Histories of Human-Nature Interactions: Use, Management, and Consumption of Plants in Extreme Environments
Part of: Society for American Archaeology 86th Annual Meeting, Online (2021)
This collection contains the abstracts of the papers presented in the session entitled "Histories of Human-Nature Interactions: Use, Management, and Consumption of Plants in Extreme Environments" at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.
Historically, humans in every environment on Earth have incorporated plants into their lives, with a wide variety of purposes: dietary, medicinal, ritual, to construct their homes, and craft their tools, among others. Nonetheless, for several extreme environments (e.g., desert or temperate bioclimates), plants have not received the same attention in the archaeological research as other resources. An example of this is how these areas are usually portrayed as marginal, distant lands, where cultivars arrived late and where people adopted these products of human developments and innovations from other, richer areas. In this session, we want to explore these narratives, confront them with research done in extreme regions, and uncover new histories for the human-plant relationships in these kind of environments. Topics such as adaptation of imported cultivars, innovations in cultivation techniques, and local processes of manipulation of wild resources and landscapes will form part of the central discussion. This symposium will strive to incorporate extreme bioclimates from all over the globe, and the whole chrono-cultural sequence, understanding that the developments of the present ecosystems, diets, and cosmologies associated with plants did not start with agriculture but are rather several long-term cultural processes that have their roots in hunter-gatherer populations.
Other Keywords
Paleoethnobotany •
Archaic •
Subsistence and Foodways •
Woodland •
Material Culture and Technology •
Archaeometry & Materials Analysis •
Hunter-Gatherers/Foragers
Geographic Keywords
South America (Continent) •
Republic of Peru (Country) •
Republic of Panama (Country) •
Republic of Colombia (Country) •
Netherlands Antilles (Country) •
Aruba (Country) •
Republic of Ecuador (Country) •
Republic of Chile (Country) •
Argentine Republic (Country) •
Falkland Islands (Islas Malvinas) (Country)
Resources Inside This Collection (Viewing 1-4 of 4)
- Documents (4)
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Bast Fiber Technology in the West Coast of South America: A Study of the Early Coastal Hunter-Gatherer's Fiber Production (2021)
DOCUMENT Citation Only
This is an abstract from the "Histories of Human-Nature Interactions: Use, Management, and Consumption of Plants in Extreme Environments" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. This study presents the results of an archaeobotanical analysis of the hunter-gatherer’s plant-fiber technologies of South America’s west coast. Due to the extreme aridity of the Atacama Desert, the preservation of organic technologies is exceptional. I analyze a unique assemblage...
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Plants and Steppe Hunter-Gatherers in Central Patagonia: A Case Study from the Aisén region (45° S, Chile) (2021)
DOCUMENT Citation Only
This is an abstract from the "Histories of Human-Nature Interactions: Use, Management, and Consumption of Plants in Extreme Environments" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Research on the use of plants among hunter-gathering groups has made visible the use of a predictable and ubiquitous resource that is locally and seasonally available, and that count with multiple potential uses. Recent studies at the Baño Nuevo 1 site (Aisén, Chile) have revealed...
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Sociocultural Trends and Innovations along 13,000 Years of Plant Use in the Atacama Desert, Chile (2021)
DOCUMENT Citation Only
This is an abstract from the "Histories of Human-Nature Interactions: Use, Management, and Consumption of Plants in Extreme Environments" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. In the Atacama Desert, plant resources are scarce and unevenly distributed due to water availability. However, by compiling all the available archaeobotanical evidences since the late Pleistocene (ca. 13,000 BP) until the Inka epoch (ca. 450 BP) in a single database, we demonstrate...
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Woodland Tradition Plant Use and Foodways in the Western Great Lakes: A View from Southeastern Wisconsin (2021)
DOCUMENT Citation Only
This is an abstract from the "Histories of Human-Nature Interactions: Use, Management, and Consumption of Plants in Extreme Environments" session, at the 86th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. This paper implements a multiproxy approach to Woodland foodways, integrating plant macrobotanical studies, faunal analyses, ceramic morphological and use-wear analyses, and absorbed residue analyses. Datasets from southeastern Wisconsin and the surrounding region highlight...