioneering work by women such as Jane Goodall, Dian Fossey, and Birute Galdikas. Herzfeld seeks to heighten our understanding of great apes and the many ways they are like us. The reader will encounter apes living in human families, painting apes, apes who use American Sign Language, and chimpanzees who travelled in space. A philosopher and historian specializing in primatology, Herzfeld offers thought-provoking insights about our perceptions of apes, as well as the boundary between "human" and "ape" and what it means to be either.

Author description

Chris Herzfeld is an artist and freelance researcher trained at the Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales in Paris. She lives in Brussels, Belgium, and Naples, FL. Kevin Frey received a PhD in English from SUNY Stony Brook. He lives in New York City. Dr. Jane Goodall, DBE, is an ethologist, famous for her research into wild chimpanzees in Tanzania. She is founder of the Jane Goodall Institute and a UN Messenger of Peace. www.janegoodall.org, www.rootsandshoots.org.