Hominology
Hominology is the study of hominids––specifically, relict hominids. As described by Dmitri Bayanov, one of the chief proponents of hominology, in 2003, “hominology was and still is in a cryptozoological phase of development.” In other words, it is not yet generally accepted as a valid field. Bayanov himself notes elsewhere that “Hominology is a branch of primatology, founded in the middle of the 20th century in science's ‘no-man's land’ between zoology and anthropology.”
In the concluding remarks of his presentation at the International Bigfoot Symposium in Willow Creek, Bayanov said:
I think that one of the great scientific results of the 20th century was the discovery of relict hominids (homins, for short), popularly known as Abominable Snowman, Yeti, Yeren, Almas, Almasty, Bigfoot, Sasquatch, etc. Actually, it was a re-discovery by hominologists of what had been known to western naturalists from antiquity to the middle of the 18th century, when wild bipedal primates were classified by Carl Linnaeus as Homo troglodytes (i.e., caveman) or Homo sylvestris (i.e., woodman, forestman). As for eastern scholars and rural populations in many parts of the world, they have always been aware of wild hairy bipeds, known under diverse popular names.
Hominology is primarily championed as a unique and necessary field of study by a handful of Russian scientists. They argue that resistance is based on fear, that is, that recognition of hominology would facilitate documentation of a relic “homin” by making funding available. Documentation of a speicies such as the sasquatch would, in turn, precipitate an upheaval of long-standing evolutionary and paleoanthropological theory, which explains in large part (in their view) the resistance to hominology and related efforts.
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