 |
DARCY NEWSOME - The Flat Hat
Barbara King (above) Anthropology professor
|
Professor Profile: Life with the apes
By Lindsay Moroney
Flat Hat Asst. Variety Editor
Recently, while discussing a newly born infant, Professor King lamented the fact that she missed getting the birth on videotape by only a few hours. King, associate professor of anthropology and university professor for teaching excellence, has done much research in the field of primatology. This birth was important to her research because the mother was one of the gorillas she studies in the National Zoo in Washington, D.C.
"Together we are studying what is called the ontogeny of gestural communication - how the infant apes come to understand and produce gestures that allow them to integrate behaviorally into their groups," King said. "A birth is a big event in this context. I'm going to meet this new infant very soon myself, and cannot wait."
King has been teaching at the College for 15 years and balances her research and her teaching in a way that is advantageous to both her and her students.
"Her teaching style is flexible," junior Christy Hoffman, King's student and research assistant, said. "She allows students to ask questions and present differing viewpoints. She takes students' questions seriously and will often do follow-up research after class. If she finds any interesting information pertaining to questions asked in class, she may spend some of the next class discussing what she found."
According to Hoffman, it is King's love of sharing her research and knowledge with others that makes her captivating in class.
"Her research enhances all of her classes," Hoffman said. "I became very interested in and aware of her research last fall because she spent some time discussing her work in the Anthropology 203 course [Introduction to Biological Anthropology]."
She added that, as King's research assistant, she does research for King on the ontogeny of gestural communication among gorillas once a month with baby gorillas at the National Zoo.
Senior Kimberly Hardee agreed with Hoffman.
"[Her research] enhances her classes," Hardee said. "It's a lot like when professors share stories about their families. She is simply sharing stories about her life outside of the classroom. I really enjoyed her intro class as well as her style of teaching."
As if brought to the College by fate, King just happened to interview here.
"I was looking for a good teaching job, one opened up, and that was that," King said. "I've chosen to stay here [because of] the quality of the students, and the support I've gotten from the anthropology department and the College as a whole for my teaching and my research."
King's research is a major part of her life. She involves her students, such as Hoffman, in her fieldwork, along with members of her family. She often brings her eight-year old daughter, Sarah.
"Sarah has developed a love of apes, monkeys and all animals," King said. "She enjoys coming with me to research sites, and I often devise a 'treasure hunt' kind of quiz for her -‹ find two apes who have young babies; write down what the infant apes do when they play; which two areas have monkeys and apes caged together?"
Seeing her daughter's enjoyment has encouraged King to educate children younger than college age.
"Watching how she learns so quickly and now thinks about endangered animals, I have tried to do 'outreach' activities to elementary and high school studies about these matters," King said. "I've learned a lot from Jane Goodall, whom I know slightly ‹ she graciously invited me to her home in Tanzania some years ago, came to speak to my class one year and has taught me about conservation through her own 'Roots and Shoots' program with schoolchildren."
Her work with younger students and with primates only enhances the classroom experience for King's students, especially in her introductory classes to biological anthropology.
"The research I have done in the past in Africa, and working with bonobo apes at the Language Research Center in Georgia, enables me, I hope, to bring an 'up close and personal' view of research to the students in the classroom," King said. "I can talk about what happened when I first met the bonobo Kanzi, famous for his ability to use linguistic symbols and to understand spoken English, or explain what it's like to be following baboons across the East African savanna and encounter a group of lions."
This past summer, she was asked by The Teaching Company to create a 12-lecture video course entitled "Primate Roots of Human Behavior." Although she found the studio lecture atmosphere different from her familiar classroom, King agreed to do the videotape because she felt that she could use it as a way to promote environmental conservation, an important responsibility to King as a scientist and teacher.
"I found it odd to be lecturing under studio lights, wearing the make-up and hair spray I'd never use in my real life," King said. "But the tapes will be sold to 'lifelong learners' who, I think, might really enjoy the perspective of anthropology. That is one reason I carried out this project; the other is that I tried to send a very strong message of conservation to those who watch the tapes."
According to King, great apes are severely endangered in the continents of Africa and Asia to the extent that extinction is predicted for some species.
"We talk about this in my classes too ‹ what are the issues and how we can help," King said. "It's so much easier to want to help once one has a background of knowing more about these wonderful creatures ‹ not only their intelligence but also their extreme sociality, and capacity for strong, enduring emotional bonds."
King demands as much of her students as she does of herself. Most of her anthropology classes require presentations and extensive readings.
"I think Professor King will admit that she has issues with the chalkboard," Hoffman said. "It is inevitable that her back will be covered in dust at the end of each class meeting. I guess that just shows just how into her work she can get."
|
