Pub Date : 2018-06-21DOI: 10.1093/actrade/9780198803515.003.0001
C. Gosden
A profound consideration is underway of the nature of long-term human history. The major turning points identified—the invention of farming, growth of cities, and technological change—were not events, but long-term processes, with unpredictable effects. ‘Rethinking prehistory’ explains that a progressive prehistory is increasingly at odds with the empirical evidence of the past as we understand it. The older model emphasized increasing human control, but this is not a feature of human history. All periods and places exhibit dynamic prehistories and histories. Our task is to appreciate, compare, and contrast those dynamisms and to debate across cultural differences what the past means to each of us in the present.
{"title":"1. Rethinking prehistory","authors":"C. Gosden","doi":"10.1093/actrade/9780198803515.003.0001","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/actrade/9780198803515.003.0001","url":null,"abstract":"A profound consideration is underway of the nature of long-term human history. The major turning points identified—the invention of farming, growth of cities, and technological change—were not events, but long-term processes, with unpredictable effects. ‘Rethinking prehistory’ explains that a progressive prehistory is increasingly at odds with the empirical evidence of the past as we understand it. The older model emphasized increasing human control, but this is not a feature of human history. All periods and places exhibit dynamic prehistories and histories. Our task is to appreciate, compare, and contrast those dynamisms and to debate across cultural differences what the past means to each of us in the present.","PeriodicalId":225863,"journal":{"name":"Prehistory: A Very Short Introduction","volume":"4 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-06-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"121225781","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2018-06-21DOI: 10.1093/ACTRADE/9780198803515.003.0003
C. Gosden
‘In the beginning—African origins and global movements’ outlines the history of human ancestors, who split off from the other great apes in the late Miocene (c.7 mya (million years ago)). The most accepted direct ancestors to modern humans are the Australopethicines, appearing c.4 mya. From c.2.4 mya, the first members of the early Homo genus appear in east Africa. The first hominin to leave Africa was probably Homo erectus c.1.8 mya. It is thought today’s world population descends from a common ancestral group in Africa, spreading just under 100,000 years ago into the Middle East and then Europe, Asia, and beyond. Tool and fire use is also discussed.
{"title":"3. In the beginning—African origins and global movements","authors":"C. Gosden","doi":"10.1093/ACTRADE/9780198803515.003.0003","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/ACTRADE/9780198803515.003.0003","url":null,"abstract":"‘In the beginning—African origins and global movements’ outlines the history of human ancestors, who split off from the other great apes in the late Miocene (c.7 mya (million years ago)). The most accepted direct ancestors to modern humans are the Australopethicines, appearing c.4 mya. From c.2.4 mya, the first members of the early Homo genus appear in east Africa. The first hominin to leave Africa was probably Homo erectus c.1.8 mya. It is thought today’s world population descends from a common ancestral group in Africa, spreading just under 100,000 years ago into the Middle East and then Europe, Asia, and beyond. Tool and fire use is also discussed.","PeriodicalId":225863,"journal":{"name":"Prehistory: A Very Short Introduction","volume":"58-60 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-06-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"116259408","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2018-06-21DOI: 10.1093/ACTRADE/9780198803515.003.0004
C. Gosden
‘The long-term history of Europe and Asia’ explains how the fluctuating climatic systems between cold and warm periods provided the context in which the global expansion of our ancestors occurred. It discusses the mammoth steppe ecosystem, the relationships between plants and animals, and the introduction of tool use, language, and farming systems across Europe and east Asia. The last great global warming—shifting vegetation zones, the territories of animals, and sea levels—was one of the most challenging periods in planetary history since the evolution of Homo sapiens. Yet from this period came a mass of novel technologies, skills, and relationships that provided the basis for life.
{"title":"4. The long-term history of Europe and Asia","authors":"C. Gosden","doi":"10.1093/ACTRADE/9780198803515.003.0004","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/ACTRADE/9780198803515.003.0004","url":null,"abstract":"‘The long-term history of Europe and Asia’ explains how the fluctuating climatic systems between cold and warm periods provided the context in which the global expansion of our ancestors occurred. It discusses the mammoth steppe ecosystem, the relationships between plants and animals, and the introduction of tool use, language, and farming systems across Europe and east Asia. The last great global warming—shifting vegetation zones, the territories of animals, and sea levels—was one of the most challenging periods in planetary history since the evolution of Homo sapiens. Yet from this period came a mass of novel technologies, skills, and relationships that provided the basis for life.","PeriodicalId":225863,"journal":{"name":"Prehistory: A Very Short Introduction","volume":"2 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-06-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"123277542","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2018-06-21DOI: 10.1093/ACTRADE/9780198803515.003.0007
C. Gosden
Rethinking our deep past is underway. An older scheme emphasizing progress has been challenged by both empirical evidence and new thoughts on what it means to be human. Prehistory as progress saw humans as attempting to exert control over the world and increasing their ability to do so. ‘Final thoughts’ suggests many now reject the notion of progress and the assumption behind it of increasing rational human control. Rather, people are seen as part of the world, enmeshed in a great network of relations needed to sustain life, which unfolds through working as much with other entities as against them. Areas for new research and thought are identified and discussed.
{"title":"7. Final thoughts","authors":"C. Gosden","doi":"10.1093/ACTRADE/9780198803515.003.0007","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/ACTRADE/9780198803515.003.0007","url":null,"abstract":"Rethinking our deep past is underway. An older scheme emphasizing progress has been challenged by both empirical evidence and new thoughts on what it means to be human. Prehistory as progress saw humans as attempting to exert control over the world and increasing their ability to do so. ‘Final thoughts’ suggests many now reject the notion of progress and the assumption behind it of increasing rational human control. Rather, people are seen as part of the world, enmeshed in a great network of relations needed to sustain life, which unfolds through working as much with other entities as against them. Areas for new research and thought are identified and discussed.","PeriodicalId":225863,"journal":{"name":"Prehistory: A Very Short Introduction","volume":"1 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-06-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"131046044","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2018-06-21DOI: 10.1093/actrade/9780198803515.003.0006
C. Gosden
Much of life globally was organized around understanding and living with the spirits of the earth and heavens. ‘New worlds—the Americas, Australia, and the Pacific’ explains that cosmological relations form the thread linking the complex forms of evidence from these continents which cover a large part of the earth’s surface and of global prehistory. Settlement was never a passive process of accepting what was found in a place, but of active engagement with new possibilities and constraints. Debate and inventiveness, including a great range of symbiotic relationships, are central to human success in both moving and creating sustainable lifestyles in novel places: some continental landmasses, others tiny islands.
{"title":"6. New worlds—the Americas, Australia, and the Pacific","authors":"C. Gosden","doi":"10.1093/actrade/9780198803515.003.0006","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/actrade/9780198803515.003.0006","url":null,"abstract":"Much of life globally was organized around understanding and living with the spirits of the earth and heavens. ‘New worlds—the Americas, Australia, and the Pacific’ explains that cosmological relations form the thread linking the complex forms of evidence from these continents which cover a large part of the earth’s surface and of global prehistory. Settlement was never a passive process of accepting what was found in a place, but of active engagement with new possibilities and constraints. Debate and inventiveness, including a great range of symbiotic relationships, are central to human success in both moving and creating sustainable lifestyles in novel places: some continental landmasses, others tiny islands.","PeriodicalId":225863,"journal":{"name":"Prehistory: A Very Short Introduction","volume":"2 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-06-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"129670116","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2018-06-21DOI: 10.1093/ACTRADE/9780198803515.003.0002
C. Gosden
‘The history of prehistory’ explains how the idea of prehistory arose gradually between the 16th and early 19th centuries in Europe and America, growing large and influential through debates about evolution in the mid-19th century. National and personal identities were problematical, but deeper issues of identity surfaced through 19th-century debates that have never gone away. At the beginning of the 20th century, an alternative set of views emphasized the local specificity and integrity of human cultures. Today, our questions have shifted away from why some people did not ascend to the top rung of the ladder of progress and towards how people created worlds for themselves that made internal sense.
{"title":"2. The history of prehistory","authors":"C. Gosden","doi":"10.1093/ACTRADE/9780198803515.003.0002","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/ACTRADE/9780198803515.003.0002","url":null,"abstract":"‘The history of prehistory’ explains how the idea of prehistory arose gradually between the 16th and early 19th centuries in Europe and America, growing large and influential through debates about evolution in the mid-19th century. National and personal identities were problematical, but deeper issues of identity surfaced through 19th-century debates that have never gone away. At the beginning of the 20th century, an alternative set of views emphasized the local specificity and integrity of human cultures. Today, our questions have shifted away from why some people did not ascend to the top rung of the ladder of progress and towards how people created worlds for themselves that made internal sense.","PeriodicalId":225863,"journal":{"name":"Prehistory: A Very Short Introduction","volume":"190 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-06-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"122101315","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2018-06-21DOI: 10.1093/ACTRADE/9780198803515.003.0005
C. Gosden
We think of globalization as a new process, but long-distance connections are basic to being human. ‘Continental fusion—connections across Europe, Asia, and Africa’ sketches regional histories, considering the Neolithic history of metallurgy, pottery, burial practices, the prehistory of languages, and art styles. It is now possible to see the depth and importance of connections across this huge region from the Neolithic onwards. Materials, such as bronze, and complex art styles linked to shared cosmologies and practices helped set up and maintain connections that all areas participated in and benefitted from. Connections did not produce similarities of culture, however, and regional differences increase from the Bronze Age onwards.
{"title":"5. Continental fusion—connections across Europe, Asia, and Africa","authors":"C. Gosden","doi":"10.1093/ACTRADE/9780198803515.003.0005","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1093/ACTRADE/9780198803515.003.0005","url":null,"abstract":"We think of globalization as a new process, but long-distance connections are basic to being human. ‘Continental fusion—connections across Europe, Asia, and Africa’ sketches regional histories, considering the Neolithic history of metallurgy, pottery, burial practices, the prehistory of languages, and art styles. It is now possible to see the depth and importance of connections across this huge region from the Neolithic onwards. Materials, such as bronze, and complex art styles linked to shared cosmologies and practices helped set up and maintain connections that all areas participated in and benefitted from. Connections did not produce similarities of culture, however, and regional differences increase from the Bronze Age onwards.","PeriodicalId":225863,"journal":{"name":"Prehistory: A Very Short Introduction","volume":"26 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-06-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"126612475","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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