High Precision Mapping of Human Behavior in Ethnographic Contexts, a New Tool for Ethnoarchaeology

Summary

Ethnoarchaeological studies attempt to link human behavior to the material residues they produce for the purpose of developing archaeological method and theory. Traditional studies in spatial ethnoarchaeology, however, have focused on the mapping of material remains, but the spatial distribution of the behaviors that produced them, the thing that interests us most, has gone largely undocumented and for good reason. Until recently, it was not technically possible to map people in space in a way that is simultaneously accurate, precise, and unobtrusive. In this paper, we discuss the use of time-lapse photography and photogrammetry for the direct, frequent, and high precision mapping of human behavior in ethnographic contexts. We illustrate the use of this method using a case study from campsites of nomadic Dukha reindeer herders in Khövsgöl Aimag, Mongolia. It is argued that this method not only provides much needed data on how humans use space but also that abundant ancillary behavioral data are collected. As such, time-lapse photography and photogrammetry could become part of the standard toolkit for ethnoarchaeological research.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 82nd Annual Meeting, Vancouver, BC (2017)   •
• Teaching through the Past: Advances in Technological Analysis of the Archaeological Record

Keywords

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 16100