Journal ArticleDOI
Technological Organization and Hunter-Gather Land Use: a California Example
TLDR
In this article, a case study focused on mobility patterns in one area of coastal California to exemplify one approach to dealing with it is presented, emphasizing the importance of considering the ways in which local conditions mediate the effects of global aspects of human adaptations and, second, the interactions between multiple causal factors as conditioners of technology.Abstract:
Recent research has identified a number of general factors with important effects on flaked-stone technology but has been less effective in solving the problem of examining these factors in specific archaeological contexts. This paper discusses this issue and presents a case study focused on mobility patterns in one area of coastal California to exemplify one approach to dealing with it. This study emphasizes the importance of considering, first, the ways in which local conditions mediate the effects of global aspects of human adaptations and, second, the interactions between multiple causal factors as conditioners of technology. This example highlights the role played by multiple, distinct technological strategies within a single pattern of activity as well as the potential ambiguity of the relations between these strategies and global mobility patterns.read more
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Raw-Material Availability and the Organization of Technology
TL;DR: Andrefsky, Jr., William. as mentioned in this paper, et al. 1994 Raw Material Availability and the Organization of Technology. American Antiquity 59:21-35.1].
Journal ArticleDOI
A Formal Approach to the Design and Assembly of Mobile Toolkits
TL;DR: This study approaches the problem analytically, making a few simple assumptions about artifact geometry and the relations between utility and artifact size, and finds situations in which artifact functionality is more closely constrained by overall size or mass.
Book
The Lifeways of Hunter-Gatherers: The Foraging Spectrum
TL;DR: Kelly as mentioned in this paper reviewed the anthropological literature for variation among living foragers in terms of diet, mobility, sharing, land tenure, technology, exchange, male-female relations, division of labor, marriage, descent and political organization, and argued for an approach to prehistory that uses archaeological data to test theory rather than one that uses ethnographic analogy to reconstruct the past.
Journal ArticleDOI
The Analysis of Stone Tool Procurement, Production, and Maintenance
TL;DR: A review of the recent literature on stone tool production with an emphasis on raw material procurement, manufacturing techniques, and tool maintenance processes as they relate to adaptive strategies of toolmakers and users can be found in this article.
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Practical and prestige technologies: The evolution of material systems
TL;DR: The aggrandizer model of prestige technology as discussed by the authors is a useful means for analyzing both practical and prestige technologies, although the goals and constraints of each are very different, and prestige items emerged only under conditions of sustainable food surplus and included the most important innovations of the last 30,000 years.
References
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Journal ArticleDOI
Ambiguous Use Traces and Blind Test Results: New Data
TL;DR: A blind test of high-magnification microwear analysis indicates that it is indeed possible to derive accurate interpretations of stone tool uses from use-wear traces, but that this is possible only when such traces are interpreted cautiously.
Journal ArticleDOI
The Past, Present, and Future of Flintknapping: An Anthropological Perspective
TL;DR: The physical evolution of hominids and the cultural evolution of flintknapping most certainly occurred simultaneously, but the arguments concerning which evolved first have frequently been debated in the anthropological literature as discussed by the authors.