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In Focus: Archaeology of Global Change DONALD L. HARDESTY Perspectives on Global-Change Archaeology ABSTRACT In this article, I explore the characteristics of global-change archaeology as an emerging field of research. Global-change archaeology seeks to document and apply historical knowledge of past human–environmental interactions to the understanding of contemporary environmental problems and management and planning for future sustainability. It takes place within an interdisciplinary research structure and is situated within the explanatory contexts of historical science and humanistic history with close links to historical and political ecology. Both history and agency play important roles in the practice of global-change archaeology. Past human decision making in the context of cultural attitudes and perceptions also has a significant role in the archaeology of global change. [Keywords: archaeology, environment, global change, landscape, ecology] T HE POSTMODERN WORLD of the late 20th and early 21st centuries brought a “global consciousness” in which individuals are increasingly aware of and act within a global frame of reference on a wide range of social, cultural, and environmental issues. Nowhere is this more evident than in the emergence of the concept of “global change.” Global change topics include population growth, resource depletion, global warming and associated climate changes, resource management and planning, global sustainability, and planning for sustainable development. The archaeol- ogy of global change lies within this social and cultural context. Global-change archaeology emerged from the eco- logical anthropology and environmental archaeology of the 1960s and 1970s, which explored human–environmental interactions within a functional and systemic (synecolog- ical) framework but evolved toward the historical and po- litical ecologies of the 1990s and beyond. Historical ecol- ogy brought with it a new concern with historical knowl- edge and the long-term history of human–environmental interactions (Balee 2002; Crumley 1994; Crumley with van Deventer and Fletcher 2001). Variable time and space scales, the concept of landscapes as the cumulative history of human–environmental interactions, agency, and meaning played equally significant roles in historical ecology, which found its way into the emerging field of global-change archaeology. Global-change archaeology also has conceptual ties to political ecology, which focuses on the relationships be- tween political economy and human–environmental in- teractions in the contemporary world (e.g., Netting 1993; Robbins 2004; Sheridan 1996). Key topics of interest in the new discipline include environmental justice, future AMERICAN ANTHROPOLOGIST, Vol. 109, Issue 1, pp. 1–7, ISSN 0002-7294 online ISSN 1548-1433. C 2007 by the American Anthropological Association. All rights reserved. Please direct all requests for permission to photocopy or reproduce article content through the University of California Press’s Rights and Permissions website, http://www.ucpressjournals.com/reprintInfo.asp. DOI: 10.1525/AA.2007.109.1.1. sustainability, environmental degradation, resource devel- opment, cultural constructions of environment, environ- mental knowledge, land and resource conservation, so- cial structure and environmental interactions, risk as- sessment and decision making, environmental politics and conflict, and environmental planning and manage- ment. Global-change archaeology shares many of these research interests with political ecology. Applied anthro- pology also has common interests with global-change ar- chaeology in the application of anthropological knowl- edge to real-life situations and in the concept of praxis, the linkages of thought to action and their ethical implications. The Archaeomedes program exemplifies the linkages of global-change archaeology to both historical and political ecology and to applied anthropology. Launched in 1992 and funded by the European Union as part of its “Climate and Natural Hazards” research program, Archaeomedes en- compassed several projects in the Mediterranean Basin of southern Europe designed to study desertification, land degradation, and land abandonment from a long-term his- torical perspective (McGlade 1995; van der Leeuw 1998, 2003; van der Leeuw and McGlade 1997). The projects in- volved diverse interdisciplinary teams of mathematicians and computer scientists, earth and life scientists, social sci- entists, historians, and archaeologists. They explored the historical interaction between natural processes such as cli- mate change and anthropogenic actions such as economic decisions by households or individuals in power positions. The Empord` a project in northeast Spain, for example, fo- cused on historical land-use strategies and the evolution of land-use conflict in this region (McGlade 1995). It explored

Perspectives on Global-Change Archaeology

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In Focus: Archaeology ofGlobal Change

DONALD L. HARDESTY

Perspectives on Global-Change Archaeology

ABSTRACT In this article, I explore the characteristics of global-change archaeology as an emerging field of research. Global-change

archaeology seeks to document and apply historical knowledge of past human–environmental interactions to the understanding of

contemporary environmental problems and management and planning for future sustainability. It takes place within an interdisciplinary

research structure and is situated within the explanatory contexts of historical science and humanistic history with close links to historical

and political ecology. Both history and agency play important roles in the practice of global-change archaeology. Past human decision

making in the context of cultural attitudes and perceptions also has a significant role in the archaeology of global change. [Keywords:

archaeology, environment, global change, landscape, ecology]

THE POSTMODERN WORLD of the late 20th and early21st centuries brought a “global consciousness” in

which individuals are increasingly aware of and act within aglobal frame of reference on a wide range of social, cultural,and environmental issues. Nowhere is this more evidentthan in the emergence of the concept of “global change.”Global change topics include population growth, resourcedepletion, global warming and associated climate changes,resource management and planning, global sustainability,and planning for sustainable development. The archaeol-ogy of global change lies within this social and culturalcontext. Global-change archaeology emerged from the eco-logical anthropology and environmental archaeology of the1960s and 1970s, which explored human–environmentalinteractions within a functional and systemic (synecolog-ical) framework but evolved toward the historical and po-litical ecologies of the 1990s and beyond. Historical ecol-ogy brought with it a new concern with historical knowl-edge and the long-term history of human–environmentalinteractions (Balee 2002; Crumley 1994; Crumley with vanDeventer and Fletcher 2001). Variable time and space scales,the concept of landscapes as the cumulative history ofhuman–environmental interactions, agency, and meaningplayed equally significant roles in historical ecology, whichfound its way into the emerging field of global-changearchaeology.

Global-change archaeology also has conceptual ties topolitical ecology, which focuses on the relationships be-tween political economy and human–environmental in-teractions in the contemporary world (e.g., Netting 1993;Robbins 2004; Sheridan 1996). Key topics of interest inthe new discipline include environmental justice, future

AMERICAN ANTHROPOLOGIST, Vol. 109, Issue 1, pp. 1–7, ISSN 0002-7294 online ISSN 1548-1433. C© 2007 by the American Anthropological Association. Allrights reserved. Please direct all requests for permission to photocopy or reproduce article content through the University of California Press’s Rights andPermissions website, http://www.ucpressjournals.com/reprintInfo.asp. DOI: 10.1525/AA.2007.109.1.1.

sustainability, environmental degradation, resource devel-opment, cultural constructions of environment, environ-mental knowledge, land and resource conservation, so-cial structure and environmental interactions, risk as-sessment and decision making, environmental politicsand conflict, and environmental planning and manage-ment. Global-change archaeology shares many of theseresearch interests with political ecology. Applied anthro-pology also has common interests with global-change ar-chaeology in the application of anthropological knowl-edge to real-life situations and in the concept of praxis,the linkages of thought to action and their ethicalimplications.

The Archaeomedes program exemplifies the linkages ofglobal-change archaeology to both historical and politicalecology and to applied anthropology. Launched in 1992and funded by the European Union as part of its “Climateand Natural Hazards” research program, Archaeomedes en-compassed several projects in the Mediterranean Basin ofsouthern Europe designed to study desertification, landdegradation, and land abandonment from a long-term his-torical perspective (McGlade 1995; van der Leeuw 1998,2003; van der Leeuw and McGlade 1997). The projects in-volved diverse interdisciplinary teams of mathematiciansand computer scientists, earth and life scientists, social sci-entists, historians, and archaeologists. They explored thehistorical interaction between natural processes such as cli-mate change and anthropogenic actions such as economicdecisions by households or individuals in power positions.The Emporda project in northeast Spain, for example, fo-cused on historical land-use strategies and the evolution ofland-use conflict in this region (McGlade 1995). It explored

2 American Anthropologist • Vol. 109, No. 1 • March 2007

the historical roots of present-day “crises,” the conse-quences of past human behavior, and short-term modelsof human–environmental interactions. Archaeomedes ini-tially examined the transformation of the MediterraneanEurope landscape over a long time period. Toward this end,researchers studied natural and anthropogenic processestaking place at a variety of time scales from millennia tothe seasonal cycles such as transhumance. Then the focuschanged to exploring the processes of spatial variability andchange in land degradation and desertification.

Several other global-change archaeology projects alsoemerged in the 1990s. Archaeologists and natural sci-entists began to explore long-term changes in human–environmental interaction in the Pacific Islands as “micro-cosms” of global change (Kirch 1997:285). Paul Bahn andJohn Flenley, for example, suggested that the long-term his-tory of human–environmental interaction on Easter Islandwas a “model for the whole planet” (1992:212). In 1992, ar-chaeologists and paleoenvironmental scientists working inthe circumpolar north organized the North Atlantic Biocul-tural Organization (NABO; McGovern 2004). The NationalScience Foundation (NSF) Office of Polar Programs initiallyfunded NABO with the intent of fostering large-scale inter-disciplinary research in this region of rapid contemporaryenvironmental change. NABO projects have been launchedin Greenland, Iceland, Norway, Scotland, and the Faroe Is-lands. The Central Arizona–Phoenix Long-Term EcologicalResearch Project began in 1997 and focused on develop-ing a model of the historical dynamics of urban ecosystemsand their hinterlands (Grimm et al. 2000). Model variablesincluded historical changes in ecological processes, land-use patterns, social processes, human attitudes and per-ceptions, and coarse-grained environmental componentssuch as climate, vegetation, and geology. The interdisci-plinary project coordinated the activities of physical, bi-ological, social, behavioral, and economic scientists andspecifically focused on the integration of “social and eco-logical data across scales of time and space” (Grimm et al.2000:583).

WHY GLOBAL-CHANGE ARCHAEOLOGY?

Why global-change archaeology? Contemporary environ-mental research by life and earth scientists typically fo-cuses on the present and develops contemporary or short-term models of natural and social dynamics to understandenvironmental problems and to forecast future changes.Such models, however, consider only the most recent endof longer-term historical processes, present a small sampleof available case studies on human–environmental interac-tion, exclude infrequent natural processes, and ignore his-torical changes in the dynamics of human–environmentalinteraction, among other things (van der Leeuw andRedman 2002:599). To remedy this situation, global-changearchaeology seeks to document and apply historical knowl-edge of past human–environmental interactions to theunderstanding of contemporary environmental problems

and management and planning for future sustainability. Ar-chaeology as a source of historical knowledge is used to doc-ument and understand: (1) long-term historical trajectoriesof human–environmental interactions, (2) responses to nat-ural hazards, (3) legacies of past land-use patterns, (4) mod-eling or historical analogs of past human–environmentalecosystems, and (5) natural versus anthropogenic agents ofchange.

Patrick Kirch’s article (this issue), which focuses on“island models” of the interaction between natural andanthropogenic changes in the historical formation ofecosystems in the Hawaiian Islands, shows the importanceof historical knowledge in understanding ecosystem dy-namics. After the initial colonization of the islands by sea-faring Polynesians in the late first millennium C.E., theisland population grew along a variety of trajectories con-strained by environmental variables. Windward regionsbest suited for crops expanded first, followed later by the dryleeward regions with the development of irrigation agro-ecosystems. The human migrants then transformed nat-ural ecosystems on the islands into a mosaic of agroe-cosystems at different geographical scales. In the mid–15thcentury, the O’ahu lowland forests disappeared, coincid-ing with a population peak on the Hawaiian archipelago.Agriculture intensified along two trajectories: (1) a “lan-desque capital intensification” in taro irrigation systems,mostly in geologically older, western islands, which coin-cided with a major phase of population growth betweenC.E. 1000 and C.E. 1450, and (2) a “cropping cycle intensifi-cation” (decreasing length of fallow period) in dryland fieldsystems, mostly in geologically younger, leeward islands,which took place in Hawai‘i and East Maui after C.E. 1400.A “state” organization emerged by the mid–15th centurywith a concept of “divine kingship” that usurped lineageand kinship rights of land control, tenure, and social or-ganization, and which was based on “staple finance,” con-trol of agroecosystems, and systematic extraction of agri-cultural surplus. The expansion of the dryland field systemin the eastern islands around the mid–15th century led tothe emergence of the state and sociopolitical crises result-ing from stochastic climatic variation (drought led to foodshortages).

A STEPCHILD OF ENVIRONMENTAL ARCHAEOLOGY?

Global-change archaeology is clearly concerned with thehistory of human–environmental interactions as a toolfor interpretation and planning for future sustainability.Is the endeavor, therefore, a “stepchild” of environmentalarchaeology or something different? Traditional environ-mental archaeology “focused on the application of singletechniques to isolated data classes” (Dincauze 2000:xvii).The techniques include archaeozoology, soil science, geo-morphology, dendroecology, pollen analysis, and macrob-otanical analysis. Early environmental archaeology con-sidered “environment” as a background or passive stagefor human action but then moved toward a “contextual”

Hardesty • Global-Change Archaeology 3

approach for understanding human–environmental inter-actions within variable time and space scales (Butzer 1982;Dincauze 2000:xvii–xviii; Redman et al. 2004). Global-change archaeology builds on such a contextual approachand is, therefore, closely aligned with the new environmen-tal archaeology. Thus, James Woollett’s article (this issue)uses faunal remains and paleoclimate proxies such as glacio-chemical sea ice cores to construct environmental variabil-ity and change in Labrador from the 1300s to the 1900s. Heanalyzes faunal remains from five winter settlement sitesin central Labrador that reflect Inuit expansion from the17th to the 19th centuries. The “Narrows” (a constrictedstrait separating two bodies of water in central Labrador)offers ecological and social advantages to the Inuit settle-ments: proximity to coastline and European trade as well asa complex local environment offering travel routes and for-aging areas in all seasons (sea mammals, fish, seabirds, andcaribou). Seal dominates the faunal assemblage from all fivesites, suggesting that seals supported the Inuit communitiesin the Narrows during this time period. The practice of sealhunting, however, changed as well. Fall open-water hunt-ing was more important in the 17th and 18th centuries, butwinter hunting around sea ice dominated in the early- tomid–19th centuries. High ratios of ringed seals in 17th- andearly-19th-century assemblages are consistent with heavyice conditions indicated by proxies (ice records, archives).Ringed seal to harbor seal ratios are consistent with mod-erate ice conditions in the 18th and later 19th centuriesindicated by proxies.

INTERDISCIPLINARY METHODS AND SUPPORT

Multidisciplinary teams and interdisciplinary researchplans that bring together archaeologists, biologists, geog-raphers, geologists, computer scientists, anthropologists,economists, political scientists, and experts from other dis-ciplines have been the hallmark of global-change research.The National Research Council Committee on the HumanDimensions of Global Change, for example, identified suchcollaboration as the key to theoretical and methodologi-cal development in the topic (Stern et al. 1992:168–172).Global-change archaeology takes place within this organi-zational framework. In the same way, global-change archae-ology takes place within a research-funding environmentand structure that is multifaceted. Within this framework,“well-defined core research areas, in otherwise large and dis-persed research programs, have provided a foundation foridentifying and prioritizing research” (van der Leeuw andRedman 2002:602). The U.S. Geological Survey, for exam-ple, engages in global-change research activities

that strive to achieve a whole-system understanding ofthe interrelationships among earth surface processes, eco-logical systems, and human activities. Activities of theprogram focus on documenting, analyzing, and model-ing the character of past and present environments andthe geological, biological, hydrological, and geochemi-cal processes involved in environmental change so thatfuture environmental changes and impacts can be antic-ipated. [U.S. Geological Survey 2006]

The U.S. Global Change Research Program funds cli-mate change and other global-change research projects. Ini-tiatives of the NSF have funded programs in global-changearchaeology, most notably the “Biocomplexity in the Envi-ronment” and the Office of Polar Programs. Currently, theNSF program in Human and Social Dynamics supports in-terdisciplinary research projects in three separate areas ofemphasis with archaeological implications for its currentfunding competition. They include (1) agents of change,which focuses on large-scale transformational changes suchas globalization and the evolution of human societies overtime; (2) dynamics of human behavior, which focuses onthe dynamics of and changes in human behavior overtime such as human–environmental interactions; and (3)decision making, risk, and uncertainty, which focuses ondecision making by human individuals and groups in theface of uncertainty such as temporal and spatial variabil-ity in the environment. Other examples include the EU DGXII Environment and Climate program and the UN Envi-ronment Program. The UNESCO Man and the BiosphereProgram (MAB) has supported and funded interdisciplinaryresearch on ecosystems, natural resources, and biodiversityassociated with sustainable human–environmental interac-tions since the 1970s. The MAB programs, for example, in-clude the study of global change in mountain biosphere re-serves, sustainable tourism, desertification, sustainable useof dryland diversity in West African biosphere reserves, andthe like.

THEORETICAL RELATIONS

What is the theoretical place or relevance of global-changearchaeology reflected in these articles? Clearly, they com-bine elements of processualism and postprocessualism. Thefocus on human–environmental interactions, ecologicalprocesses, ecosystem modeling, and evolutionary changeconjure up images of archaeology’s processual theme.History and agency, however, key players in postprocessualtheories, have equally prominent roles in these articles andexemplify the practice of global-change archaeology as bothhistorical science and humanistic history (Hardesty andFowler 2001:78). Historical science explores the transforma-tion of human–environmental relationships over time; hu-manistic history focuses on the meanings of environmentsto people in the past and how those meanings affected hu-man decisions.

Historical Ecology

The theoretical underpinnings of historical ecology—including the key concepts of landscape, scale, region,boundary, diversity, resilience, agency, and organizationalstructure—play a prominent role in the archaeology ofglobal change (Balee 2002; Bauer 2003; Cormier 2003;Crumley 1994; Kirch and Hunt 1997; Lentz 2000; McIntoshet al. 2000; Rival 2002). Historical evolution of landscapes isthe foundation. The landscape concept focuses on the pro-cesses, patterns, and structures of behavior rather than on

4 American Anthropologist • Vol. 109, No. 1 • March 2007

individual sites or features. Landscape models stress the in-terconnections of sites and places rather than their individ-uality. Thus, the article by In Focus guest editor Thomas H.McGovern and colleagues (this issue) explores the changinglandscapes of Viking settlement in the Myvvatnssveit regionof Northeastern Iceland during the pioneer Landnam erafrom C.E. 874 until Iceland became a province of Norwayin C.E. 1264.

The key variables in the Myvvatnssveit landscape settle-ment system include: (1) management of livestock grazing,(2) climate instability, (3) woodland management (in partassociated with iron and charcoal production), (4) commu-nity management of waterfowl for sustainable egg collec-tion, and (5) importing of marine fish and sea mammalsfrom the coast via trade and exchange networks, possi-bly associated with entrepreneurial activities of chiefs. Ex-cavations at the “temple farm” site of Hofstaoir led to alandscape-scale multidisciplinary study in the Myvatn re-gion. Radiocarbon dates show that this inland region wascolonized rapidly rather than being gradually populatedby individual households from the coast. Written sources(sagas) suggest that “chiefly” first settlers claimed large ar-eas of land and placed retainers in a wide variety of resourcezones. This model, however, does not explain why manyof these early farms were well established with resident lin-eages wealthy enough to support elaborate burials. An alter-native model portrays wealthy and powerful settlers “leapfrogging” densely forested lowland valleys to higher ele-vation hillside meadows. Later deforestation of the valleyswould have brought the elite farmers to the valley floors.

Landscape transformation as an expression of the his-tory of human–environmental interaction takes place at avariety of scales in time and space. Time scales are illus-trated by the concept of “historical structures” in the An-nales school of social history (Braudel 1949; see also Knapp1992, Little and Shackel 1989). Historical structures are in-terconnected events, places, things, and relations that areexpressed over time. At one end of the time scale are histori-cal structures formed over very long periods of time rangingfrom centuries to millennia. They include, for example, bio-geophysical processes and structures such as climate, hydro-logical, and vegetation patterns; political economies suchas the modern worldsystem; and cultural traditions such asthe traditional Chinese ideology of feng shui. In the middleof the time scale are “medium length” historical structuresformed over decades and years, which link together socialand cultural entities, relations, and processes and whichplay a key role in social reproduction and change. Theyinclude, for example, social structures grounded in the ide-ologies of class, ethnicity, and gender that “mediate” theopposition between individual or short time and long orgeographical time. Social time focuses on social and cul-tural entities, relations, and processes that play a key rolein social reproduction and change: These include specificsocial groups defined by class, ethnicity, gender, and occu-pation and their physical expression in landscape. Finally,historical structures created in short-term time periods of

days, months, and years link together the actions, socialrelations, and perceptions of individuals or specific socialunits such as domestic households. They are, in effect, his-torical biographies or life histories and may be expressed inlandscapes as networks or mosaics of microenvironments.

The concept of historical patterns of resilience is an-other key component of historical ecology. A recent com-parative study of the recovery of desert vegetation in twomining landscapes in Death Valley, California, for exam-ple, provided historical knowledge about the sensitivityof plants to different soils and geological histories (Brown2000). The discovery of base and precious metals in the val-ley in the first decade of the 20th century brought aboutthe emergence of several short-lived boom towns that wereabandoned within a few years. Recent studies of two of thetown sites, Skidoo in the Panamint Range on the west side ofthe valley and Greenwater in the Black Mountains on theeast side of the valley, show significant differences in therecovery of native desert vegetation. The desert vegetationat Skidoo is rapidly recovering after 70 years with a mixof short-lived colonizing plants such as cheesebrush andlong-lived native plants like creosote. In contrast, plantshave barely begun to recolonize the contemporaneous siteof Greenwater. The different ages of the soils in the twoplaces seem to be the principal reason for the differences inthe rate of recovery of desert vegetation. Greenwater’s soilis at least 100,000 years old, but Skidoo grew up on a debrisflow with soil less than 4,000 years old. Plants recolonizeyoung soils, which are much coarser and resilient, fasterthan they do old soils.

Modeling of Complex Adaptive Systems

Modeling of complex adaptive systems is a key proces-sual link in global-change archaeology. The article by T. J.Wilkinson and colleagues (this issue) explores the behaviorof small Bronze Age communities in Upper Mesopotamiawithin the context of global environmental change us-ing computer simulations of complex adaptive systems. Inthis area of Upper Mesopotamia, nucleated tell-based set-tlements developed from the sixth to the fourth millenniaB.C.E. reached a peak in the third millennium B.C.E., andthen collapsed in the late third or second millennia B.C.E.Climatic episodes of drought may be correlated but regionalvariation suggests greater complexity: Some settlements inthe driest areas did not collapse whereas others in wet areasdid. Two-way interactions are most likely, resulting in “acomplex array of coevolutionary pathways and nonlinearresponses” (Wilkinson et al. this issue). The two-way inter-actions involve both external climatic and disease fluctu-ations and environmental degradation and other impactsbrought about by human population growth and urbaniza-tion. Wilkinson and colleagues develop models that focuson “bottom-up” social and environmental processes thatoperate on local and small-scale levels but which often re-sult in larger-scale structures or outcomes known as “emer-gent properties.” They use archaeological, textual, and

Hardesty • Global-Change Archaeology 5

ethnographic data to model a landscape settlement systemat Tell Beydar, a 12-kilometer radius nucleated tell-based set-tlement in northern Syria dating to the mid– to late thirdmillennium B.C.E. They use ENKIMDU (of the ArgonneNational Laboratory, Advanced Simulation TechnologiesCenter) to run simulations of demographic change over a100-year span and the impact of simulated harvest blights,five-year droughts, and variable number of plow team perhousehold on the Tell Beydar landscape settlement system.

A related approach uses complexity theory to arguethat complex organizations may fail as human life sup-port systems because they become too costly (e.g., Allenet al. 2003; Dean 2000; Tainter 1988). From this perspec-tive, an increasingly expensive infrastructure appears to bethe reason why many past civilizations and other com-plex societies collapsed. At first, the organizations helpedsolve critical problems in a cost-effective manner. The ad-ditional work or other costs needed to support the orga-nization had significant benefits to the society as a wholesuch as greatly increased agricultural yields. At some point,however, the demand on individuals and groups reacheda point at which they were no longer willing to pay theadditional costs needed to support the organization. In ef-fect, the complex society collapsed from its own weight. Per-haps the key problem with modeling of this type is using anappropriate scale. Modeling life support organizations on asmall scale, for example, often leaves out potentially catas-trophic events and processes operating on a much largergeographical or temporal scale. But with careful attentionto issues of scale and boundaries, complexity models offer agood framework within which to analyze and interpret theconditions under which urban, industrial, and other lifesupport systems of the modern world survive or collapse.

Agency

The archaeology of global change clearly reflects the post-processual influence of agency or the role of agents (e.g.,individuals, households, local settlements, corporations) inunderstanding ecological change. Several years ago, Eliz-abeth Brumfiel argued that archaeologists have acquiredfrom ecosystem theory “a sensitivity to structural causa-tion and an appreciation for the interconnectedness of so-cial and cultural variables” but that “the analysis of socialchange has been hampered by ecosystem theory’s insis-tence on whole populations and whole behavioral systemsas the units of analysis” (1992:551). Such behavioral sys-tems, Brumfiel argued, should be understood as “the com-posite outcomes of negotiation between positioned socialagents pursuing their goals under both ecological and so-cial constraints” (Brumfiel 1992:551). She discussed gender,class, and social factions as some of the key players or agents.Likewise, agent-based models have been developed in re-cent years to simulate the behavior of complex adaptivesystems. Timothy Kohler and colleages (2005), for exam-ple, used agent-based models to provide detailed simula-tions of social and environmental change among Puebloan

settlements in Long House Valley in Arizona and the CentralMesa Verde region in Colorado. They applied object-basedcomputer programming languages (e.g., Java) to simulatethe characteristics and behaviors of households operat-ing under a variety of environmental and social condi-tions (based on archaeological, paleoenvironmental, andethnographic data) and to predict variability and changein the settlement patterns that resulted. Kohler and GeorgeGummerman (2000) offer other examples of the use ofagent-based modeling in archaeology, cultural anthropol-ogy, primatology, and sociology.

In the same vein, several of these “In Focus” articlesillustrate the role of socially positioned agents in the in-terpretation of environmental change. Thus Wilkinson andcolleagues explore the behavior of small Bronze Age com-munities in Upper Mesopotamia within the context ofglobal-environmental change using agent-based modelsand computer simulations of complex adaptive systems.Modeling of the local communities is organized arounddecision-making agents such as the patriarchal household.The ENKIMDU framework models the decision-makingcharacteristics of Bronze Age Mesopotamian householdswithin a global-environmental context. The key compo-nents of the model include household demography and so-cial structure, agricultural practices and activities, pastoralpractices and activities, and household stress coping mech-anisms and economic exchange.

In a similar vein, Woollett’s article focuses on the shiftfrom Thule to Inuit cultures during the “Little Ice Age”from the late 16th to the 18th century. The emergenceof the communal house is a key marker of this transi-tion and is considered by some to be an adaptation tochanging climate. Others, however, consider the commu-nal house to be an outcome of trade with Europeans orof indigenous long-distance trading networks: “Multifam-ily households formed around entrepreneurial individualswho earned wealth and prestige as middlemen in trade withEuropeans or as whale hunters” (Woollett this issue). House-hold heads negotiated power over critical resources suchas boats. Hosting visitors also played an important role intrade networks (e.g., communal houses facilitate social net-works beyond local groups). Social stress arising from con-flicts over whale hunt surpluses, wealth displays, and ac-cess to wives intensified in the 18th century. Communalhouseholds helped cement social alliances and cohesionthrough traditional leadership patterns. Woollett focuseson the environmental context of subsistence change takingplace during the tradition from Thule to Inuit culture thatmay explain cultural changes such as the communal house.

The article by McGovern and colleagues also uses“agent-based” models focusing on farm households asdecision-making units without specifically mentioningthese concepts. Farm household “management strategies”played key roles in the eventual outcomes of, for exam-ple, Hofstaoir (which managed livestock grazing to min-imize land degradation and, therefore, survived until themodern-era, post-1700 deflation and erosion) and Sveigakot

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(which did not manage livestock grazing and, therefore, wasabandoned by early 13th century), even though the twofarms are only 12 kilometers apart.

Meaning

In a recent volume, I note the role played by the search for“paleo-meanings” (Hardesty and Fowler 2001:84–86) in thenew environmental archaeology. Is it possible to interpretthe meanings associated with past landscapes? Consider,for example, the formation of mining landscapes in themodern world. Mining landscapes reflect cultural represen-tations that convey ideas and meaning through signs andsymbols. As signs, the components of mining landscapescommunicate messages, as, for example, prospectors usedstone cairns to mark the boundaries of mining claims. AsFowler and I wrote, such markers

represent not only miners’ knowledge of where ore bod-ies should occur but also legal concepts in mining law.The geographical distribution of settlements, buildings,and structures on mining landscapes reflects some combi-nation of “ideal” concepts of settlement and communityand “real” determinants, such as topography, water avail-ability, transportation routes, and mine locations. Thus,miners coming from the eastern United States typicallycarried with them cultural concepts of settlements laidout in a grid pattern. [Hardesty and Fowler 2001:83–84]

On a larger geographical scale, mining-settlement pat-terns often reflect social and cultural constructions. Mining-settlement patterns in 19th-century Nevada, for example,reflect Comstock-era ideas about the formation of gold-bearing ore bodies (Tingley et al. 2001). The Comstockmodel visualized gold- and silver-bearing “lodes” that oc-curred within 500 feet of the surface. Miners for severaldecades after the Comstock discovery followed this ideain searching for ore bodies and established mining campsaccordingly. They completely overlooked the gold-bearingweathered silica ledges that did not conform to this model.The 1902 discovery of gold in this geological formation atGoldfield, Nevada, dramatically changed ideas about min-ing and created a new geological model that patternedmining-settlement patterns for several decades afterward.As symbols, the components of mining landscapes “spon-taneously and unintentionally evoke emotions deeply em-bedded within a specific historical and cultural context”(Hardesty 2001:23), as in bringing to mind culturally basedimages or past personal experiences. Examples include theindividual places or landforms in mining landscapes thathave meaning as “traditional cultural properties” to par-ticular tribes, or the human survival response to arsenic-or mercury-contaminated mine waste or open mine shafts,which follows their recognition as “toxic” or “hazardous.”Mining landscapes as places with signs and symbols alsomay have significant educational and market value as eco-museums, outdoor museums of science and industry, oras sites for community-based archaeology and heritagetourism.

In a related area of meaning, understanding risk as-sessment and decision making is a key topic in political

ecology and historical ecology, which is reflected in the ar-chaeology of global change. Past human decision makingin the context of cultural attitudes and perceptions, for ex-ample, played a significant role in both the Archaeomedesprogram (van der Leeuw 1998) and in the Central Arizona–Phoenix project (Grimm et al. 2000). The new environmen-tal archaeology appears to be moving in such a direction(Hardesty and Fowler 2001:85–86; Redman 1999:202–206;Redman et al. 2004). In her comprehensive text in environ-mental archaeology, for example, Dena Dincauze observesthat:

Human ecology is the story of self-domestication, of de-cisions made, risks taken, and limits defined or defied. Itis also the untold story of the consequences of strategies.Decisions and risks are defined ideologically as they arelived, and their outcomes are enshrined ideologically intoday’s politics. The results of paleoecological researchare distorted for purposes of public policy because ofthe thick cultural screen between scientifically informedpublications and the ideologically freighted language ofpublic discourse. The continuing debate about humanresponsibility for global warming, for example, is con-suming resources and time better spent on planning forreducing those threats we can control and for adaptingrealistically to those we cannot. Management policies di-rected to human society rather than to human habitatscan improve the quality of our self-domestication by of-fering space and resources to other forms of life. Anthro-pocentric paleoecology may help us learn to manage our-selves for continuing existence. [2000:521]

Global-change archaeology is poised to do just that.

DONALD L. HARDESTY Department of Anthropology, Uni-versity of Nevada at Reno, Reno, NV 89557

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