Population Dynamics and Subsistence Variability on the Farming/Hunter-Gatherer Boundary: Central Western Argentina as a Case Study

Summary

This is an abstract from the "Global Perspectives on Human Population Dynamics, Innovation, and Ecosystem Change" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

This case study integrates times-series of multiple types of proxy to evaluate causal relationships between population dynamic, subsistence/diet variation, and ecosystem change. The presentation evaluates whether intensification based on wild and domesticated resources takes different evolutionary trajectories. We present trends in population dynamics in central-western Argentina (CWA) regarding two main processes: intensification in resource exploitation and the introduction of domesticated resources. CWA was occupied by hunter-gatherers since the Late Pleistocene/Early Late Holocene. It is proposed that in the North and Center of CWA, this lifestyle was disrupted by the introduction of domesticated plants (i.e., maize, beans, quinoa, and squash) ca. 2500 BP. In the South of CWA, exploitation of wild resources under a hunter-gatherer system continued until historic times. We employed Summed Probability Distribution of Radiocarbon dates to estimate changes in population density and carbon and nitrogen stable isotopes analysis to reconstruct the human diet. We compared both lines of inquiry in three geographic and ecologically distinctive areas of CWA to explore the relation between population growth/decline, the carrying capacity of the environment, and cultural responses. We propose that cultigens impacted each area differently, which could respond to specific feedback between environmental constraints and population dynamics.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Global Perspectives on Human Population Dynamics, Innovation, and Ecosystem Change   •
• Society for American Archaeology 89th Annual Meeting, New Orleans, LA (2024)

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 39105.0