Dear David,
I agree with the spirit of your message, but I would like to add that
subsistence and human environment are as 'cultural' as religion and
social structure. However, I take your point that they are sometimes
presented as they were divorced from the main questions on past human
behaviour.
Cheers,
Umberto
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> 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
>
Umberto Albarella
Dept of Archaeology
University of Durham
Durham DH1 3LE, UK
tel. +44-191-3741139
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