The “home” as a setting for human behavioral evolution

A home is used by modern human societies as a place to cook and share food, to sleep, to socialize with our loved ones, to relax and recuperate, and to shelter from the elements. It is the place where our children grow and learn the rules of our society and where we strengthen and maintain important social bonds. For these reasons, the home often holds a special emotional and symbolic place in our minds, and within society at large. Because so many of the most important aspects of being human transpire in these spaces, a greater attention to changes in living spaces over the course of human evolution could help us understand our development as a species. In this talk, I will present some changes in living spaces that I see revealed in my own research and I will go on to speculate what else could be learned from an increased focus on the evolution of the human home.