Evolutionary Research in Archaeology seeks to provide a comprehensive overview of contemporary evolutionary research in archaeology.

The book will provide a single source for introduction and overview of basic and advanced evolutionary concepts and research programs in archaeology. Content will be organized around four areas of critical research including microevolutionary and macroevolutionary process, human ecology studies (evolutionary ecology, demography, and niche construction), and evolutionary cognitive archaeology.

Given a focus on theory and application the book does not seek comprehensive coverage of the full range of empirical work as measured temporally and geographically. Authors of individual chapters will address theoretical foundations, history of research, contemporary contributions and debates, and implications for the future for their respective topics. As appropriate and within space limits authors could present or discuss short empirical case studies to illustrate key arguments.

Autorentext

Dr. Anna Marie Prentiss is an archaeologist specializing in the prehistory of the Great Plains, Pacific Northwest, and Western Arctic regions of North America and Chilean Patagonia. She has a methodological specialty in lithic technology and theoretical interests in the archaeology of villages and towns, social inequality, hunter-gatherer mobility and technological organization, and the cultural evolutionary process. She is currently editor of the SAA Archaeological Record, the magazine of the Society for American Archaeology.

Inhalt

Microevolution.- Introduction to Cultural Microevolutionary Research in Anthropology and Archaeology.- Cultural Transmission and Innovation in Archaeology.- Natural Selection, Material Culture, and Archaeology.- Analyzing Cultural Frequency Data: Neutral Theory and Beyond.- Macroevolution.- Cultural Macroevolution.- Landscape Revolutions for Cultural Evolution?: Integrating Advanced Fitness Landscapes into the Study of Cultural Change.- The Uses of Cultural Phylogenetics in Archaeology.- Contributions of Bayesian Phylogenetics to Exploring Patterns of Macroevolution in Archaeological Data.- Cultural Macroevolution and Social Change.- Human Ecology.- Human Ecology.- Human Behavioral Ecology and Zooarchaeology.- Human Behavioral Ecology and Plant Resources in Archaeological Research.- Costly Signaling Theory in Archaeology.- Human Behavioral Ecology and Technological Decision-Making.- Demography, Environment, and Human Behavior.- Niche Construction Theory and Human Bio-Cultural Evolution.- Evolutionary Cognitive Archaeology.- A Brief Overview of Evolutionary Cognitive Archaeology.- Embodied Cognition and the Archaeology of the Mind: A Radical Reassessment.- Evolution and the Origins of Visual Art: An Archaeological Perspective.