The Chimpanzees of the Tai Forest: 40 Years of Research

Description

The Tai Chimpanzee Project (Tai National Park, Cote D'Ivoire) has yielded unprecedented insights into the nature of cooperation, cognition, and culture in our closest living relatives. Founded in 1979 by Christophe and Hedwige Boesch, the project has entered its 40th year of continuous research. Alongside other famous long-term chimpanzee study sites at Gombe and Mahale in East Africa, the tireless work of the team at Tai has contributed to the fields of behavioural ecology and anthropology, as well as improving public awareness of the urgent need to protect this already endangered species. Encompassing important research topics including chimpanzee ecology, reproductive behaviour, tool use, culture, communication, cognition and conservation, this book provides an engaging account of how Tai chimpanzees are adapted to African jungle life and how they have developed unique forms of cooperation with less violence, regular adoptions and complex cultural differences between groups.

Christophe Boesch is Director of the Department of Primatology at the Max-Planck-Institut fur Evolutionare Anthropologie, Germany and Professor of Zoology at the Universitat Leipzig, Germany. He co-founded the Tai Chimpanzee Project in Cote d'Ivoire, Africa with his wife Hedwige in 1979 and was its Director for thirty-five years. He is also the founder and President of the Wild Chimpanzee Foundation. His research concentrates on the evolution of cooperation, tool use and culture in wild chimpanzees and its implication for our understanding of human evolution. Roman Wittig is Group Leader at the Max-Planck-Institut fur Evolutionare Anthropologie, Germany, and has been Director of the Tai Chimpanzee Project since 2012. His research focusses on the costs and benefits of group living, social bonds and social cognition in wild chimpanzees and other non-human primates, in particular Bonobos, Chacma baboons and Sooty mangabeys.

'... this is a substantial book that is a 'must-have' on any primatologist's bookshelf ...' William C. McGrew , Primates