Java man Missing the link Prejudice Commentary

Eugène Dubois primatology

Java man

• Ernst Haeckel claimed
• humans originated in southeast Asia
• because he thought
• the Sumatran orangutan
• was our closest cousin.
• Eugène Dubois thought
• he had proven Haeckel’s theory
• because he found
• a tooth, skull cap, and thigh bone
• of a human-like ape
• or an ape-like human
• on the nearby island of Java.

Missing the link

• Dubois called his missing link Anthropithecus—
• Cross that out.
• Pithecanthropus erectus—
• Cross that out, too.
• Homo erectus was not related
• to the orangutan.
• He was out of Africa—
• or out of Asia.
• Some paleoanthropologists think
• he was a common ancestor
• of Homo habilis,
• Homo heidelbergensis,
• Homo neanderthalensis, and us;
• some think
• he was an east Asian species of homo ergaster;
• and some think
• he was was not related to homo ergaster.

Prejudice

• Like a person from another school
• another city, state, country
• another religion or political party
• another sexuality
• another race
• with his low forehead
• his prominent brow ridge,
• this creature is weird
• but not as weird as bear or coyote
• whom native Americans
• called brothers.