Dean Falk

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Dean Falk (June 25, 1944 - ) is an American academic anthropologist who specializes in the evolution of the brain and cognition in higher primates. She is presently a Professor of Anthropology at Florida State University.

After the skeletal remains of an 18,000-year-old, "Hobbit"-sized human were discovered on the Indonesian island of Flores in 2003, some scientists thought that the specimen must have been a pygmy or a microcephalic—a human with an abnormally small skull. With an international team of experts, Falk created detailed maps of imprints left on the ancient hominid's braincase and concluded that the so-called Hobbit was actually a new species closely related to Homo sapiens. Falk's team have repeatedly asserted that their findings confirm that the species cataloged as LB1, Homo floresiensis, is definitely not a human born with microcephalia—a somewhat rare pathological condition that still occurs today. This assertion, though, has met with considerable criticism within the field of physical anthropology.[1]

[edit] Works

Dean Falk's books include:

Falk, D. External Neuroanatomy of Old World Monkeys (Cercopithecoidea). Contributions to Primatology 15:1-95, 1978
Armstrong, E. and D. Falk, (eds.). Primate Brain Evolution: Methods and Concepts. New York: Plenum Publishing Company, 1982
Falk, D. Evolution of the Brain and Cognition in Hominids. The sixty-second James Arthur Lecture. New York: The American Museum of Natural History, 1992
Falk, D. Braindance: New Discoveries About Human Origins and Brain Evolution. New York: Henry Holt, 1992
- Owl Book edition, 1994 (paper)
- German edition, Basel: Birkhauser Verlag, 1994
- German translation as Warum Schimpansen nicht steppen konnen (Why Chimpanzees Can’t Tap Dance), Leipzig: Insel Verlag, 1996 (paper)
Falk, D. Primate Diversity. New York: Norton, 2000
Falk, D. and K. Gibson (eds) Evolutionary Anatomy of the Primate Cerebral Cortex. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001
Keenan, J., with Gallup, G. and D. Falk. The Face in the Mirror: The Search for the Origins of Consciousness, Ecco (Harper Collins), 2003
Falk, D. Braindance Revised and Expanded. University Press of Florida, 2004
Falk, D., Finding Their Tongues: The Rise of Motherese and How it Led to the Development of Language, Music and Art. Basic Books, in preparation, 2007