![]() The more Goodall learned, the more she saw how much we have in common with these primates. The breakthrough came when she watched David Greybeard, the chimp community’s elder, use a stick as a tool to dig up ants. Examining their lives in detail, Goodall demonstrated that the chimpanzees were thinking and reasoning creatures, concepts applied only to humans at the time. Initially, the chimps she was planning to study ran away from her, but the film shows how she gradually earned their trust. Morgen includes recent interviews with Goodall, now 83 years old, and voiceover commentary from her books. Her experiences with chimpanzees follow, as well as the insights she gathered in her research and her efforts to educate the public about primates. Writer and director Brett Morgen begins with Goodall’s early life and her obsession with Africa. Most of the footage was shot in the 1960s by the Dutch nature photographer Hugo van Lawick, and had not been previously viewed publicly. The remarkable National Geographic film “Jane” came about when 140 hours of film of Goodall working in Gombe were rediscovered in 2014. The initial research was to last six months, but it still exists today, and is the longest continuous study of animals in their natural habitat. At the time, little was known about chimpanzees in the wilderness. A number of media outlets, such as the BBC, have described her work as redefining mankind.Jane Goodall was a 26-year-old secretary with no training or scientific degree when her boss, prominent paleoanthropologist Louis Leakey, picked her to study primates in Gombe, Tanzania. ![]() Goodall's finding is now considered a groundbreaking discovery, along with other work which has changed the understanding of the relationship between humans and chimpanzees. "And now animal intelligence in particular is something that people are really interested in." "You can't share your life in a meaningful way with a dog, a cat, a rabbit and so on, and not know the professors were wrong," she said. Goodall said she encountered some of the same dismissal from her fellow academics about the methods she used in her research, with some saying that she should not give the chimpanzees names or emotions.Īnd at this point, Goodall took inspiration from another big influence in her life - her dog Rusty. ![]() Leakey enrolled Goodall at the University of Cambridge to do a PhD to continue her studies. It was upon this discovery that Leakey said: "Now we must redefine 'tool,' redefine 'man' or accept chimpanzees as humans." While observing the chimp, she saw him using a blade of grass to fish out ants from a colony, countering the established belief that humans were the only species which used tools. There she met a chimpanzee she named David Greybeard from whom she made her first discovery. In 1960, she set about her own study in a reserve in Gombe Stream Chimpanzee Reserve. There she met paleoanthropologist Louis Leakey, who was coincidentally in need of a secretary and was said to be so impressed by Goodall's knowledge of the natural world, she ended up joining him on an expedition in Tanzania, according to a BBC report. She then embarked on her first trip to Africa after receiving a letter from a school friend inviting her to Kenya for a holiday. While she did well at school, Goodall said she had no money for university so opted to do a secretarial course. This is the message Goodall said she has taken to young people around the world. "My mother said, 'If you really want to do something like this, you're going to have to work really hard, take advantage of every opportunity, but don't give up.'," she said. ![]() Goodall said it was her mother who provided her with the best advice to overcome these dismissive remarks. "There was no expectation of becoming a scientist because girls didn't do that sort of thing and everybody laughed at me," said Goodall, 85, adding that some responded to her aspirations by telling her she was "just a girl."
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