Evolutionary Archaeology and the Anthropocene

Summary

Recently, the Anthropocene has challenged us to reflect on the era we live in and about the very terms in which we can frame its definition. As a geological era, the Anthropocene seems to be the field of geologists, paleontologists and biologists. However, now that the impact of Homo sapiens on the planet became focus of preoccupation, an excellent opportunity has arisen to rethink the relationship H. sapiens - nature from the viewpoint of other disciplines. As controversy, the Anthropocene can allow us the revision of paradigms entrenched for centuries in terms of the scientific criteria that has guided the characterization of a "new era". Since the 1980s, Evolutionary Archaeology has studied numerous cases showing how H. sapiens has created different and new ecological niches, modifying as a result not only the living conditions of animals and plants, but also of ecosystems. Our framing of the potential contribution of Evolutionary Archaeology to the Anthropocene-controversy aims at pondering criteria and indicators to establish the onset of this "new era" from a perspective that should be transdisciplinary in a comprehensive sense.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 81st Annual Meeting, Orlando, FL (2016)   •
• Evolutionary Archaeologies: New Approaches, Methods, and Empirical Sufficiency

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