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Books > Humanities > Archaeology
Although current environmental debates lay the focus on the
Industrial Revolution as a sociopolitical development that has led
to the current environmental crisis, many ecocritical projects have
avoided historicizing their concepts or have been characterized by
approaches that were either pre-historic or post-historic: while
the environmental movement has harbored the dream of restoring
nature to a state untouched by human hands, there is also the
pessimistic vision of a post-apocalyptic world, exhausted by
humanity's consumption of natural resources. Against this
background, the decline of nature has become a narrative template
quite common among the public environmental discourse and
environmental scientists alike. The volume revisits Antiquity as an
epoch which witnessed similar environmental problems and came up
with its own interpretations and solutions in dealing with them.
This decidedly historical perspective is not only supposed to fill
in a blank in ecocritical discourse, but also to question,
problematize, and inform our contemporary debates with a completely
different take on "nature" and humanity's place in the world.
Thereby, a productive dialogue between contemporary ecocritical
theories and the classical tradition is established that highlights
similarities as well as differences. This volume is the first book
to bring ecocriticism and the classical tradition into a
comprehensive dialogue. It assembles recognized experts in the
field and advanced scholars as well as young and aspiring
ecocritics. In order to ensure a dialogic exchange between the
contributions, the volume includes four response essays by
established ecocritics which embed the sections within a larger
theoretical and practical ecocritical framework and discuss the
potential of including the pre-modern world into our environmental
debates.
Analysis of the scroll fragments of the Qumran Aramaic scrolls has
been plentiful to date. Their shared characteristics of being
written in Aramaic, the common language of the region, not focused
on the Qumran Community, and dating from the 3rd century BCE to the
1st century CE have enabled the creation of a shared identity,
distinguishing them from other fragments found in the same place at
the same time. This classification, however, could yet be too
simplistic as here, for the first time, John Starr applies
sophisticated statistical analyses to newly available electronic
versions of these fragments. In so doing, Starr presents a
potential new classification which comprises six different text
types which bear distinctive textual features, and thus is able to
narrow down the classification both temporally and geographically.
Starr's re-visited classification presents fresh insights into the
Aramaic texts at Qumran, with important implications for our
understanding of the many strands that made up Judaism in the
period leading to the writing of the New Testament.
Multiple Hopewellian monumental earthwork sites displaying timber
features, mortuary deposits, and unique artifacts are found widely
distributed across the North American Eastern Woodlands, from the
lower Mississippi Valley north to the Great Lakes. These sites,
dating from 200 b.c. to a.d. 500, almost define the Middle Woodland
period of the Eastern Woodlands. Joseph Caldwell treated these
sites as defining what he termed the ""Hopewell Interaction
Sphere,"" which he conceptualized as mediating a set of interacting
mortuary-funerary cults linking many different local ethnic
communities. In this new book, A. Martin Byers refines Caldwell's
work, coining the term ""Hopewell Ceremonial Sphere"" to more
precisely characterize this transregional sphere as manifesting
multiple autonomous cult sodalities of local communities affiliated
into escalating levels of autonomous cult sodality heterarchies. It
is these cult sodality heterarchies, regionally and transregionally
interacting - and not their autonomous communities to which the
sodalities also belonged - that were responsible for the
Hopewellian assemblage; and the heterarchies took themselves to be
performing, not funerary, but world-renewal ritual ceremonialism
mediated by the deceased of their many autonomous Middle Woodland
communities. Paired with the cult sodality heterarchy model, Byers
proposes and develops the complementary heterarchical community
model. This model postulates a type of community that made the
formation of the cult sodality heterarchy possible. But Byers
insists it was the sodality heterarchies and not the complementary
heterarchical communities that generated the Hopewellian ceremonial
sphere. Detailed interpretations and explanations of Hopewellian
sites and their contents in Ohio, Illinois, Indiana, and Georgia
empirically anchor his claims. A singular work of unprecedented
scope, Reclaiming the Hopewellian Ceremonial Sphere will encourage
archaeologists to re-examine their interpretations.
Regional identities and practices are often debated in American
archaeology, but Middle Atlantic prehistorians have largely
refrained from such discussions, focusing instead on creating
chronologies and studying socio-political evolution from the
perspective of sub-regions. What is Middle Atlantic prehistoric
archaeology? What are the questions and methods that identify our
practice in this region or connect research in our region to larger
anthropological themes? Middle Atlantic Prehistory: Foundations and
Practice provides a basic survey of Middle Atlantic prehistoric
archaeology and serves as an important reference for situating the
development of Middle Atlantic prehistoric archaeology within the
present context of culture area studies. This edited volume is a
regional, historic overview of important themes, topics, and
approaches in Middle Atlantic prehistory; covering major practical
and theoretical debates and controversies in the region and in the
discipline. Each chapter is holistic in its review of the
historical development of a particular theme, in evaluating its
contributions to current scholarship, and in proposing future
directions for productive scholarly work. Contributing authors
represent the full range of professional practice in archaeology
and include university professors, cultural resources
professionals, government regulatory/review archaeologists and
museums curators with many years of practical and theoretical
immersion in his/her chapter topic, and is highly regarded in the
discipline and in the region for their expertise. Middle Atlantic
Prehistory provides a much-needed synthesis and historical overview
for academic and cultural resource archaeologists and independent
scholars working in the Middle Atlantic region in particular.
"Interesting, strong, and timely. Everyday Life Matters is clearly
and sharply written, and by targeting the archaeology of everyday
life as an emerging field explicitly, it identifies and fills a
real void in the field."--John Robb, author of The Early
Mediterranean Village "An absolute must-read. Robin's thorough
understanding of commoners and how they occasionally interacted
with elites provides a solid foundation for social
reconstruction."--Payson Sheets, coeditor of Surviving Sudden
Environmental Change While the study of ancient civilizations most
often focuses on temples and royal tombs, a substantial part of the
archaeological record remains hidden in the understudied day-to-day
lives of artisans, farmers, hunters, and other ordinary people of
the ancient world. Various chores completed during the course of a
person's daily life, though at first glance trivial, have a
powerful impact on society as a whole. Everyday Life Matters
develops general methods and theories for studying the applications
of everyday life in archaeology, anthropology, and a wide range of
related disciplines. Examining the two-thousand-year history (800
B.C.-A.D. 1200) of the ancient farming community of Chan in Belize,
Cynthia Robin's ground-breaking work explains why the average
person should matter to archaeologists studying larger societal
patterns. Robin argues that the impact of the mundane can be
substantial, so much so that the study of a polity without regard
to its citizenry is incomplete. Refocusing attention away from the
Maya elite and offering critical analysis of daily life elucidated
by anthropological theory, Robin engages us to consider the larger
implications of the commonplace and to rethink the constitution of
human societies by ordinary people living routine lives.
Communicating archaeological heritage at the institutional level
reflects on the current status of archeology, and a lack of
communication between archaeologists and the general public only
serves to widen the gap of understanding. As holders of this
specific scientific expertise, effective openness and communication
is essential to understanding how a durable future can be built
through comprehension of the past and the importance of heritage
sites and collections. Developing Effective Communication Skills in
Archaeology is an essential research publication that examines
archeology as a method for present researchers to interact and
communicate with the past, and as a methods for identifying the
overall trends in the needs of humanity as a whole. Presenting a
vast range of topics such as digital transformation, artificial
intelligence, and heritage awareness, this book is essential for
archaeologists, journalists, heritage managers, sociologists,
educators, anthropologists, museum curators, historians,
communication specialists, industry professionals, researchers,
academicians, and students.
The Cold War remains one of the twentieth century's defining
events, possessing broad political, social, and material
implications that continue to have impact. In this book, Todd
Hanson presents nine case studies of archaeological investigations
conducted at famous-and some not so famous-historic American Cold
War sites, including Bikini Atoll, the Nevada Test Site, and the
Cuban sites of the Soviet Missile Crisis. By examining nuclear
weapons test sites, missile silos, submarine bases, fallout
shelters, and more, Hanson illustrates how archaeology can help
strip away myths, secrets, and political rhetoric to better inform
our understanding of the conflict's formative role in the making of
the contemporary American landscape. Addressing modern
ramifications of the Cold War, Hanson also looks at the
preservation of atomic heritage sites, the atomic tourism
phenomenon, and the struggles of atomic veterans.
In his illuminating, well-researched book examining the site of
Et-Tell, also known as Bethsaida, Carl E. Savage explores
archaeological evidence to offer readers a portrait of the
religious beliefs and practices of the community living near the
north shore of the Sea of Galilee during the first century CE. In
the study of the cultural and social matrix of the first century in
the Galilee, scholars have commonly prioritized written sources
over archaeological evidence because written sources seem to
contribute more directly to an understanding of the religious
beliefs and practices of a community. However, there exist many
competing views of the landscape during that time due to the
varying interpretations of the textual sources. Using
archaeological data from Bethsaida itself, Savage investigates the
material practices of Bethsaida's ancient inhabitants, describing
these practices as significant indicators of their sense of place
both ideologically and geographically. He evaluates the historical
plausibility of various social reconstructions for the region, and
finds that the image that emerges of first-century Bethsaida is one
similar to those of other Jewish communities in the Galilee.
Digging through History follows rabbi and archaeologist Richard
Freund's journey through some of the most fascinating
archaeological sites of human history-including the mysterious
Atlantis, Qumran and the Dead Sea Scrolls, and the long-buried
Holocaust camp Sobibor. Each chapter takes readers through a
different archaeological site, showing what we can learn about past
religious life and religious faith through the artifacts found
there, as well as what has given each site such strong "staying
power" over time. Richard Freund and the research in Digging
through History are featured in the National Geographic documentary
Atlantis Rising, which premieres on National Geographic on Sunday,
January 29, at 9/8 central. The documentary follows Oscar-winning
executive producer James Cameron and Emmy-winning filmmaker Simcha
Jacobovici as they investigate the myths and realities of Atlantis.
Digging through History is the only book that details Freund's
groundbreaking research on Atlantis that is featured in the film. A
free app, "Archaeology Quest: Atlantis" is also available for
iPhone and Android users who want to explore Freund's newest
information on Atlantis.
Digital history is commonly argued to be positioned between the
traditionally historical and the computational or digital. By
studying digital history collaborations and the establishment of
the Luxembourg Centre for Contemporary and Digital History, Kemman
examines how digital history will impact historical scholarship.
His analysis shows that digital history does not occupy a singular
position between the digital and the historical. Instead,
historians continuously move across this dimension, choosing or
finding themselves in different positions as they construct
different trading zones through cross-disciplinary engagement,
negotiation of research goals and individual interests.
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