A bold, provocative exploration of the tension between our evolutionary history and our modern woes - and what we can do about it We are living through the most prosperous age in all of human history, yet we are listless, divided and miserable. Wealth and comfort are unparalleled, but our political landscape is unmoored, and rates of suicide, loneliness and chronic illness continue to skyrocket. How do we explain the gap between these truths? And how should we respond? For evolutionary biologists Heather Heying and Bret Weinstein, the cause of our woes is clear: the modern world is out of sync with our ancient brains and bodies. We evolved to live in clans, but today many people don't even know their neighbours' names. Survival in our earliest societies depended on living in harmony with nature, but today the food we eat, the work we do - even the light we absorb - is radically different from what our minds and bodies evolved to expect. In this book, Heying and Weinstein draw on decades of their work teaching in college classrooms and exploring earth's most biodiverse ecosystems to confront today's pressing social ills - from widespread sleep deprivation and dangerous diets to damaging parenting styles and backward education practices. A Hunter-Gatherer's Guide to the 21st Century outlines a science-based worldview that will empower you to live a better, wiser life.

Alexander Lesser, one of Franz Boas's finest students, and probably one of the best of his time in his research on the Plains Indians, is a brilliant but neglected figure in American anthropology. This representative selection of Lesser's work is designed to make the range of his writings accessible to a broad audience. His work is of particular interest to present-day readers for its advocacy of an historical-evolutionary perspective in anthropology. Such an approach, almost unique at the time Lesser was writing, has become increasingly widely appreciated since. His work is also of interest for the light it throws on the British 'functionalist' school, and the effects of their views on American anthropology.