Biological Profile: Ancestry Flashcards
why is ancestry the most difficult to determine?
racial boundaries are dynamic
biological concept of race
different populations of the same species, which are distinguished from one another by the possession of certain distinctive hereditary traits
what are the two stances of race between forensic anthropologists?
- those who wish to separate individuals into biologically distinct races
- those who feel that racial boundaries are plastic and the human population cannot be separated into different racial categories
ancestry
commonly used instead of race to refer to a group of individuals that are descended from the same ancestral populations
why is race still used in forensic anthropology?
- to identify an individual, a biological profile must be established
- forensic anthropologists will continue to separate individuals as long as societies as a whole does the same
- uses ancestry to assist in identification
what are the two methods to assess ancestral affiliations?
nonmetric and metric
discrete/discontinuous traits
- scoring of nonmetric traits
- scored as complete/incomplete or present/absent
- scored on a ranked scale of 0, 1, 2, 3
non-metric traits
- documented for large sample sizes
- clearly illustrated
- rigorously quantified
- scored as absent or present
interorbital breadth
distance between the eyes
nasal aperture
hole of nose, how wide/narrow
inferior nasal aperture
bottom of nose where it meets the upper lip, it is a smooth curve or angle lip of bone
nasal shape
- how bones of the nose are shaped
- can be round, triangular, or flat
post-bregmatic depression
- small concavity on sagittal suture just past the bregma (dip in the middle of skull)
- either have it or don’t
palate shape
- round
- U shaped
- V shaped
midface pragmatism
does the middle of the face protrude away from the forehead, go inward or make a straight line
African Ancestry
- Alveolar prognathism
- Receding zygomatics
- Nasal spine small
- Nasal aperture wide
- Nasal architecture round
- Interorbital breadth wide
- Orbits rectangular
- Molar crenulation
European Ancestry
- “Pointed” face
- Midfacial prognathism (zygomatics recede)
- Carabelli’s cusp on protocone
- Nasal aperture narrow
- Nasal sill present
- Interorbital breadth minimal
- Nasal architecture steepled
Asian/Native American Ancestry
- Orthognathic
- Flaring/forward-projecting zygomatics
- Incisor shoveling
- Nasal aperture moderate
- Interorbital breadth intermediate
- Orbits circular
- Nasal architecture tented
ecotype
- an observable phenomena
- group of individuals sharing environmental adaptations
- not always a major subdivision between species
disadvantages of non-metric analysis
- interobserver error (assessment is objective)
- intraobserver error
