Chapter 8 Flashcards
what are the two types of anthropologists that study the past?
Paleoanthropologists and archeologists
what do Paleoanthropologists focus on?
skeletal fossils and genetic remains
- compare us to our ancestors
What Do archeologists focus on?
reconstructing changes in past human societies using the archeological record (all human material and objects) - long term perspective - determine the how and why
Archaeological record
The record consists of material evidence of human modification of the physical environment.
what are the 3 main goals of archeology?
- reconstruct how humans lived in the past
- identify how cultures have changed
- understand the influence of changes
What is the archaeological process and what are the main methods?
- scientific methods used from biologists and geologists
- dig
- identify precise location of remains
what are processual archeologists?
- view archeology as an objective - empirical science
- use math to determine distribution of materials
- emphasize human adaptations to different environments
what are post-processual archaeologists?
- emphasize human agency and ideas and values when they study past cultures
- stress symbolism
- examine power, domination, internal contradictions
what is an archeological survey?
- a physical examination of geographical regions to determine is they are promising sites
- walk area, research, photograph
- use GPR and GIS systems to show buried remains
- dont harm the area
what are artifacts?
objects that have been deliberately and intelligently shaped by humans or hominin ancestors
what are features?
non-portable items created by humans (house)
what are ecofacts?
biological remains that are likely associated with food consumption or other human activities
when an object is found they record three things, what are they?
the matrix
the provenance
the other remains around it
what is the immediate matrix?
soil, gravel, clay, sand
what is the provenance?
the 3D position of the artifact found
Stratigraphy is what?
In archaeology, stratigraphy is the layering of soil and other materials in the earths surface. This layering can be naturally caused (e.g. by geological processes) or artificially caused (e.g. by someone digging a well that has since filled in).
ethnoarchaeology
the study of the way present day societies use artifacts and structures and how those objects became part of the archeological record.
Taphonomy
the study of how the various processes that may have affected the formation of a particular site
what is another name for the post-processual archologists?
interpretive
what is GPR?
remote senstivity technology
what is GIS?
Geographic Info Systems
what is excavation?
- we use it when we want to know a lot about a little area of a site
- the systematic uncovering of arch. remains through careful removal of the matrix (soil)
what is substinance?
food
clothes
shelter
basic needs
what are substiance strategies?
the ways people meet their basic needs - basically how humans lived and survived in the past
What three factors do anthropologists need to know in order to study the major transformation in human material adaptations?
Ecological factors (e.g. climate change/environmental change)
Economic factors (e.g. emergence of agriculture)
Sociocultural factors (e.g. emergence of complex societies and change in human’s life ways)
Ecological factors
climate change/environmental change
Economic factors
emergence of agriculture
Sociocultural factors
(e.g. emergence of complex societies and change in human’s life ways)
what are the two ways that anthropologists divide their societies into?
- food collectors
- food producers
what is the difference between food collectors and food producers?
collectors - gather, fish, hunt
producers - depend on domesticated plants animals or both
what are pastoralists?
animal herders
what are farmers?
- people who cultivate crops using extensive, intensive, and mechanized agriculture
what is extensive agriculture?
cultivate small plots that are moved each year
what is intensive agriculture?
use plows animals irrigation and large land
what is mechanized agriculture?
food production on a large scale - depend on technology
what is feminist archeology?
recognizes that traditional approaches have often ignored the presence of women.
what is gender archaeology?
questions then binary male-female distinction
-looks into variation in sex and gender
what is cosmopolitanism?
- move comfortably between cultural settings - different cultures may view artifacts differently
- used to question western approaches.
