Teaching Archaeology from a Sustainability Perspective

Summary

In the twenty-first century, archaeology should be applied and should include scientists and engineers. Why? The reason is simple: because the discipline contributes to our understanding of contemporary issues such as global warming and environmental degradation as well as the past. As a paleoethnobotanist (and now historian of paleobotany), I saw a need for more collaborative work. Thus, in my classroom, I utilized a multi-disciplinary perspective, one that drew from anthropology, water resources engineering, and plant science. Once my students were trained in the necessary theoretical and methodological practices, they went into the field (Ecuador) to conduct their own fieldwork under the auspices of sustainable development. Students conducted interviews with the local community, undertook survey work, took water and soil samples, and drew maps of the study region. Upon their return, they created a design plan that took into account the prehistoric and historic use of the land in order to develop a more sustainable development program. In this fashion, archaeology was seen as contributing to global sustainable development projects in a more relevant way, for it allowed the students to tackle real-world problems in a deep and meaningful way.

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

• Teaching Archaeology in the Twenty-First Century: Activities for the College Classroom   •
• Society for American Archaeology 80th Annual Meeting, San Francisco, CA (2015)

Keywords

Spatial Coverage