Historical Archaeology and Environment

270 Pages·2018·7.91 MB·English

by  Marcos André Torres de Souza

Marcos André Torres de Souza 
Diogo Menezes Costa Editors
Historical
Archaeology
and
Environment
Historical Archaeology and Environment
Marcos André Torres de Souza
Diogo Menezes Costa
Editors
Historical Archaeology
and Environment
Editors
Marcos André Torres de Souza Diogo Menezes Costa
Department of Anthropology, Graduate Program in Anthropology
Museu Nacional Federal University of Pará
Federal University of Rio de Janeiro Belém, Pará, Brazil
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
ISBN 978-3-319-90856-4 ISBN 978-3-319-90857-1 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-90857-1
Library of Congress Control Number: 2018947433
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Preface
In the beginning of 2015 the germ of this book was born when the authors discussed
the possibility of a work that converged the actual debates about new materiality
interpretations in the historical archaeology field and the contemporaneous environ-
mental impacts caused by human actions on the future of the world. Following this,
the authors proposed a symposium to be held at the Congress of the Society of
Brazilian Archaeology (SAB) in that same year to commemorate the 35 years of
social development in the city of Goiânia. The symposium, entitled “Historical
Archaeology and the Environment,” congregated seven presentations distributed
along three axes of discussion focused mainly on the South American perspective.
We were fortunate and honored to have had as a debater Alfredo González-Ruibal,
one of the speakers invited to the event. The good acceptance of the debate by the
public and the great synergy among the speakers convinced us that this was indeed
a hot topic of discussion and that more work needed to be done on it.
The second stage was the book organization itself, which incorporated the papers
already presented during the symposium as a base, with the inclusion of works by
new invited authors. At this time, the book’s scope and coverage were regional, but
changes happened and the project reached an international level. As the major pub-
lications in the area of environmental archaeology were about pre-history, the “tim-
ing was right” and the diverse contributions received in this edited volume were the
proof that the idea of Ecoarchaeology works.
We would like to thank you our colleagues Matt Edgeworth (University of
Leicester), Stephen Mrozowski (University of Massachusetts Boston), Patricia
Fournier Garcia (ENAH)), Tim Murray (La Trobe University), Rafael de Abreu e
Souza (Unicamp), Julio César Rubin de Rubin (PUCGO), Marcos Leitão de
Almeida (Northwestern University), Alicia Caporaso (Bureau of Ocean Energy
Management, BOEM), Daniel Warren (Oceaneering Survey Services), Stephen
R. Gittings (NOAA Office of National Marine Sanctuaries), Susan Lawrence
v
vi Preface
(La Trobe University), Peter Davies (La Trobe University), Andrés Zarankin
(UFMG), Melissa Salerno (CONICET) and others colleagues that for unforeseen
reasons did not participate in this volume but helped it to happen on many levels.
Belém, Pará, Brazil Diogo Menezes Costa
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil Marcos André Torres de Souza
Contents
1 Introduction: Historical Archaeology and Environment . . . . . . . . . . 1
Marcos André Torres de Souza and Diogo Menezes Costa
Part I Conceptual Frameworks
2 More than Just a Record: Active Ecological Effects
of Archaeological Strata . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
Matt Edgeworth
3 The Archaeology of Climate Change:
Is Unbridled Commodity Production Sustainable? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
Stephen A. Mrozowski
Part II Studies on Environmental Historical Archaeology
4 Eco-historical Archaeology in the Brazilian Amazon:
Material, Natural and Cultural Western Transformations . . . . . . . . . 65
Diogo M. Costa
5 Indigenous Charcoal Production and Spanish Metal
Mining Enterprises: Historical Archaeology of Extractive
Activities and Ecological Degradation in Central
and Northern Mexico . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87
Patricia Fournier Garcia
6 Towards an Archaeology of Extensive Pastoralism
in the Great Artesian Basin in Australia . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 109
Tim Murray
7 The Fishermen’s Disappearance: An Archaeology
of Cruel Modernity in São Paulo City . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129
Rafael de Abreu e Souza
vii
viii Contents
8 Entangled Relations: The Expansion of a Colonial Frontier
in Central Brazil During the Eighteenth Century . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 155
Marcos André Torres de Souza and Julio Cezar Rubin de Rubin
9 The Deep History of the Ficus thonningii Bl. in Central Africa:
Ontology, Settlement, and Environment among Lower
Congo Peoples (Early Times to ca. 500 B.C.E.) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 181
Marcos Leitão de Almeida
10 The Evolution of Recent Multidisciplinary Deep-Water
Archaeological and Biological Research on the Gulf
of Mexico Outer Continental Shelf . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 207
Alicia Caporaso, Daniel J. Warren, and Stephen R. Gittings
Part III Historical Archaeology and the Anthropocene
11 Archaeology and the Anthropocene in the Study
of Settler Australia . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 229
Susan Lawrence and Peter Davies
12 The Anthropocene in Antarctica: Considering “Fixed”
and “More Fluid” Perspectives of Analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 253
Andrés Zarankin and Melisa A. Salerno
Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 267
Chapter 1
Introduction: Historical Archaeology
and Environment
Marcos André Torres de Souza and Diogo Menezes Costa
Abstract The creation of this volume was motivated, on the one hand, by the lack
of available studies involving the environment in historical archaeology and, on the
other, by the dramatic climate changes that are occurring across the planet and the
global efforts to face them. With this in mind, our intent was to offer new thoughts
on the subject and, by doing so, contribute to the development of new approaches,
debates and bodies of knowledge that involve historical archaeology and
environment.
In this introduction, we also hope to update the discussions and approaches that
may be helpful to those debating this topic. As we understand it, an array of new
forms of knowledge is emerging in the discipline that might be potentially relevant
to our interests. Following an historical archaeological approach to environmental
changes, all the chapters deal with the main issues relevant to this discussion,
including (1) theoretical and methodological approaches to the environment in his-
torical archaeology, which intend to offer innovative and substantial analytical ven-
ues for the study of the environment through the lens of historical archaeology; (2)
studies on environmental historical archaeology, which include a range of case stud-
ies that demonstrate how the human–nature relationship has evolved historically
and globally; and (3) historical archaeology and the Anthropocene, where we found
studies of environmental changes and the impact of human activity on the environ-
ment that affect us today and will continue to so in the future.
The creation of this volume was motivated, on the one hand, by the lack of available
studies involving the environment in historical archaeology and, on the other, by the
dramatic climate changes that are occurring across the planet and the global efforts
M. A. T. de Souza (*)
Department of Anthropology, Museu Nacional, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro,
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
D. M. Costa
Graduate Program in Anthropology, Federal University of Pará, Belém, Pará, Brazil
e-mail: [email protected]
© Springer International Publishing AG, part of Springer Nature 2018 1
M. A. T. de Souza, D. M. Costa (eds.), Historical Archaeology and Environment,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-90857-1_1
2 M. A. T. de Souza and D. M. Costa
to face them. With this in mind, our intent was to offer new thoughts on the subject
and, by doing so, contribute to the development of new approaches, debates and
bodies of knowledge that involve historical archaeology and environment.
In this introduction, we also hope to update the discussions and approaches that
may be helpful to those debating this topic. As we understand it, an array of new
forms of knowledge is emerging in the discipline that might be potentially relevant
to our interests. Following an historical archaeological approach to environmental
changes, all the chapters deal with the main issues relevant to this discussion,
including (1) theoretical and methodological approaches to the environment in his-
torical archaeology, which intend to offer innovative and substantial analytical ven-
ues for the study of the environment through the lens of historical archaeology; (2)
studies on environmental historical archaeology, which include a range of case stud-
ies that demonstrate how the human–nature relationship has evolved historically
and globally; and (3) historical archaeology and the Anthropocene, where we found
studies of environmental changes and the impact of human activity on the environ-
ment that affect us today and will continue to so in the future.
1.1 Transposing Frontiers in Historical Archaeology
The development of debates involving the environment has been connected to a
variety of epistemic and ontological issues. As has long been noted (Deagan 2008
[1996], p. 24; Hardesty 1999, pp. 51–52; Mrozowski 2006, p. 24), the lack of inter-
est in the environment in historical archaeology has been related to the understand-
ing that the modern world has increasingly distanced human beings from the natural
environment, mainly because of a greater dependence on modern technology and
market economies. In his influential work In Small Things Forgotten, James Deetz
(1977) presented arguments that have become emblematic of this line of
reasoning:
This lessened dependence on the natural sciences is but a reflection of the role played by the
natural world in the history of human development. The earlier in time one goes, the more
directly and intimately tied to the environment, so that such disciplines as paleontology and
geology are essential to the proper understanding of life in the distant past. As culture
became more complex, we were further removed from the natural world. Since Historical
Archeology deals only the past few hundred years of our multimillion-year history, it fol-
lows that this last, brief time would find us at our greatest remove. (Deetz 1977, p. 22)
In historical archaeology, this kind of perception articulates itself with different
interconnected dualities. At a more fundamental level it is related to the view of the
historical period as a compartment distinct from prehistory. In the construction of
the concept of prehistory the native and “wild” were placed into a distinct discursive
field. Thus, they became a legitimate other, linked to a diverse temporality and asso-
ciated with primitive and natural modes of existence (Kehoe 2013; Lane 2013;
Lucas 2005, pp. 121–126, Matthews 2007; Mitchell and Scheiber 2010). When his-
torical archaeology was established as a field of study in various parts of the