Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Delaware, 2006. / Principal faculty advisor: Susan Goodman & Carl Dawson, Dept. of English. Includes bibliographical references.

abstract: This dissertation uses a comparative approach to investigate long-term human- environment interrelationships in times of climate change. It uses Geographical Information Systems and ecological models to reconstruct the Magdalenian (~20,000- 14,000 calibrated years ago) environments of the coastal mountainous zone of Cantabria (Northwest Spain) and the interior valleys of the Dordogne (Southwest France) to contextualize the social networks that could have formed during a time of high climate and resource variability. It simulates the formation of such networks in an agent-based model, which documents the processes underlying the formation of archaeological assemblages, and evaluates the potential impacts of climate-topography interactions on cultural transmission. This research then reconstructs the Magdalenian social networks visible through a multivariate statistical analysis of stylistic similarities among portable art objects. As these networks cannot be analyzed directly to infer social behavior, their characteristics are compared to the results of the agent-based model, which provide characteristics estimates of the Magdalenian latent social networks that most likely produced the empirical archaeological assemblage studied. This research contributes several new results, most of which point to the advantages of using an inter-disciplinary approach to the study of the archaeological record. It demonstrates the benefits of using an agent-based model to parse social data from long- term palimpsests. It shows that geographical and environmental contexts affect the structure of social networks, which in turn affects the transmission of ideas and goods that flow through it. This shows the presence of human-environment interactions that not only affected our ancestors’ reaction to resource insecurities, but also led them to innovate and improve the productivity of their own environment. However, it also suggests that such alterations may have reduced the populations’ resilience to strong climatic changes, and that the region with diverse resources provided a more stable and resilient environment than the region transformed to satisfy the immediate needs of its population. / Dissertation/Thesis / Appendix_D_Sites_Dates / Appendix_E_Flowchart_Biome_Reconstruction / Appendix_H_Flowchart_ABM / Appendix_I_Flowchart_Social_Network / Appendix_J_Portable_Art_Objects / Appendix_J_Art_Characteristics / Appendix_L_Poster_Summary / Appendix_A_Prehistoric_Fauna / Appendix_B_Modern_PFT_Distribution / Appendix_C_Prehistoric_PFT_Distribution / Doctoral Dissertation Anthropology 2017

Fysiklärare möter ofta den svåra uppgiften att representera abstrakta, väldefinierade egenskaper hos den fysiska världen (så som krafter eller energier) för studenter som går bortom ekvationer, grafer eller diagram. I denna studie tittar jag två fall av universitetsstudenter som löser en fysikalisk uppgift, användandes det digitala programmet Algodoo på en stor pekskärm för att undersöka hur studenter naturligt använder sig av sådan teknologi för att återskapa dessa representationer själva. Jag finner att när studenter skapar scener i Algodoo prioriterar de att behålla en viss mått av likhet från den fysiska världen, vilket går bortom den formella behandlingen av uppgifter som studenter kan ha fått lära sig i fysikundervisningen. Vidare, när studenterna använder sig av fysikaliska ekvationer vid lösandet av problemet, verkar de använda Algodoo som ett facit för att se huruvida deras numeriska lösning, uträknad på en klassisk whiteboard, stämmer. På detta sätt - vilket har föreslagits i tidigare forskning - ser jag hur Algodoo, och liknande digitala lärmiljöer, fungerar som en bro mellan studenternas konceptuella förståelse av den fysiska världen, och den mer formella, matematikbaserade beskrivningen vilket används inomfysiken. / Physics teachers are often faced with the difficult task of representing abstract, formally-defined properties of the physical world (such as forces or energy) for students in a way which goes beyond equations, graphs, and diagrams. In this study, I investigate two cases of university students solving a physics problem while using the digital software, Algodoo, on a large touch screen to examine how students might naturally leverage such technology to create such representations of their own. I find that as student draw scenes in Algodoo, they tend to prioritze a degree of resemblance to the physical world which goes beyond the formal treatment of problems they might have been taught in physics classes. Additionally, as the students recruit physics equation into their solution of the problem, they appear to use Algodoo as a conceptual check for the numerical answer they calculate on the normal whiteboard. In this way - and as has been hypothesized in previous research - I see the potential for Algodoo and similar digital learning environments to act as a bridge between students’ conceptual intuitions of the physical world and the more formal, mathematically-based descriptions used in physics.

We present newly-registered Paiján sites in the interior and upper parts of the Chicama, Moche and Virú valleys, with strong tiesto the highland region. The research indicates that Paiján hunter-gatherers were not only a coastal group whose subsistence was basedon marine resources. They also occupied diverse ecological environments preferring springs with high mobility across the Andes and exploiting diverse resources, such as white-tail deer (Odocoileus virginianus) and raw materials for producing lithic tools. / En este artículo se presenta el registro de nuevos sitios paijanenses al interior y parte alta de los valles de Chicama, Moche y Virú, más vinculados con la región de la sierra, lo que evidencia, de manera consistente, que estos grupos de cazadores-recolectores no se establecieron solo en la costa y basaron su subsistencia en los recursos marinos, sino que ocuparon diversos ambientes ecológicos siempre relacionados con fuentes de agua y tuvieron un amplio grado de movilidad de manera longitudinal y transversal a lo largo de los cursos de ríos y quebradas, con lo que pudieron aprovechar una mayor diversidad de recursos, entre ellos el venado gris de cola blanca (Odocoileus virginianus) y materias primas para la elaboración de herramientas líticas.

O presente trabalho aborda uma região bem delimitada, circunscrita aos afloramentos calcários do alto curso do rio São Francisco no estado de Minas Gerais (1500km²). Depois de um período inicial exploratório com levantamentos de superfície intensivos, resultando na descoberta de 120 sítios, duas cavernas, a Loca do Suim e a Gruta do Marinheiro, foram escolhidas para receberem escavações. O objetivo foi comprovar a existência de uma ocupação caçadora-coletora arcaica na região estudada, utilizando como principal elemento descritivo a indústria lítica produzida por esses grupos, envolvendo aspectos como tipologia, tecnologia e cronologia do material. Buscou-se assim colocar em evidência algumas particularidades da região estudada, assim como apontar para eventuais semelhanças com as grandes tradições arqueológicas do período arcaico conhecidas no centro e sul do Brasil. / This project is located in the carstic region (1500km²) of the upper São Francisco river valley, in the southeastern portion of the Brazilian highlands, 250km to the southwest of the well known Lagoa Santa region, State of Minas Gerais. After a period (5 years) of intensive search for sites, discovering more than 120 of them, two caves (Loca do Suim and Gruta do Marinheiro) where excavated. The objective was to prove the existence, also in this area, of archaeological material related to arcaic hunter-gatherers. For being abundant, the lithic industry produced by these pre-historic groups was chosen as main descriptive element. The analysis, based on typological, technological and chronological characteristics of the sample, points out the similarities and differences that exist between this industry and the main lithic archaeological traditions of central and southern Brazil during the arcaic period.

Pesquisas recentes apontam para o fenômeno construtivo de sambaquis fluviais na região do médio Vale do Ribeira de Iguape, São Paulo, mais precisamente em três regiões, Itaoca, bacia do rio Jacupiranguinha e bacia do Juquiá, durante, pelo menos, o período de 9000 anos. O presente trabalho tem por objetivo definir o perfil de um sambaqui fluvial, sítio Moraes (6000-4000 anos a.P.), no município de Miracatu, SP, com a finalidade de criar a compreensão intra-sítio dos processos formativos envolvidos para a elevação desta estrutura monticular, através de diferentes abordagens: distribuição espacial intra-sítio, tecnologia, subsistência, isótopos estáveis, estudo sedimentológico e análise de proporção componencial volumétrico. Os resultados destas análises associados aos dados advindos de outras pesquisas nos permitiram ampliar a discussão sobre o processo formativo do sítio Moraes e abordar a questão sobre as relações genética e cultural entre sambaquieiros fluviais e os demais grupos vizinhos. / Previous research at the Ribeira de Iguape valley, at the southern part of the State of São Paulo, Brasil, has revealed a long cultural sequence (ca. 11 to 1,2 kyBP) characterized by small shellmound sites generally designated as riverine, or fluvial, sambaquis. Besides the conspicuous presence of a terrestrial gastropod (Megalobulimus sp.) shells, these little mounds also share relevant amounts of human burials and similar technological patterns as regards lithic and bone industries, among other compositional elements. The principal aim of this thesis is to describe one of these mounds, Moraes, investigating the cultural and post-depositional formation processes implied on the long duration (6 to 4 kyBP) construction phase of such mound structure and after its abandonment, by means of zooarchaeological, technological, geochemical and isotopic analysis of its various deposits and cultural components therein, as well as their spatial distribution and articulation. This thesis also discusses the cultural and historical relationships of this fluvial shellmound culture with other cultural patterns and populations found at the same and nearby areas.

abstract: For most of human history hunting has been the primary economic activity of men. Hunted animals are valued for their food energy and nutrients, however, hunting is associated with a high risk of failure. Additionally, large animals cannot be consumed entirely by the nuclear family, so much of the harvest may be shared to others. This has led some researchers to ask why men hunt large and difficult game. The “costly signaling” and “show-off” hypotheses propose that large prey are hunted because the difficulty of finding and killing them is a reliable costly signal of the phenotypic quality of the hunter. These hypotheses were tested using original interview data from Aché (hunter gatherer; n=52, age range 50-76, 46% female) and Tsimané (horticulturalist; n=40, age range 15-77, 45% female) informants. Ranking tasks and paired comparison tasks were used to determine the association between the costs of killing an animal and its value as a signal of hunter phenotypic quality for attracting mates and allies. Additional tasks compared individual large animals to groups of smaller animals to determine whether assessments of hunters’ phenotypes and preferred status were more impacted by the signal value of the species or by the weight and number of animals killed. Aché informants perceived hunters who killed larger or harder to kill animals as having greater provisioning ability, strength, fighting ability, and disease susceptibility, and preferred them as mates and allies. Tsimané informants held a similar preference for hunters who killed large game, but not for hunters targeting hard to kill species. When total biomass harvested was controlled, both populations considered harvesting more animals in a given time period to be a better signal of preferred phenotypes than killing a single large and impressive species. Male and female informants both preferred hunters who consistently brought back small game over hunters who sometimes killed large animals and sometimes killed nothing. No evidence was found that hunters should forgo overall food return rates in order to signal phenotypic qualities by specializing on large game. Nutrient provisioning rather than costly phenotypic signaling was the strategy preferred by potential mates and allies. / Dissertation/Thesis / Doctoral Dissertation Anthropology 2019

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Den här studien analyserar den moderna paleodieten genom en postmodernistisk teori och observerar om de aktörer som förespråkar den moderna paleodieten har ett nyanserat och problematiserande förhållningsätt till paleodieten. Studien baseras på fyra källor skrivna av tre aktörer, två böcker av arkeologen Göran Burenhult. Ytterligare en källa är The Paleo Solutionav Robb Wolf, den fjärde källan som förespråkar paleodieten är Swedish Paleo, ett företag som marknadsför paleodieten samt AIP-dieten online. Marlene Zuk är i sin bok Paleofantasymotståndare till paleodieten och hennes argument står i kontrast till de andra källorna. Honräknas dock inte som en huvudaktör och granskas inte av studien. Istället används hon endast för att analysera det positiva metanarrativet kring paleodieten. Studien kommer fram till att förespråkare för den moderna paleodieten ofta exkluderar information som motsäger den bildav dieten som de vill presentera. / This study analyses the modern paleodiet through a postmodernist lens and tries to find out if the proponents of the diet have a honest approach to archeological science. The study is based on four sources written by three individuals, two books by the archeologist Göran Burenhult, another source is The Paleo Solution by Robb Wolf. The fourth positive source to the paleodiet is Swedish Paleo, a company which markets the paleodiet and AIP-diet online. Marlene Zuk in her book Paleofantasy is an opponent to the paleodiet and her arguments are in opposition to the other sources. She is not however considered to be a main actor to be analyzed in this study, instead her arguments are only meant to analyze the positive metanarrative which proponents of the paleodiet advocates. The result of the study is that the modern paleodiet often excludesinformation which contradicts the image of the paleodiet the proponents of the diet wants to present.

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