vocab arch

Sacred Place

A natural feature or human-made structure with a vital role in society.

Navel

The cosmological central place.

Psychopomp

Ancestors or specific gods acting as intermediaries between the living and the dead.

Shaman

Individuals with supernatural powers who belong to the healer class.

Ideology

Knowledge or beliefs developed by human societies as part of their cultural adaptation.

Ethnography

Analysis of living societies to aid in understanding and interpreting the archaeological record.

Ethnohistory

The study of history using oral and traditional sources.

Astroarchaeology

The study of ancient astronomical knowledge using archaeological methods.

Culture history

Description of human cultures derived from archaeological evidence.

Normative view of culture

The view that identifies abstract rules regulating a culture's concepts of normal behavior.

Components

Physically bounded portions of a site that contain a distinct assemblage.

Phases

Cultural units represented by similar components at different sites within a well-defined chronological span.

Regions

Defined by natural geographic boundaries displaying cultural homogeneity.

Culture Areas

Larger arbitrary geographic or research areas with general cultural homogeneity.

Horizons

Widely distributed sets of cultural traits and artifact assemblages indicating rapid spread.

Traditions

Persistent technological or cultural patterns identified by characteristic artifact forms.

Inevitable variation

Cumulative culture change due to minor differences in learned behavior over time.

Cultural selection

The process that leads to the acceptance of adaptive culture traits and innovations.

Ethnoarchaeology

The study of living societies to aid in the interpretation of ancient ones.

Experimental archaeology

Conducting controlled experiments with ancient technologies to interpret human behavior.

Inductive reasoning

Using specific observations to form general conclusions.

Deductive reasoning

Forming specific implications from a generalized hypothesis.

Processual Archaeology

The study of the processes by which human societies changed in the past.

General Systems Theory

The notion that organisms can be studied as systems broken down into interacting subsystems.

Feedback loop

When the outcome of one subsystem becomes input for the next subsystem.

Cultural Ecology

The study of how human societies adapt to and transform their environments.

Cognitive Archaeology

Using archaeological methods to study human motives and ideologies.

Cognitive-Processual Archaeology

An approach combining methods of processual and postprocessual researchers.

Stasis

The state of little or no change.

Primate

Mammals that live in trees with larger brains and complex vocalizations.

Pleistocene

The last geological era marked by periods of cooling and heating, known as the Ice Age.

Hominin

Primates of the family Hominidae, including modern humans and their ancestors.

Punctuated Equilibrium

A theory suggesting evolution includes long periods of stability followed by rapid change.

Adaptive radiation

A burst in evolution resulting in several new forms as a species fills ecological niches.

Monophyletic

Descended from a single ancestor.

Homo heidelbergensis

A species that lived 600,000 to 200,000 years ago known for being expert big game hunters.

Homo neanderthalensis

A species that lived 350,000 to 30,000 years ago, known for intelligence and larger brains.

Composite tools

Tools consisting of more than one component.

Diaspora

The movement of people from their homeland to create new communities and identities.

Upper Paleolithic

Late Ice Age period ranging from 50,000 to 15,000 years ago.

Sunda

The sunken continent consisting of parts of Southeast Asia.

Wallacea

Two large landmasses known as Sulawesi and Timor.

Sahul

Combination of New Guinea, Australia, and the adjacent shelf.

Threshold populations

The minimum individuals required to provide a good or service to an area.

Burin

A chisel-like tool used for grooving stone and making engravings.

Groove-and-splinter technique

Longitudinal grooving of antler and bone to create parallel-sided grooves.

Blade

Long, parallel-sided flakes produced from pre-shaped cores.

Venus figurines

Depictions of women with unspecified religious or symbolic meaning.

Microlith

Small stone artifacts used as barbs and points for spears and arrows.