Download or read book The Kintampo Complex written by Joanna Casey and published by British Archaeological Reports Oxford Limited. This book was released on 2000 with total page 198 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Cambridge Monographs in African Archaeology 51 Series editor: John Alexander
Download or read book The Archaeology of Africa written by Bassey Andah and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2014-05-22 with total page 896 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Africa has a vibrant past. It emerges from this book as the proud possessor of a vast and highly complicated interweaving of peoples and cultures, practising an enormous diversity of economic and social strategies in an 2xtraordinary range of environmental situations. At long last the archaeology of Africa has revealed enough of Africa's unwritten past to confound preconceptions about this continent and to upset the picture inferred from historic written records. Without an understanding of its past complexities, it is impossible to grasp Africa's present, let alone its future.
Download or read book From House Societies to States written by Juan Carlos Moreno Garcia and published by Oxbow Books. This book was released on 2022-10-21 with total page 492 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The organization and characteristics of early and ancient states have become the focus of a renewed interest from archaeologists, ancient historians and anthropologists in recent years. On the one hand, neo-evolutionary schemas of political transformation find it difficult to define some of their most basic concepts, such as ‘chiefdom’, ‘complex chiefdom’ and ‘state’, not to mention the transition between them. On the other hand, teleological interpretations based on linear dynamics, from less to increasingly more complex political structures, in successive steps, impose biased and too rigid views on the available evidence. In fact, recent research stresses the existence of other forms of socio-political organization, less vertically integrated and more heterarchical, that proved highly successful and resilient in the long term in tying together social groups. What is more, such forms quite often represented the basic blocks on which states were built and that managed to survive once states collapsed. Finally, nomadic, maritime and mountain populations provide fascinating examples of societies that experienced alternative forms of political organization, sometimes on a seasonal basis. In other cases, their consideration as ‘marginal’ populations that cultivated specialized skills ensured them a certain degree of autonomy when living either within or at the borders of states. This book explores such small-scale socio-political organizations, their potential and the historical trajectories they stimulated. A selection of historical case studies from different regions of the world may help rethink current concepts and views about the emergence and organization of political complexity and the mechanisms that prevented, occasionally, the emergence of solid polities. They may also cast some light over trajectories of historical transformation, still poorly understood as are the limits of effective state power. This book explores the importance of comparative research and long-term historical perspectives to avoid simplistic interpretations, based on the characteristics of modern Western states abusively used retrospectively.
Download or read book Archaeology and Language II written by Roger Blench and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2003-09-02 with total page 468 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Using language to date the origin and spread of food production, Archaeology and Language II represents groundbreaking work in synthesizing two disciplines that are now seen as interlinked: linguistics and archaeology. This volume is the second part of a three-part survey of innovative results emerging from their combination. Archaeology and historical linguistics have largely pursued separate tracks until recently, although their goals can be very similar. While there is a new awareness that these disciplines can be used to complement one another, both rigorous methodological awareness and detailed case-studies are still lacking in the literature. This three-part survey is the first study to address this. Archaeology and Language II examines in some detail how archaeological data can be interpreted through linguistic hypotheses. This collection demonstrates the possibility that, where archaeological sequences are reasonably well-known, they might be tied into evidence of language diversification and thus produce absolute chronologies. Where there is evidence for migrations and expansions these can be explored through both disciplines to produce a richer interpretation of prehistory. An important part of this is the origin and spread of food production which can be modelled through the spread of both plants and words for them. Archaeology and Language II will be of interest to researchers in linguistics, archaeologists and anthropologists.
Download or read book Encyclopedia of Prehistory written by Peter N. Peregrine and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2012-12-06 with total page 869 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Encyclopedia of Prehistory represents also defined by a somewhat different set of an attempt to provide basic information sociocultural characteristics than are eth on all archaeologically known cultures, nological cultures. Major traditions are covering the entire globe and the entire defined based on common subsistence prehistory of humankind. It is designed as practices, sociopolitical organization, and a tool to assist in doing comparative material industries, but language, ideology, research on the peoples of the past. Most and kinship ties play little or no part in of the entries are written by the world's their definition because they are virtually foremost experts on the particular areas unrecoverable from archaeological con and time periods. texts. In contrast, language, ideology, and The Encyclopedia is organized accord kinship ties are central to defining ethno ing to major traditions. A major tradition logical cultures. is defined as a group of populations sharing There are three types of entries in the similar subsistence practices, technology, Encyclopedia: the major tradition entry, and forms of sociopolitical organization, the regional sub tradition entry, and the which are spatially contiguous over a rela site entry. Each contains different types of tively large area and which endure tempo information, and each is intended to be rally for a relatively long period. Minimal used in a different way.
Download or read book Palynology and Human Ecology of Africa written by Orijemie, Emuobosa Akpor and published by IGI Global. This book was released on 2024-08-27 with total page 418 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Africa's environmental history and the complex interactions between humans and their environment remain poorly understood, creating a significant knowledge gap in this crucial field of study. Despite Africa's vital role in human evolution, biodiversity, and agricultural expansion, the long-term impact of environmental changes on African landscapes, vegetation communities, and human cultures lacks comprehensive research. This knowledge gap hampers efforts to tackle urgent challenges like climate change, global food production, resource management, and evidence-based policy formulation. Palynology and Human Ecology of Africa, edited by Emuobosa Orijemie and Sylvester Obigba, fills this void by bringing together experts from various disciplines such as archaeology, anthropology, palaeoecology, and palynology. This groundbreaking book offers a practical and theoretical framework for understanding Africa's environmental history and the intricate relationships between humans and their environment. It serves as a compendium of knowledge, providing empirical findings and exploring the application of palynology and innovative technologies in studying human ecology in Africa. By shedding light on topics like environmental changes, vegetation dynamics, human culture, and technological innovations, the book equips readers with valuable insights into the dynamics of the environment and their impact on the people of Africa. It becomes an indispensable resource for students, researchers, and professionals in the fields of human ecology, palaeoecology, and palynology, offering essential tools to address pressing environmental challenges and formulate evidence-based policies. With its multidisciplinary approach and evidence-driven insights, this book paves the way for a sustainable future rooted in a profound understanding of human-environment interactions in Africa and beyond.
Download or read book Ancient Africa Fully Explained Geography Prehistory Early History and the Rise of Its Civilizations written by Adam Muksawa and published by Muksawa. This book was released on 2021-09-25 with total page 292 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Ancient history of Africa can be thought of as a history of beginnings, for it is in Africa that the human story first begins. In telling this story of Africa's past, a variety of images and maps are included — which means that you'll never get "lost" in a "sea" of text. And like the cover says, everything is "fully explained" (without becoming — tedious, boring, dull etc.). The end-result of all this is a truly engaging book, suitable for all, that will likely change how you think about Africa (forever).
Download or read book Archaeology and Language Correlating archaeological and linguistic hypotheses written by Roger Blench and published by Psychology Press. This book was released on 1998 with total page 468 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Using language to date the origin and spread of food production, Archaeology and Language II represents groundbreaking work in synthesizing two disciplines that are now seen as interlinked: linguistics and archaeology. This volume is the second part of a three-part survey of innovative results emerging from their combination. Archaeology and historical linguistics have largely pursued separate tracks until recently, although their goals can be very similar. While there is a new awareness that these disciplines can be used to complement one another, both rigorous methodological awareness and detailed case-studies are still lacking in the literature. This three-part survey is the first study to address this. Archaeology and Language II examines in some detail how archaeological data can be interpreted through linguistic hypotheses. This collection demonstrates the possibility that, where archaeological sequences are reasonably well-known, they might be tied into evidence of language diversification and thus produce absolute chronologies. Where there is evidence for migrations and expansions these can be explored through both disciplines to produce a richer interpretation of prehistory. An important part of this is the origin and spread of food production which can be modelled through the spread of both plants and words for them. Archaeology and Language II will be of interest to researchers in linguistics, archaeologists and anthropologists.
Download or read book Revelations of Dominance and Resilience written by Apoh, Wazi and published by Sub-Saharan Publishers. This book was released on 2019-07-25 with total page 362 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Chinua Achebe ("The art of fiction”) famously observed that until lions have their own historians “the history of the hunt will always glorify the hunter.” In this volume chronicling the complex imperial and colonial entanglements of the Kpando region in eastern Ghana over recent centuries, the lions have found their proverbial historian. Drawing on an array of sources—archaeological, oral historical and documentary—Wazi Apoh brings locally nuanced perspective to the complex social political economic entanglements among Akpini, German and British actors. His illumination of previously silenced histories provides a rich platform from which to provoke us to imagine and act on the possibilities for restorative repatriation in the present. Its novel combination of historical study with analysis of ongoing dialogues over repatriation is a unique contribution to African studies.
Download or read book Divine Consumption written by Stephen A. Dueppen and published by Cotsen Institute of Archaeology Press. This book was released on 2022-12-31 with total page 328 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Kirikongo is an archaeological site composed of thirteen remarkably well-preserved discrete mounds occupied continually from the early first to the mid second millennium AD. It spans a dynamic era that saw the growth of large settlement communities and regional socio-political formations, development of economic specializations, intensification in interregional commercial networks, and the effects of the Black Death pandemic. The extraordinary preservation of architectural units, activity areas and industrial zones provides a unique opportunity to discern the cultural practices that created stratified mounds (tells) in this part of West Africa. Building from a new detailed zooarchaeological analysis and refinements in stratigraphic precision, this book argues that repeated ritual activity was a significant factor in the accumulation of stratified archaeological deposits. The book details consistencies in form and content of discrete loci containing animal bones, food remains, and broken and unbroken objects and suggests that these are the remnants of sequential ancestor shrines created when domestic spaces were converted to tombs or dedicated mortuary monuments were constructed. Continuities and transformations in ancestral rituals at Kirikongo inform on earlier West African ritual practices from the second millennium BC as well as political and social transformations at the site. More broadly, this case study provides new insights on anthropogenic mound (tell) formation processes, social zooarchaeology, material culture theory, historical ontology, and the analysis of ritual and religion in the archaeological record.
Download or read book Egalitarian Revolution in the Savanna written by Stephen A. Dueppen and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2014-09-11 with total page 359 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Many West African societies have egalitarian political systems, with non-centralised distributions of power. 'Egalitarian Revolution in the Savanna' analyses a wide range of archaeological data to explore the development of such societies. The volume offers a detailed case study of the village settlement of Kirikongo in western Burkina Faso. Over the course of the first millennium, this single homestead extended control over a growing community. The book argues that the decentralization of power in the twelfth century BCE radically transformed this society, changing gender roles, public activities, pottery making and iron-working. 'Egalitarian Revolution in the Savanna' will be of interest to students of political science, anthropology, archaeology and the history of West Africa.
Download or read book The Oxford Handbook of African Archaeology written by Peter Mitchell and published by OUP Oxford. This book was released on 2013-07-04 with total page 1077 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Africa has the longest and arguably the most diverse archaeological record of any of the continents. It is where the human lineage first evolved and from where Homo sapiens spread across the rest of the world. Later, it witnessed novel experiments in food-production and unique trajectories to urbanism and the organisation of large communities that were not always structured along strictly hierarchical lines. Millennia of engagement with societies in other parts of the world confirm Africa's active participation in the construction of the modern world, while the richness of its history, ethnography, and linguistics provide unusually powerful opportunities for constructing interdisciplinary narratives of Africa's past. This Handbook provides a comprehensive and up-to-date synthesis of African archaeology, covering the entirety of the continent's past from the beginnings of human evolution to the archaeological legacy of European colonialism. As well as covering almost all periods and regions of the continent, it includes a mixture of key methodological and theoretical issues and debates, and situates the subject's contemporary practice within the discipline's history and the infrastructural challenges now facing its practitioners. Bringing together essays on all these themes from over seventy contributors, many of them living and working in Africa, it offers a highly accessible, contemporary account of the subject for use by scholars and students of not only archaeology, but also history, anthropology, and other disciplines.
Download or read book World History Encyclopedia 21 volumes written by Alfred J. Andrea Ph.D. and published by Bloomsbury Publishing USA. This book was released on 2011-03-23 with total page 8025 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An unprecedented undertaking by academics reflecting an extraordinary vision of world history, this landmark multivolume encyclopedia focuses on specific themes of human development across cultures era by era, providing the most in-depth, expansive presentation available of the development of humanity from a global perspective. Well-known and widely respected historians worked together to create and guide the project in order to offer the most up-to-date visions available. A monumental undertaking. A stunning academic achievement. ABC-CLIO's World History Encyclopedia is the first comprehensive work to take a large-scale thematic look at the human species worldwide. Comprised of 21 volumes covering 9 eras, an introductory volume, and an index, it charts the extraordinary journey of humankind, revealing crucial connections among civilizations in different regions through the ages. Within each era, the encyclopedia highlights pivotal interactions and exchanges among cultures within eight broad thematic categories: population and environment, society and culture, migration and travel, politics and statecraft, economics and trade, conflict and cooperation, thought and religion, science and technology. Aligned to national history standards and packed with images, primary resources, current citations, and extensive teaching and learning support, the World History Encyclopedia gives students, educators, researchers, and interested general readers a means of navigating the broad sweep of history unlike any ever published.
Download or read book Nyame Akuma written by and published by . This book was released on 2006 with total page 380 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Themes in West Africa s History written by Emmanuel Kwaku Akyeampong and published by Ohio University Press. This book was released on 2006-01-15 with total page 459 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: There has long been a need for a new textbook on West Africa’s history. In Themes in West Africa’s History, editor Emmanuel Kwaku Akyeampong and his contributors meet this need, examining key themes in West Africa’s prehistory to the present through the lenses of their different disciplines. The contents of the book comprise an introduction and thirteen chapters divided into three parts. Each chapter provides an overview of existing literature on major topics, as well as a short list of recommended reading, and breaks new ground through the incorporation of original research. The first part of the book examines paths to a West African past, including perspectives from archaeology, ecology and culture, linguistics, and oral traditions. Part two probes environment, society, and agency and historical change through essays on the slave trade, social inequality, religious interaction, poverty, disease, and urbanization. Part three sheds light on contemporary West Africa in exploring how economic and political developments have shaped religious expression and identity in significant ways. Themes in West Africa’s History represents a range of intellectual views and interpretations from leading scholars on West Africa’s history. It will appeal to college undergraduates, graduate students, and scholars in the way it draws on different disciplines and expertise to bring together key themes in West Africa’s history, from prehistory to the present.
Download or read book Lithic Technological Systems and Evolutionary Theory written by Society for American Archaeology. Annual Meeting and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2015-01-22 with total page 319 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This collection of essays brings together several different evolutionary perspectives to demonstrate how lithic technological systems are a byproduct of human behavior. The essays cover a range of topics, including human behavioral ecology, cultural transmission, phylogenetic analysis, macroevolution, and various applications of evolutionary ecology.
Download or read book The Oxford Handbook of Nigerian History written by Toyin Falola and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2022 with total page 793 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book reads the narrative of the national politics alongside deeper histories of political and social organization, as well as in relation to competing influences on modern identity formation and inter-group relationships, such as ethnic and religious communities, economic partnerships, and immigrant and diasporic cultures
