Low or declining attendence for zooarchaeology-oriented sessions at larger
conferences (I'm only familiar with those in North America) seems to be a
pretty common trend over the past few years, and I think in many ways we
have only ourselves to blame. We need to integrate zooarchaeology into more
general research issues in order to attract a larger audience.
When I was a grad student (U of Arizona), I had to take a course in
archaeological theory from an epigrapher. He started off under the
impression that all I would care about were numbers and graphs and was
astounded to eventually realize that zooarchaeology is just archaeology with
a different data set and the same ultimate goals about understanding the
past. We need to try to educate our colleges so that they can have the same
sort of breakthrough in understanding.
I think the key is to always try to make conference presentations (or
contract reports, for that matter) deal with research issues that other
archaeologists (and not just zooarchaeologists) can appreciate. I know I
find it quite tedious to sit through a presentation that concludes "the
primary focus was hunting rabbits" or "fish was the dominant resource." In
most cases, we DO already know that. Let's try to be more creative and have
more presentations that conclude "we have evidence here for feasting" or
"bone burning in these houses suggests rapid abandonment."
There is no reason why zooarchaeologists cannot focus on the same broad
range of rearch issues that other archaeologists are interested in. My last
few conference papers have focussed primarily on recognizing ritual
behaviour in archaeological contexts using faunal remains or on the
importance of fauna in ritual contexts. Let's try to see a few more
presentations on non-subsistence/environmental issues. It may open the eyes
of a few non-bone specialists.
Dave Maxwell
Statistical Research, Inc.
Burnaby, British Columbia
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