Interdisciplinary Approaches in Zooarchaeology: Addressing Big Questions with Ancient Animals

This collection contains the abstracts of the papers presented in the session entitled "Interdisciplinary Approaches in Zooarchaeology: Addressing Big Questions with Ancient Animals" at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

Zooarchaeology is a powerful subfield in archaeology that can provide critical information on a wide range of topics including past foodway practices, ancient environments, taphonomic conditions of a site, and the nature of religious and social organizations of the past. Indeed, the analysis of faunal remains is an inherent part of archaeological research, providing vital insights into past peoples and societies. Contemporary archaeological research has become increasingly interdisciplinary through the integration of disparate datasets, perspectives, and techniques from outside disciplines. What can we learn about how human activities shaped past ecosystems through the integration of faunal and ecological datasets? What does the historic and archaeological record tell us about past societies? And how do community-based research methods help answer archaeology’s big questions? The goal of this session is to highlight creative approaches that address fundamental questions about past societies and human culture that cannot be answered by zooarchaeology alone.