Ezra Zubrow is a Professor in the Department of Anthropology at the University at
Buffalo. Professor Zubrow has a wide range of interests including the application of
demography to archaeology and cognitive archaeology. He has carried out field
research in northern Europe and is currently working in Siberia. In this podcast
Professor Zubrow talks about his experience as one of the participants in the New
Archaeology.
For reflection: How does Professor Zubrow describe the contribution of Lewis
Binford to the New Archaeology? What was the social context for the emergence of
the New Archaeology?
For further reading: Binford, Lewis R. "Archaeology as anthropology." American
antiquity (1962): 217-225.
Zubrow, Ezra BW. "Carrying capacity and dynamic equilibrium in the prehistoric
Southwest." American Antiquity (1971): 127-138.
Francesco Berna is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Archaeology at
Simon Fraser University. He is a geoarchaeologists who specializes in the use of
microscopy to study archaeological deposits. In this podcast he talks about his
views of the role of science in archaeology and the discovery of early evidence of fire
at Wonderwerk Cave, South Africa.
For reflection:
How do you think research at the microscopic scale can enhance our understanding
of the archaeological record? What was the ‘smoking gun’ that led Prof. Berna to
identify traces of early fire at Wonderwerk Cave?
For further reading:
Goldberg, Paul, and Francesco Berna. "Micromorphology and context."Quaternary
International 214.1 (2010): 56-62.
Berna, Francesco, et al. "Microstratigraphic evidence of in situ fire in the Acheulean
strata of Wonderwerk Cave, Northern Cape province, South Africa."Proceedings of
the National Academy of Sciences 109.20 (2012): E1215-E1220.
April Nowell is an Associate Professor at the University of Victoria. She studies the
cognition of early hominins and has carries out fieldwork on Paleolithic sites in
Jordan. In this podcast Prof. Nowell talks about her research on the Lower
Paleolithic Birkhet Ram figurine and
For reflection: How did Prof. Nowell determine that the grooves found on the
Berekhet Ram figurine were produced by tools? Do you agree with Prof. Nowell that
archaeologists can learn about the evolution of human cognition?
For further reading:
d'Errico, Francesco, and April Nowell. "A new look at the Berekhat Ram figurine:
implications for the origins of symbolism." Cambridge Archaeological Journal 10.01
(2000): 123-167.
d'Errico, Francesco, et al. "Archaeological evidence for the emergence of language,
symbolism, and music–an alternative multidisciplinary perspective."Journal of
World Prehistory 17.1 (2003): 1-70.
John Shea is a Professor in the Department of Anthropology at the State University
at Stony Brooke. His an expert on the stone tools used by Neanderthals and early
modern humans and his field research is in the Turkana Basin, Kenya. In this
podcast he talks about his experience using experimental archaeology.
For reflection: How you think learning to make stone tools is important for
Paleolithic archaeologists? What does Professor Shea mean when he says that the
crossbow provides an experimental control?
For further reading: Shea, John, Zachary Davis, and Kyle Brown. "Experimental tests
of Middle Palaeolithic spear points using a calibrated crossbow." Journal of
Archaeological Science 28.8 (2001): 807-816.
Shea, John J. "Spear points from the Middle Paleolithic of the Levant." Journal of Field
Archaeology 15.4 (1988): 441-450.
Britt Bousman is a Professor in the Department of Anthropology at Texas State
University. Professor Bousman is involved in fieldwork in both Texas and South
Africa. In this podcast he speaks about the transition from the Paleoindian to the
Archaic in North America and his research in South Africa.
For reflection: How does Professor Bousman describe transition from the
Paleoindian to the Archaic? What factors might play a role in changes in the
archeological record in South Africa that are less relevant in North America?
For further reading:
Bousman, Britt et al. "The Palaeoindian-Archaic transition in Noh America: new
evidence from Texas." Antiquity 76 (2002): 980-90.
Bousman, C. Britt. "Coping with risk: Later stone age technological strategies at
Blydefontein Rock Shelter, South Africa." Journal of Anthropological
Archaeology 24.3 (2005): 193-226.
Lisa Maher is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Anthropology at the
University of California Berkeley. She is an expert in the later prehistory of the Near
East and directs excavations at the site of Kharaneh in Jordan. In this podcast she
describes her excavations at Kharaneh and the significance of the results of these
excavations.
For reflection: What does Professor Maher mean when she says that the
excavations at Kharaneh use standard Paleolithic excavation techniques? How does
Professor Maher describe the prehistoric occupation of Kharaneh?
For further reading:
Maher, Lisa A., et al. "Twenty thousand-year-old huts at a hunter-gatherer
settlement in eastern Jordan." PloS one 7.2 (2012): e31447.
Maher, Lisa A., Tobias Richter, and Jay T. Stock. "The Pre‐Natufian Epipaleolithic:
Long‐term Behavioral Trends in the Levant." Evolutionary Anthropology: Issues,
News, and Reviews 21.2 (2012): 69-81.
Sarah Sherwood is an Assistant Professor of Environmental Studies and University
Archaeologist at the University of the South. She is a geoarchaeologist with field
projects in the American Southeast and Eastern Europe. In this podcast she
discusses the relationship between archaeology and environmental studies and her
research on moundbuilding at sites such as Chokia and Poverty Point.
For reflection: How does Professor Sherwood describe the relationship between
archaeology and environmental studies? What insight does geoarchaeology bring to
the study of prehistoric mound construction?
For further reading:
Sherwood, Sarah C., and Tristram R. Kidder. "The DaVincis of dirt: Geoarchaeological
perspectives on Native American mound building in the Mississippi River
basin." Journal of Anthropological Archaeology 30.1 (2011): 69-87.
Goldberg, Paul, and Sarah C. Sherwood. "Deciphering human prehistory through the
geoarcheological study of cave sediments." Evolutionary Anthropology: Issues, News,
and Reviews 15.1 (2006): 20-36.
Benjamin Saidel is a Associate Professor at East Carolina University. His research
focus is the archaeology of pastoral societies in the Middle East. In this podcast he
discusses the archaeology of pastoralism and his own excavation on pastoral sites.
For reflection: What do pastroralist archaeological sites look like? How do survey
strategies have to respond to the characteristics of these sites?
For further reading:
Rosen, Steven A., and Benjamin A. Saidel. "The Camel and the Tent: An Exploration
of Technological Change among Early Pastoralists*." Journal of Near Eastern
Studies 69.1 (2010): 63-77.
Saidel, Benjamin Adam. "The excavations at Rekhes Nafha 396 in the Negev
Highlands, Israel." Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research(2002): 3763.
Charley French is head of the Division of Archaeology at Cambridge University. Dr.
French is a geoarchaeologist who has been involved in research at Stonehenge and
Durrington Walls. In this podcast he discusses these sites from a geoarchaeological
perspective.
For reflection: What does it mean to think about Stonehenge from a landscape
perspective? How does Dr. French describe the particular value of Durrington Walls
in comparison to Stonehenge?
For further reading:
French, Charles, et al. "Durrington Walls to West Amesbury by way of Stonehenge: a
major transformation of the Holocene landscape." Antiquaries Journal 92.Sept
(2012): 1-36.
Pearson, Mike Parker, et al. "Materializing Stonehenge the Stonehenge riverside
project and new discoveries." Journal of Material Culture 11.1-2 (2006): 227-261.
Morag Kersel is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Anthropology at DePaul
University. Professor Kerstel pursues research on the antiquities trade alongside
fieldwork in Israel and Jordan. In this podcast she discusses the impact of conflicts
in the Middle East, including the war in Iraq, on archaeology
For reflection: How does warfare effect archaeology? What do you think
archaeologists should be doing in the context of conflicts like the war in Iraq that
threaten cultural heritage?
For further reading: Kersel, Morag M. "Transcending Borders: Objects on the
Move." Archaeologies3.2 (2007): 81-98.
UNESCO Convention Concerning the Protection of the World Cultural and Natural
Heritage (http://whc.unesco.org/en/conventiontext/).
T.R. Kidder is a Professor in the Department of Anthropology at the Washington
University. T.R. Kidder is an expert in the archaeology of the American Southeast
and has recently shifted his research to China. In this podcast Professor Kidder
discusses his experience doing research in China and the challenge of combining the
historical record with archaeology.
For reflection: How do written documents differ from the archaeological record?
What can archaeologists learn but combining the archaeological record with the
study of written history?
For further reading:
Kidder, Tristram R., LIU HAIWANG, and Li Minglin. "Sanyangzhuang: early farming
and a Han settlement preserved beneath Yellow River flood deposits."
Antiquity 86.331 (2012): 30-47.
Kidder, Tristram, et al. "The Alluvial Geoarchaeology of the Sanyangzhuang Site on
the Yellow River Floodplain, Henan Province, China." Geoarchaeology27.4 (2012):
324-343.
Stephen Houston is a Professor in the Department of Anthropology at Brown
University. Professor Houston is both an epigrapher who works on Maya texts and
an archaeologist. In this podcast he talks about his recent fieldwork at the site of El
Zotz and the relationship between epigraphy and archaeology.
For reflection: How has the preservation of stuccos contributed to the
understanding of the pyramid at El Zotz? Do you agree with Professor Houston that
texts ‘take archaeology to an entirely new level’?
For further reading:
Garrison, Thomas G., et al. "Discovering ancient Maya settlements using airborne
radar elevation data." Journal of Archaeological Science 38.7 (2011): 1655-1662.
Houston, Stephen D. "Into the minds of ancients: advances in Maya glyph
studies." Journal of World Prehistory 14.2 (2000): 121-201.