Current approaches to landscape characterisation as tools for the understanding of highlands-lowlands interactions

Summary

In the European Landscape Convention ‘landscape’ means an area, as perceived by people, whose character is the result of the action and interaction of natural and/or human factors. This view approaches landscape as an integrated and integrating concept, requiring a holistic approach to the investigation, protection, management, and planning of space, consistent with the objective of sustainable development. Landscapes are dynamic socio-ecological systems emerging from long-term historical development of human societies in dialogue with constraints and opportunities presented by their surrounding topography and environment as they change through time. Following this approach, the proposed paper will outline potential strategies and tools for the understanding of diachronic lowlands-highlands interactions in an inter-disciplinary manner through the prism of a landscape perspective. It will draw on examples from a variety of European contexts and will try to respond to major challenges of landscape change as examples of the diachronic interaction of the societies in lowlands with the ones living in mountainous areas.

SAA 2015 abstracts made available in tDAR courtesy of the Society for American Archaeology and Center for Digital Antiquity Collaborative Program to improve digital data in archaeology. If you are the author of this presentation you may upload your paper, poster, presentation, or associated data (up to 3 files/30MB) for free. Please visit http://www.tdar.org/SAA2015 for instructions and more information.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 80th Annual Meeting, San Francisco, CA (2015)   •
• Connecting highlands and lowlands – Towards a holistic approach to upland and lowland symbiosis in the past, present and for the future

Keywords

Spatial Coverage