Things and people, people and things: comparing, combining and juxtaposing early Neolithic networks of the Near East.

Conference: The Connected Past: Artefactual Intelligence

Dates: 29 September 2021-30 September 2029

Abstract:

The recognition that material culture is a key element of social interaction in human societies forms the basis for much archaeological network research, which typically uses material culture as the basis for reconstructing past social networks. However, while it is widely recognised by archaeologists and anthropologists that material culture is not simply a passive reflection of sociality, but a highly active agent in our social worlds, the implications of this for the use of material traces in network science remains under-theorised. This paper will compare multiple networks for the same period and geographical region – the Epipalaeolithic and early Neolithic of the Near East - reconstructed using different kinds of material culture, in order to investigate just how variable networks based on, for example, jewellery as opposed to art, as opposed to ground stone might be. Are simple networks based on single types of material culture sufficient to inform on meaningful patterns of interaction? Are multiplex networks combining different types of material culture required, or do they simply blur the picture by conflating different forms of materiality and relationship? Does material culture link sites, or do sites link material objects? And can archaeological network techniques be used not only to reconstruct social networks from material culture, but to better understand how those objects acquire agency and become integrated into our social worlds in the first place, and the implications of this process for human sociality?

Source: Manual