Why do people have so much stuff? The role of human material engagement in long term social change.

Conference: Materiality and Agency: anthropological, archaeological, and philosophical perspectives

Dates: 1-5 December 2020

Abstract:

While humans are far from the only species that engages with material culture, our emotional and social engagement with objects is a key defining characteristic of our species. Here I argue that human material engagement is a key element in the long-term evolution of human social systems from the very earliest tool behaviours of our ancestors, right the way through to the adoption of settled village lifeways: one of the most significant transformations in human prehistory and foundational to the complex urban societies of today. Multiple interlinked processes occurred in SW Asia between 20,000-6,000BCE, including not only the domestication of certain plant and animal species and the adoption of agriculture, but also the adoption of sedentism, and demographic, social and material culture changes. The continued existence of small-scale and mobile societies dependent on domesticates, and of complex forager societies, suggest the social and material factors may be more than simply side-effects of an increasing reliance on domesticates, but significant factors in the development of complex society in their own right. In this talk I will discuss the the long-term implications of human material engagement and the nature and implications of the social and material changes occurring at this critical juncture in human history.

Source: Manual