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Archaeological Theory - Science topic
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This study is a PhD research on the settlement history and material culture of the Middle-Niger Area of Nigeria.
Call for papers International Meeting of the International Council for Archaeozoology (Ankara, September 2-7 2018)
Session: Identifying and interpreting food taboos: a zooarchaeological approach
Organisers: Veronica Aniceti, Idoia Grau-Sologestoa, Mikolaj Lisowski (U. Sheffield), Marcos García-García (U. Granada), Silvia Valenzuela-Lamas (CSIC-IMF)
This session aims to highlight the important role of zooarchaeology in assessing the presence of dietary taboos in faunal assemblages, and interpreting their socio-cultural, religious, and economic significance. The session is open to all zooarchaeological studies dealing with dietary taboos in different geographical areas and periods, from prehistory to contemporary times.
This session aims to highlight the important role of zooarchaeology in assessing the presence of dietary taboos in faunal assemblages, and interpreting their socio-cultural, religious, and economic significance. The session is open to all zooarchaeological studies dealing with dietary taboos in different geographical areas and periods, from prehistory to contemporary times.
Despite the considerable amount of animal bones and teeth recovered from archaeological sites, this valuable material is not often used to determine identities in past societies. Nevertheless, animal remains are often associated with food consumption, an important cultural identifier. When humans recurrently eat a specific food, this becomes part of their cultural roots, whatever the origin of such consumption practices.
Equally, the prohibition of some food products can be associated with specific cultural backgrounds. In the literature, the avoidance of eating certain foods (beef, pork, fish, etc.) is commonly defined as ‘food taboo’. This definition, however, does not only refer to the avoidance of consuming specific animal species, but also to the rules on how animal products were processed.
Please submit paper abstracts visiting http://www.icaz2018ankara.com before the 30th March 2018.

Is there some method of dating not only the age of rock or non organic material, but when that material was manipulated or altered or had a new surface exposed to the atmosphere? Say in the case of a stone carving or stone construction like the pyramids where the material is shaped. Is there no natural process that determines levels of oxidation or thermoluminescence or some other measure that reveals when the surviving surface was exposed. i.e when the carving dates from rather than when the material from which it is made dates from?
Please I am looking for diagrams of theoretical frameworks in traditional architecture; formulated by researchers like Sa'ad Tukur, Amos Rapoport, etc!
I came across the reference 'Eclectic Model of Environment-Behaviour Relation (Bell et al., 1996)' in somebody's writeup! Where can I find it with its diagram, and also other theories that would relate to my research on SPATIAL QUALITIES OF TRADITIONAL FAMILY HOUSE?
The neologism ethnogenesis has been in use since the nineteenth century but became a regular feature of archaeological work after 1945 in Russia. There it was used to describe a very slow process (thousands of years) by which people of different 'race' and linguistic groups acquired a stable sense of self.
In more recent anthropological and theoretically inclined archaeology it has become something a code-word to indicate a belief that ethnic identities are rapidly, and self-consciously, reformulated on a a routine and regular basis.
I am aware of quite a literature on this bu wondered what people thought the best accounts of it were...
We found, during one excavation in a Dolmen, in Central Portugal, a structure composed with small subquadrangular
quartzite stones founded in a layer that is below all monument. This structure are also conneted with the orientation planning observed.
You can see more in https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Alexandra_Figueiredo, in the articale The planning and orientation of Dolmen I of Rego da Murta (Alvaiázere, Portugal)
I could't find until know other example.
In the past few decades we've lost records pertaining to the manufacture & distribution of products due to Paper Retention Policies. The lack of paper storage & the often hazards of on-line records storage, gives question: How much information will actually be available for future researchers? Take soda bottle caps. There likely have been 30 changes to Coca-Cola bottle caps alone, not counting varieties, since 1970. Is there a record? Can we date each type? Is that information already lost to us?
Are these studies relevant? Can they contribute anything to our contemporary industrial society? What types of people would see our academic and conservation efforts to be of value?
Symposium: What's Happening on the Fringe: Testing a New Model of Cross-Cultural Interaction in Ancient Borderlands
For the 2014 SAA meeting we invite paper proposals from anyone interested in the archaeological investigation of cultural exchange that takes place in ancient borderlands, frontiers, colonies, peripheries of ancient empires, or regional exchange systems where boundaries of cultural exchange are fluid. Research from all geographic areas and time periods is welcome.
In this session we would ask presenters to apply a graphic model of cross-cultural interaction that my colleague Kirk Costion and I have developed to their own specific research. Our model explores the various ways in which people interacted and what motivates their participation in cultural exchanges or what they reject. We find that many of these interactions are taking place simultaneously and the goal of our model is to present these different facets in a comprehensive way. The purpose of the session therefore is to use and review the model and its functionality. This is a work in progress and we hope to improve the model based on the application and comments of our colleagues.
If you are interested in participating please contact me at ugreen@ucsd.edu by the end of August and I will provide you with more detailed information. Feel free to pass this invitation on to any colleagues who might be interested in participating in this session.
We look forward to a lot of productive collaboration
Donald E. Brown's book, "Human Universals", explores and describes physical and behavioral characteristics that can be considered universal among all cultures, all people. I have not been able to get my hands on a copy of that work. Can someone who has read the book tell me if Brown employed a systematic cross-cultural analysis? Or did he employed a different methodology? If so, what was the procedure he used to determine which traits are ubiquitous in human societies? Are his findings robust and reliable? Or are they based on a somewhat haphazard survey of regionally isolated studies?
I would be interested in getting cross-cultural data about hunter-gatherer/foraging societies in relation to:
-pregnancy success (natural or induced abortions through pregnancy)
-mortality at birth (of both women and babies)
-mortality rate of newborns
thanks!!
I discovered at Poiana Ciresului - Piatra Neamt, in a layer dated to 19,000 years, a sample of amber 43 /33 / 8.5 mm. There are two sources that can be counted: the Baltic Sea and Romania with a modest outcrop. What kind of analysis considered being useful to show the source? I am interested in literature on the subject.
Thank you very much!
I am also working on a research paper on the architecture of longhouses, currently. I have recovered information from Champlain on his impressions of the longhouses and interiors. I was hoping someone may have more information or point me where to look it up please?
In developing countries, there is still a general lack of interest in stone artifacts, and scarce cooperation of archaeologists with geologists. I find in French and anglo-saxon terminologies inadequate translations of siliceous rocks and there is no consistency in using specific terms. Therefore, the use of adequate and uniform terminology is still far from being satisfactory. It is very important to have a clear image and consensus about the meaning of a specific term. So, do you think that strict criteria can be established for distinguishing siliceous rocks?
The study of archaeological objects is essentially based on the recognition that there are conceptual lineages (= typologies) in material culture: things cannot reproduce, but ideas can, and the latter become fossilized in the former. Yet models of conceptual evolution are almost universally rejected as it seems. My question is twofold: (1) have you also come across this apparent contradiction in your respective field of study and (2) has this cognition altered the way you think about dynamics for change?
I recently addressed this topic within the context of interpreting shipwrecks, published in my article entitled “Conceptual Evolution in Ancient Shipbuilding: An Attempt to Reinvigorate a Shunned Theoretical Framework". Watercraft are some of the most complex structures, yet some peculiar constructional features survive centuries or even millenia, even when they became functionally obsolete. I found concepts within the cognitive sciences very appealing to address these phenomena, like the cultural virus theory or the conformist bias, which will have certainly played a role for shipwright apprentices. Also the way change was brought about is a very „noisy“ process. When other ship designs were copied from visual representations, it was often only the analogous aspects that were reconstructed, while the vessel itself was built in the "same DNA", using the techniques and methods of the own tradition, a process that could be almost described as evolutionary convergence. I found many indications that would support meme-theory, but I am not entirely convinced whether this opens up new avenues of interpretation, as we all were - no doubt - at least subconsciously aware of this dynamic by using typologies.
Can cenotaphs include some mortuary remains or funerary artifacts?