Episode 45

What Is Going on With Those Denisovans?!?

Anna and Amber sit down to chat about the Denisovans, the human ancestors we didn't know we had until recently. Learn about what evidence we have for Denisovans, the traits for which we can thank them, and some of the mysteries that remain. Come for big reveals about what's in human DNA, stay for ample use of phrases like "bouts of interbreeding."

To learn more, check out:

Meet the Denisovans (Discover)

First Confirmed Denisovan Skull Piece Found (Sapiens)

The first known fossil of a Denisovan skull has been found in a Siberian cave (ScienceNews)

Denisovans, A Mysterious Kind Of Ancient Humans, Are Traced To Tibet (NPR)

Found: First Tibetan Evidence of Neanderthal Cousins, the Denisovans (LiveScience)

Why Am I Denisovan? (National Geographic)

We may have bred with Denisovans much more recently than we thought (New Scientist)

A world map of Neanderthal and Denisovan ancestry in modern humans (ScienceDaily)

DNA Shows The Denisovans Have At Least 3 Distinct Branches (Tech Times)

Mum’s a Neanderthal, Dad’s a Denisovan: First discovery of an ancient-human hybrid (Nature)

Denisovans and Neanderthals Interbred in a Giant Cave (Jstor Daily)

Bone suggests ‘Red Deer Cave people’ a mysterious species of human (The Conversation)

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The Dirt Podcast

Archaeology, Anthropology, and our shared human past.

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The Dirt Podcast

As science communicators in anthropology and archaeology, we hosts of The Dirt acknowledge that we hold a position of considerable privilege and opportunity, and commit ourselves to continuous learning, unlearning and reflection. We recognize that our disciplines, as well as our own lives, are rooted in and propped up by settler colonialism, white supremacy, and dispossession.

We now reside on the stolen ancestral territory of the Shawnee and Haudenosaunee and on the lands of the Muscogee and Cherokee Nations, but over its lifetime, The Dirt has also been produced on the unceded traditional territory of the Piscataway Conoy and Cedarville Band of Piscataway Indians, as well as that of the Yocha Dehe Wintun Nation, Patwin and Miwok peoples and all those dispossessed by Cession 296. We offer our show as a platform for Indigenous scholarship, history, and cultural expression, through citation and conversation, and we welcome the opportunity to host and compensate Indigenous scholars of archaeology and anthropology as interview guests.

Likewise, we encourage all listeners who reside in settler-colonial states to learn about on whose land they reside, their place in the ongoing process of colonization, and how to contribute materially to reparations and Indigenous sovereignty.