You may have to Search all our reviewed books and magazines, click the sign up button below to create a free account.
A volume of papers from a conference held by the McDonald Institute in Cambridge, 1993. The aim of the conference was to address key issues in the development of intelligence and cognitive capacities though the course of human evolution. It did this by invoking theoretical perspectives from a broad range of relevant disciplines - psychology, ethology and primate behaviour, neurology, child development, artificial intelligence and, of course, archaeology. The volume contains the papers presented at the conference, revised and updated in the light of post-conference discussions. It provides the most comprehensive review available of current approaches to 'modelling' the evolution of intelligence and congnition in early human popoulations. Seventeen papers by Colin Renfrew, Richard W. Byrne, Robert A. Foley, Steven Mithen, J. A. J. Gowlett, Frederic Joulian, James Russell, Christopher Longuet-Higgins, David Erdal, Andrew Whiten, P. C. Lee, Peter G. Grossenbacher, K. A. Robson Brown, Leslie C. Aiello, Elizabeth Whitcombe, Angela C. Roberts, Peter Collins and Trevor W. Robbins.
None
This volume outlines and illustrates the importance of considering social contexts of food consumption in interpretations of past and present human societies, giving a new twist to the old adage 'You are what you eat'. What we eat, how we eat, are and always have been fundamental to the structuring of social life, both in the past and in the present. The remains of food are also among the most common archaeological finds. The papers in this volume explore and develop ways of using food to write social history; they move beyond taphonomic and economic properties of 'subsistence resources' to examine the social background and cultural contexts of food preparation and consumption. Contributions break new ground in method and interpretation in case studies spanning the Palaeolithic to the Present, and from the Amazon to the Arctic. This volume will thus be essential reading for all archaeologists, anthropologists and social historians interested in the prehistory and history of food consumption.
None
All over the world archaeological sites are being looted to feed an ever-expanding antiquities market. The phenomenon has been well-documented, by journalists and TV documentaries as much as by academic study, but it true scale remains a matter for conjecture. With this in mind in October 1999 the McDonald Institute convened an international symposium of archaeologists and other interested parties, which allowed them to give accounts of looting in their own countries, share their experiences, and to consider possible remedies or preventative measures. The proceedings of the Symposium are now published in this volume.
Archaeoacoustics focuses on the role of sound in human behaviour, from earliest times up to the development of mechanical detection and recording devices in the 19th century. Recent calls for an `archaeology of the senses' have served as a timely, even overdue reminder that the past which we experience - and which others have experienced before us - is multisensory, drawing not only upon the primary field of vision, but also on touch, smell and hearing. Megalithic tombs, Palaeolithic painted caves, Romanesque churches and prehistoric rock shelters all present specific sound qualities which offer clues as to how they may have been designed and used. Voices resonate, external noises are subdue...
In the early 1990s the University of Cambridge reopened excavations at the Neolithic site of Çatalhöyük in central Turkey, abandoned since the 1960s. This is Volume 2 in the Çatalhöyük Research Project series. Here Ian Hodder explains his vision of archaeological excavation, where careful examination of context and an awareness of human bias allows researchers exciting new insights into prehistoric cognition. The aim of the volume is to discuss some of the reflexive or postprocessual methods that have been introduced at the site in the work there since 1993. These methods involve reflexivity, interactivity, multivocality and contextuality or relationality.
Contemporary art and modern archaeology are increasingly seen to share much common ground yet their interactions have yet to be fully investigated. This innovative volume explores key themes, including the role of display in art, in the practice of archaeology and in daily life, and the material transformations which underlie the physical reality of the archaeological record as much as the creative processes of the contemporary artist. Prominent practising artists Simon Callery and Antony Gormley provide seminal papers considering the role of materiality and embodiment in their own work, exploring issues that are directly relevant to current archaeological thinking. They are joined by archaeologists actively involved with visual approaches, including Anwen Cooper, Christopher Evans, Steven Mithen, Joshua Pollard, Nicholas Saunders, Aaron Watson and the editorial trio. The book is lavishly illustrated in colour.
Material Explorations in African Archaeology examines materiality in African archaeology by exploring concepts of material agency and material engagement and entanglement in relation to their manifest presence in persons, animals, objects, substances, and contexts of the African past.
What is the relationship between mind and ideas on the one hand, and the material things of the world on the other? In recent years, researchers have rejected the old debate about the primacy of the mind or material, and have sought to establish more nuanced understandings of the ways humans interact with their material worlds. In this volume alternative approaches are presented, deriving from a wide variety of theoretical perspectives. Contributors debate the significance of key thresholds in the human past, including sedentism, domestication, and the emergence of social inequality and their impact on changing patterns of human cognition, symbolic expression, and technological innovation. In its global coverage and its broad theoretical scope, this landmark volume offers an innovative and comprehensive assessment of current thinking and future directions.