The Movement of Technical Knowledge: Cross-Craft Perspectives on Mobility and Knowledge in Production Technologies

This collection contains the abstracts of the papers presented in the session entitled "The Movement of Technical Knowledge: Cross-Craft Perspectives on Mobility and Knowledge in Production Technologies," at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

The mechanisms by which technical knowledge moves through time and space provides the basis of much material culture research, spanning studies that explore technological change and innovation as well as those that examine technological stability and continuity. However, there are challenges facing archaeologists who reconstruct the learning processes and knowledge networks of past craft practitioners and the implications of the movement of such knowledge and/or craftspeople. In particular, there is a gap between identifying technological change and knowledge transfer in specific local contexts and developing an understanding of regional technological trends, especially in light of the growing use of ‘big data’ to examine research questions at very broad scales.

This session brings together archaeomaterials research that considers how and why technological knowledge moves (temporally and geographically) on all scales, and asks for a reflection on how these interpretations are formed, in relation to – for example – ethnographic and/or experimental data. It seeks to stimulate discussion on all aspects of knowledge transmission, to share approaches and perspectives from different materials, and bridge the gap between local and regional technological landscapes. This session should interest those working in materials-focused excavation, ethnoarchaeology, experimental archaeology, and analysis of production remains and artefacts.