Vivek V. Venkataraman
@vivek123.bsky.social
📤 544
📥 316
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Biological anthropologist at the University of Calgary
https://www.vivekvenkataraman.com/
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Vivek V. Venkataraman
Duncan Stibbard Hawkes
3 days ago
As we've argued in a recent preprint, Ardrey might have benefited from paying more heed to the anthropologists.
osf.io/preprints/os...
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Arvid Ågren
13 days ago
Everyone should read the Spandrels paper. But too often it's discussed without context of the other contributions. Esp. Clutton-Brock & Harvey on how the comparative method can be used to test adaptive hypothesis, and Cain’s final critique (which SJG called “tame” compared to the oral remarks).
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Haneul Jang
25 days ago
Our new paper in Hunter-Gatherer Research! We explored women’s decision-making power within households in two subsistence communities with different gender norms (BaYaka foragers & Bandongo fisher-farmers) in the Congolese rainforest ✨
www.liverpooluniversitypress.co.uk/doi/abs/10.3...
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Duncan Stibbard Hawkes
30 days ago
Latest crop of early online papers at HGR includes some bangers - if I do say so myself. Not just this report on BaYaka Women's autonomy and my own article about cage traps, but also Sterelny on quasi-darwinian mechanisms in cultural evolution.
www.liverpooluniversitypress.co.uk/doi/abs/10.3...
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Mauro Silva Júnior
29 days ago
"The problem...which recurs throughout 'Spandrels', is not that this criticism is wrong, it’s that Gould & Lewontin...make only cursory and superficial remarks about how test those alternatives, or about how to pursue an alternative research programme built on different conceptual foundations"
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Duncan Stibbard Hawkes
30 days ago
Not to forget this extremely interesting paper on consensus-based decision-making in egalitarian societies.
bsky.app/profile/vive...
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Duncan Stibbard Hawkes
30 days ago
And don't miss out on Vivek's absolutely sterling interview with Bob Kelly.
bsky.app/profile/vive...
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Gearing up to teach my grad Theory class again, I am reminded that the Spandrels of San Marcos is not a good paper.
dynamicecology.wordpress.com/2011/08/26/w...
(but I'll probably assign it anyway, for precisely this reason)
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Why "The Spandrels of San Marco" isn't a good paper
Stephen Jay Gould & Richard Lewontin’s 1979 article “The spandrels of San Marco and the Panglossian paradigm: a critique of the adaptationist programme” is one of the most wid…
https://dynamicecology.wordpress.com/2011/08/26/why-the-spandrels-of-san-marco-isnt-a-good-paper/
about 1 month ago
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Graeme Warren
about 1 month ago
Great to read Vivek's interview with Bob - lots of interesting things here. And not just the insights into Binford's data collection 😱. Thanks to both Vivek and Bob for the publication!
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Check out my interview with Bob Kelly in Hunter Gatherer Research. The view from 30,000 feet: An interview with archaeologist Robert L Kelly
liverpooluniversitypress.co.uk/doi/10.3828/...
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The view from 30,000 feet: An interview with archaeologist Robert L Kelly: Hunter Gatherer Research: Vol 0, No 0
View all available purchase options and get full access to this article.
https://liverpooluniversitypress.co.uk/doi/10.3828/hgr.2026.11
about 1 month ago
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New article in Hunter Gatherer Research! Foraging societies practice consensus-based politics. We conduct a xc review and argue that it helps to boost collective intelligence. Consensus, cooperation and collective intelligence in foraging societies
liverpooluniversitypress.co.uk/doi/10.3828/...
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Consensus, cooperation and collective intelligence in foraging societies | Hunter Gatherer Research
Consensus-based collective decision-making is a common feature of political life in hunter-gatherer (forager) societies. In this paper, we ask why. Synthesising evidence from anthropology and experimental social psychology, we argue that consensus-based ...
https://liverpooluniversitypress.co.uk/doi/10.3828/hgr.2026.9
about 1 month ago
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Duncan Stibbard Hawkes
about 1 month ago
🎄 New paper! 🎁 Since the 20s it's been said that "the Hadza don't use traps". Except sporadic snaring, none have been reported. So I was excited to find baited cage traps in use. More exciting, this was cross-cultural transmission — seldom seen in action! 1/5
tinyurl.com/cagetrap
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(PDF) First recorded use of cage traps by the Tanzanian Hadza: A case of cross-cultural transmission
PDF | While hunting is a critical subsistence strategy for the Tanzanian Hadza, reports of trapping have traditionally been minimal. Snare trapping of... | Find, read and cite all the research you nee...
https://tinyurl.com/cagetrap
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Dr Dan Shugar 🇨🇦
about 1 month ago
Perhaps a late Xmas/Chanukah/Festivus/Kwanzaa present for some research hot shot currently not in Canada but who might like to move here - the new Impact+ Research Chairs. Note the strategic areas in Arctic, environment, climate resilience and water security. 🧪⚒️
careers.ucalgary.ca/jobs/1717054...
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Canada Impact+ Research Chairs, University of Calgary in Calgary, AB, ...
Canada Impact+ Research Chairs, University of Calgary in Calgary, AB, ...
https://careers.ucalgary.ca/jobs/17170542-canada-impact-plus-research-chairs-university-of-calgary
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It never ceases to amaze me how flexible and multi-purpose the human foot can be. Pics taken with the Batek of Malaysia.
2 months ago
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The Dissenter
2 months ago
In episode 1022, I talk with Dr. Vivek Venkataraman about tree climbing, running, and hunting across human societies.
#Anthropology
#Science
youtu.be/QirFyPqN3e0
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#1022 Vivek Venkataraman: Tree Climbing, Running, and Hunting across Human Societies
YouTube video by The Dissenter
https://youtu.be/QirFyPqN3e0
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Brian Wood
2 months ago
"At Brown and Harvard, more than 20 percent of undergraduates are registered as disabled. At Amherst, that figure is 34 percent." Accommodation Nation: America’s colleges have an extra-time-on-tests problem.
www.theatlantic.com/magazine/202...
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Accommodation Nation
America’s colleges have an extra-time-on-tests problem.
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/2026/01/elite-university-student-accommodation/684946/
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Check out our new paper in the journal Osteoarthritis and Cartilage, led by Ian J. Wallace. "Dampened inflammation and reduced risk of osteoarthritis among non-industrialized societies"
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
4 months ago
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Bruce Winterhalder was once asked to share some professional insights. Here they are:
5 months ago
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SAPIENS Magazine
5 months ago
From the archive. Societies divide labor by gender and age. A biological anthropologist considers when and why this behavior arose. Read more:
www.sapiens.org/biology/labo...
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How Allocating Work Aided Our Evolutionary Success
Many societies divide labor by gender and age. A biological anthropologist considers when and why this behavior arose.
https://www.sapiens.org/biology/labor-division-gender-human-orgins/
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Vivek V. Venkataraman
A great piece on the women's hunting debate by Elena Bridgers that covers some of our work:
elenabridgers.substack.com/p/did-women-...
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Did Women Hunt in Our Evolutionary Past?
When Western gender ideology gets in the way of good science
https://elenabridgers.substack.com/p/did-women-hunt-in-our-evolutionary
5 months ago
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A great piece on the women's hunting debate by Elena Bridgers that covers some of our work:
elenabridgers.substack.com/p/did-women-...
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Did Women Hunt in Our Evolutionary Past?
When Western gender ideology gets in the way of good science
https://elenabridgers.substack.com/p/did-women-hunt-in-our-evolutionary
5 months ago
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Ed Hagen
6 months ago
My review of Sex is a Spectrum, by Agustín Fuentes 🧪
#BioAnth
blog.edhagen.net/posts/2025-0...
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Review of Sex Is a Spectrum: The Biological Limits of the Binary by Agustín Fuentes – Grasshoppermouse
Blog posts and talk slides
https://blog.edhagen.net/posts/2025-08-07-review-sex-is-a-spectrum/
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Zach Garfield
6 months ago
Some thoughts on how preferences for
#leaders
change with our environments: Leaders for the World We Think We Live In | Psychology Today
www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/ecol...
#LeadSciSky
#EvPsych
#CultEvol
#socialpsyc
#BehSci
🧪
@zohrankmamdani.bsky.social
@psychologytoday.com
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Leaders for the World We Think We Live In
Why do we trust steady hands in some contexts and risk-takers in others? Evolutionary theory reveals how environments shape our shifting choices of leaders.
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/ecology-of-minds/202508/leaders-for-the-world-we-think-we-live-in
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Sonja Drimmer
6 months ago
Do not accept the premise that education is to blame for abysmal jobs outcomes. “The fantasy economy's framing of economic inequality… focuses exclusively on education…deflects attention away from decades of public policies and changing business practices that have…contributed to stagnating wages”
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Roope Kaaronen
8 months ago
Published two years ago in
@science.org
: "Body-based units of measure in cultural evolution" We looked into how, and why, human societies have measured things with their bodies. A little thread about the deep ancestry and cross-cultural heritage of measurement:
www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
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Body-based units of measure in cultural evolution
Measurements based on body part length have cognitive and behavioral advantages, which accounts for their widespread and persistent use.
https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.adf1936
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Vivek V. Venkataraman
I’ve been trying to figure out which scientists in the human evolutionary sciences were directly influenced by Robert Ardrey’s books. Mostly the answer is a resounding no.
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Lewis Wolpert: 'No one working in the social sciences can ignore the
I recently had lunch with John Tooby and Leda Cosmides of the University of California at Santa Barbara. They have become famous for their contributions to evolutionary psychology, and have revolution...
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/lewis-wolpert-no-one-working-in-the-social-sciences-can-ignore-the-role-of-our-genetic-inheritance-114109.html
6 months ago
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I’ve been trying to figure out which scientists in the human evolutionary sciences were directly influenced by Robert Ardrey’s books. Mostly the answer is a resounding no.
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Lewis Wolpert: 'No one working in the social sciences can ignore the
I recently had lunch with John Tooby and Leda Cosmides of the University of California at Santa Barbara. They have become famous for their contributions to evolutionary psychology, and have revolution...
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/lewis-wolpert-no-one-working-in-the-social-sciences-can-ignore-the-role-of-our-genetic-inheritance-114109.html
6 months ago
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Hugo Mercier
6 months ago
From ancient Greece to the Arabic golden age, scholars have been driven by their curiosity to investigate astronomy, history, philosophy, and sundry other disciplines. Is there a structure to that curiosity? Are astronomers as likely to also be historians or to also be philosophers?
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Chris Stringer
6 months ago
Changes in diet drove physical evolution in early humans
www.eurekalert.org/news-release...
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Changes in diet drove physical evolution in early humans
A Dartmouth-led study shows that early humans developed a taste for grassy carbohydrate-rich plants 700,000 years before they evolved the ideal teeth to chew the tougher plant fibers efficiently. The ...
https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/1092585?et_rid=34814771&et_cid=5691587
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Philip Ball
6 months ago
This is fascinating. It is also evidence in favour of taking biological agency seriously, rather than treating it as an "as if" property.
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"Behavior drives morphological change during human evolution" Our new article is out in
@science.org
today
www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
6 months ago
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Pleased to present our new preprint on sleep and circadian rhythms among the Orang Asli of Peninsular Malaysia. This is a fascinating system for exploring sleep biology. Lots of variation in light exposure, housing type, and subsistence.
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
🧵 below.
6 months ago
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Vivek V. Venkataraman
Some fun unpublished data from a talk I gave years ago on the sexual division of labor (SDOL) among the Batek of Malaysia. The Batek have been described as highly gender-egalitarian. Kirk and Karen Endicott collected the data in 1975-76, back when the Batek were fully nomadic foragers.
7 months ago
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Some fun unpublished data from a talk I gave years ago on the sexual division of labor (SDOL) among the Batek of Malaysia. The Batek have been described as highly gender-egalitarian. Kirk and Karen Endicott collected the data in 1975-76, back when the Batek were fully nomadic foragers.
7 months ago
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From our new preprint on physical activity (PA) and cardiometabolic health among the Orang Asli of Peninsular Malaysia. An extreme lifestyle gradient results in drastic variation in PA, w/ especially notable age-related declines in PA with urbanization
www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1...
7 months ago
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Our new preprint looks at how early life environments shape adult cardiometabolic health among the Orang Asli.
www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...
"We find support for the Developmental Constraints model but not the Predictive Adaptive Response model in explaining adult cardiometabolic health"
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Early life environments shape adult cardiometabolic health during rapid lifestyle change
Early life environments can have long-lasting impacts on health and fitness, but the evolutionary significance of these effects remains debated. Two major classes of explanations have been proposed: d...
https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.06.06.658350v1
7 months ago
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Check out our new preprint! We ask: how does urbanization impact cardiometabolic health among Orang Asli and Turkana? Congrats to lead author
@marinawatowich.bsky.social
!
www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1...
"We find that age effects on cardiometabolic health are highly modifiable by lifestyle..."
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Urbanization exacerbates age-associated declines in cardiometabolic health in Turkana and Orang Asli
Declines in cardiometabolic health among older individuals are so ubiquitous in Western, high-income countries that non-communicable diseases (NCDs) like type 2 diabetes, hypertension, and cardiovascu...
https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2025.06.06.25329160v1.full.pdf+html
7 months ago
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Prof. Gillian Brown
7 months ago
Useful observation by
@enzaspinapolice.bsky.social
that a simplistic and problematic 'man the hunter' stereotype was propagated by popular science (e.g. Audrey, Morris) and was less explicit in original academic literature.
@ishpssb2025.bsky.social
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Luke Glowacki
8 months ago
I'm excited to share that my wife's book, The Mind Electric, is out! She's a brilliant neurologist and weaves together patient stories exploring the human mind. I read it and it's fantastic. If you r interested in the mind, culture, & how we make meaning, check it out!
www.amazon.com/Mind-Electri...
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IASToulouse
7 months ago
The Friends of IAST conference has come to an end Thank you to all the attendees, presenters, partners & organizers for the richness of the moments we shared together: discussions, presentations as well as informal exchanges during the coffee breaks! 👋
@minhuayan.bsky.social
S. Mitter J. Stieglitz
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IASToulouse
7 months ago
🎉 The Friends of IAST conference kicks off today in Toulouse! Held every two years, this event brings together IAST alumni and new research fellows—two days of reconnecting, sharing ideas, and sparking new collaborations. 👋Organizers:
@minhuayan.bsky.social
S. Mitter J. Stieglitz
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Michael Gurven
8 months ago
Your next Fall read, my new book: SEVEN DECADES: HOW WE EVOLVED TO LIVE LONGER Longevity is shaped by our evolutionary past—imagine aging as opportunity rather than burden. Out Sept 16, preorder w/ code PUP30 for 30% discount:
press.princeton.edu/books/hardco...
@princetonupress.bsky.social
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Seven Decades
An anthropologist uncovers new evidence for the evolutionary origins of human longevity—and explains why growing old is an opportunity, not a burden
https://press.princeton.edu/books/hardcover/9780691231990/seven-decades
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Vivek V. Venkataraman
Radical Anthropology
9 months ago
And this is our recent excellent ZOOM with
@vivek123.bsky.social
youtu.be/6IgVqOxCxIk?...
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The Meanings and Dividends of Man the Hunter by Vivek Venkataraman 20 May 2025
YouTube video by Radical Anthropology
https://youtu.be/6IgVqOxCxIk?si=W09u7lWUBBalGxlh
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Last week, I delivered a talk to the Radical Anthropology Group on our new preprint called The Meanings and Dividends of Man the Hunter. Thanks to
@radicalanthro.bsky.social
for having me! Link:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=6IgV...
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The Meanings and Dividends of Man the Hunter by Vivek Venkataraman 20 May 2025
YouTube video by Radical Anthropology
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6IgVqOxCxIk&t=641s&ab_channel=RadicalAnthropology
9 months ago
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Vivek V. Venkataraman
ProSocial World
9 months ago
Evolutionary anthropologist Vivek Venkataraman and renowned scientist David Sloan Wilson dig into how early human societies developed. 🔗Don't miss out, come along!
www.prosocial.world/events/democ...
#Evolution
#Biology
#Academic
#Podcast
#History
#Science
#ProSocial
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Really looking forward to this conversation on Friday May 23 with
@davidsloanwilson.bsky.social
If you've ever wondered what hunter-gatherers can tell us about the evolution of democracy, please join us!
www.prosocial.world/events/democ...
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Democracy’s Deep Roots: From Hunter-Gatherers to Modern Society A conversation between Vivek Venkataraman and David Sloan Wilson
Free Live Discussion and Q&A with the Speakers
https://www.prosocial.world/events/democracys-deep-roots-venkataraman-and-wilson
9 months ago
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Tomorrow (Tues May 20) I'll be giving an online talk to the Radical Anthropology Group on our new preprint about the Meaning of Man the Hunter. All are welcome! 130pm EST ZOOM only ZOOM ID 384 186 2174 passcode Wawilak
www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/the-meanin...
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The Meaning and Dividends of Man the Hunter
Leading hunter-gatherer anthropologist Vivek Venkataraman looks into the debates arising from 'Man the Hunter'
https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/the-meaning-and-dividends-of-man-the-hunter-tickets-1322130220079
9 months ago
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Vivek V. Venkataraman
Radical Anthropology
9 months ago
Our ZOOM tomorrow with Vivek Venkataraman on 'The Meaning and Dividends of Man the Hunter' 6:30pm ID 384 186 2174 passcode Wawilak
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Vivek V. Venkataraman
9 months ago
I highly recommend this live podcast titled "Democracy's Deep Roots: From Hunter-Gatherers to Modern Society:
www.prosocial.world/events/democ...
.
@prosocialworld.bsky.social
@vivek123.bsky.social
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Democracy’s Deep Roots: From Hunter-Gatherers to Modern Society A conversation between Vivek Venkataraman and David Sloan Wilson
Free Live Discussion and Q&A with the Speakers
https://www.prosocial.world/events/democracys-deep-roots-venkataraman-and-wilson
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Vivek V. Venkataraman
Radical Anthropology
9 months ago
Looking forward to our ZOOM next week with
@vivek123.bsky.social
Details 👇
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