Theme:
4. Persisting with Change: Theory and Archaeological Scrutiny
Session format:
Regular session
Title:
Changes in Life, Changes in Death: An integrative Approach to the Neolithic Transformations in Southwest Asia
Content:
The Neolithic was a period marked by profound transformations in subsistence, lifestyle, and social organisation. In Southwest Asia populations grew and aggregated in permanent settlements, farming and animal domestication became the main ways of subsistence, and the environment was slowly modified to meet the needs of the new economic system. These changes had an impact on the health status and disease outcomes of these very first farmers, permeated into their cultural and ritual spheres and crystallised into their varied funerary traditions.
Advances in archaeological science during the past decades have enabled the recovery of a rich body of first-hand data on aspects like subsistence practices, chronologies, funerary traditions, mobility, pathologies, genetic relatedness, biological and social kinship of some of these farming groups. The information is, however, greatly fragmented due to the limitations imposed by the harsh climate conditions -incompatible with good biomolecular preservation- and the political instability in the region, and still highly compartmentalised with limited engagement across disciplines.
This session aims to bring together different research areas within archaeology that can contribute to the understanding of the changes in lifeways, social organisation, and funerary traditions, to push the discussion towards a more integrative overview of the life and death in Neolithic societies (ca. 10,000-5,000BCE) of Southwest Asia.
We welcome contributions from researchers working in human, animal and environmental bioarchaeology in disciplines such as ancient DNA, isotope analysis, proteomics, dating, osteoarchaeology, zooarchaeology, geoarchaeology or archaeobotany, as well as more theoretical approaches to settlement patterns, economic systems, and burial customs. We particularly welcome studies that provide a multi-disciplinary approach to the life and death of the world’s first farmers.
Keywords:
Neolithic, Southwest Asia, Funerary Archaeology, Bioarchaeology, Subsistence, Social organisation
Session associated with MERC:
no
Session associated with CIfA:
no
Session associated with SAfA:
no
Session associated with CAA:
no
Session associated with DGUF:
no
Session associated with other:
Main organiser:
Eva Fernandez (United Kingdom) 1
Co-organisers:
Jessica Pearson (United Kingdom) 2
Berenice Chamel (France) 3,4
Jo-Hannah Plug (United Kingdom) 2
Kelly Blevins (United Kingdom) 1
Affiliations:
1. Department of Archaeology. Durham University.
2. Department of Archaeology, Classics and Egyptology. University of Liverpool.
3. Institut Français du Proche-Orient (IFPO), Beyrouth
4. French Ministry of Foreign Affairs/CNRS
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