TAG2024

Framing the session title in an interrogative way, at one level is a nod towards remembering Alfred Russell Wallace, who conceived the theory of evolution through natural selection independently of Charles Darwin, who lived in Bournemouth and was buried in Broadstone cemetery in 1913. At another level the theme prompts the question of whether evolutionary models are still relevant for understanding culture-change through archaeology. And at yet another level the theme raises the matter of changing archaeological practice and where current trends in fieldwork might be taking us: is archaeology as a discipline ‘evolving’?. But the theme should not be seen as a constraint on contributions; it is a starting point! Presentations on any aspect of theoretically grounded archaeology are welcome.



9:00am | Imperialism as Structural Totality: Determinism, Teleology and Normativity. | Sahal Abdi
9:15am | Reflection: mirrors in Roman and Han Empires.  | Goran Đurđević
9:30am | The role of the military in the evolution of technology through a case study of ceramic and glass production in Roman Britain. | Helena Fahy
9:45am | What Do We Do With The Commingled Sailors? Investigating Disarticulated and Commingled Skeletal Remains As An Under-Utilised Source of Information. | Xander King, Mélie Le Roy, Gabrielle Delbarre & Dr Martin Smith
10:00am | ‘Kinship work’ in pre-Nuragic Sardinia? Carving community through rock-cut tombs (domus de janas)  | Kirsty Lilley
10:15am | Archaeogenetics and modes of mobility in the ancient Mediterranean. | Hannah Moots
10:30am | Discussion |

In this session we aim to explore whether concepts of environmental legibility and landscape learning can be used effectively in: 1. interpreting the archaeological traces of prehistoric hunter-gatherer communities, and 2. predictive modelling. From the outset we acknowledge the partial nature of the archaeological record; that culture is not separate from nature; that humans are not separate from landscape and that archaeologists frequently deal with non-analogue landscapes (particularly when considering evolutionary timescales).

Environmental legibility and landscape learning are crucial in hunter-gatherer communities, influencing decision-making, resource use, and the embedding of ecological knowledge within social and spiritual contexts (as explored through multiple theoretical lenses e.g. Kelly 1995, Basso 1996, Ingold 2000). Simply put, environmental legibility refers to the ease with which people can read and navigate landscapes (Guiducci & Burke 2016; Schmuck et al 2022). The concept of landscape learning, arises from the idea that population movement into unfamiliar environments can have significant consequences (Rockman 2003, 2009, 2012).

Recent studies aligning with these themes suggest extended periods of human dependency during childhood allow time for complex skill development required for the hunting and gathering niche (Kaplan et al., 2000; Hewlett & Lamb, 2005). The transmission of social learning processes often involves play; and the cultural emphasis on individual autonomy and socio-political egalitarianism among hunter-gatherers, shapes knowledge transmission mechanisms (Boyette, 2018; Salali et al 2019). Thinking through these themes allows new perspectives of prehistoric peoples and landscapes (e.g. Hiscock 2014)

9:10am | Predicting and protecting lithic landscapes – understanding the distribution of lithics across Dartmoor, UK | Emma Stockley, Laura Basell, LS Bray, H. Chapman

9:35am | Exploring the interplay of environment and mobility in Pleistocene hunter-gatherers: a case-study from southern Ethiopia during MIS 3  | Valentina Decembrini & Enza E. Spinapolice 

10:00am | “I know where I’m going”: Finding the way in Stone Age Africa  | Laura Basell

Full paper abstracts available here:
https://tag2024.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/tag-2024-session-abstracts-1.pdf

The concept of cosiness has captured our modern attentions. We burrow into blankets and knitted jumpers, enjoy the gentle glow of a lit candle, or soothe ourselves with a warm brew. However, our perceptions of the past are rarely as comfortable or tender. Although there is often reason to paint the past as bleaker than our present, it biases our interpretations of how different peoples experienced these periods. The terminology is relatively new. The etymological roots of cosiness stem from the eighteenth century, and it has recently cemented itself in our current imaginations on a wave of hygge, but does this mean that people did not experience “cosiness” before this?

This session interrogates the easily-blurred lines between comfort and utility. For example, a hearth can serve very practical functions, but also provide comfort and more-than-tactile warmth. Furthermore, these spaces offer nexus points for the less tangible: shared stories, whispers, and laughter. When does a blanket become more than a means of negating the cold? How do the tools of our food production contribute beyond just sustenance? Is cosiness accessible to non-human persons?

We invite participants to explore the different ways we can investigate this complicated interplay in the archaeological record, ultimately broadening our appreciation of past experiences. How has our understanding of cosiness evolved? Does this notion transcend temporal boundaries? We welcome a variety of perspectives on this topic, from the usage of space, the affective properties of objects, and the presence of cosiness where we may not typically expect it (and many others). In doing so, this session will nuance our perceptions of the past—not by dismissing its dark spots, but welcoming its warm ones too.

9:20am | Homecooking? (re)creating homely foods in diaspora  | Ben Davenport

9:40am | Miniatures and Emotional Cuteness: An Approach to Comfort in Archaeological Contexts  | Tânia M. Casimiro & Ricardo C. Silva

10:00am | The Temporality of Cosiness  | Ben Jervis

10:20am | Cosy Life Discussion |

11:10am | Embracing the Afterlife: Exploring Cosiness in Burial Practices at Deh Dumen Cemetery   | Mahsa Najafi & Reza Naseri

11:30am | A Pillow for Your Head: “Comfortable” Deaths in Viking Age Denmark  | Emma Louise Thompson,

11:50am | Cosy Cremation  | Howard Williams

12:10pm | Cosiness in Death Discussion |

12:30pm | Common Cosy Discussion |

Full paper abstracts available here:
https://tag2024.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/tag-2024-session-abstracts-1.pdf

Archaeological inquiry has evolved to encompass a more holistic view of human societies, recognizing the intricate relationships between humans, animals, and their environments across time. This session seeks to explore our understanding of these relationships through a more-than-human approach, emphasizing the dynamic entanglements that have shaped both human cultures and animal ecologies.

Animals have been integral to human societies as sources of food, labour, materials for technology, and companionship. Beyond utilitarian roles, they have been subjects of symbolism, spiritual significance, and artistic expression, influencing cultural identities and belief systems worldwide. Such interactions are not one-sided but involve reciprocal influences where animals, as active agents, have impacted human behaviour and vice versa. This session invites contributions that explore how archaeological evidence illuminates these multifaceted relationships and focus on the complexities of human-animal entanglements across diverse cultural and environmental contexts.

9:00am | More-than-archaeologists: Studying rat-human interactions across disciplines  | Daan Jansen

9:20am | Anthropogenic Niche Construction and Multi-Species Entanglements: Insights from Pınarbaşı, Boncuklu Höyük, and Çatalhöyük, Anatolia   | Emma Jenkins, Michelle Feider, Paul Clarkson, Sabrina Renaud, Katerina Papayiannis, Greger Larson, Kristina Tabadda, Lisa Yeomans, Emilie A. Hardouin, Thomas Cucchi & Douglas Baird

9:40am | Evolution or revolution in the small animal world  | Paul Clarkson

10:00am | Reimagining Human-Animal Entanglements in Late Chalcolithic Mesopotamia (c. 4000-3100 BCE): Perspectives from Shakhi Kora, Kurdistan Region of Iraq.  | Synnøve Heimvik

10:20am | Multispecies interactions at an Eastern Jordanian wetland in the Late Pleistocene and Early Holocene  | Lisa Yeomans, Maria Codlin, Beatrice Demarchi & Camilla Mazzucato1 

11:00am | ZooMS and Isotopic analysis of El Hammar and El Hattab II caves  | S. Iken, A. Bouzouggar & A. Grandal-d’Anglade

11:20am | Changing the lens: human-animal entanglements in Portuguese Holocene Prehistory  | Nelson J. Almeida

11:40am | The Use of Animal Resources in the Economic Model of the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra  | Sergiy Taranenko, Mykhailo Kublii

12:00pm | Woolly thinking: St Kilda’s three ancient sheep races  | Andrew Fleming

12:20pm | Discussion |

Full paper abstracts available here:
https://tag2024.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/tag-2024-session-abstracts-1.pdf

The evolution of cognitive and behavioural complexity is a major focus of Palaeolithic research. Experimental archaeology – a hypothesis-driven, practical approach for testing theories about past production processes – has contributed to this field as a provider of a “maker’s knowledge” (Currie, 2022, 337). Interpretation of this knowledge can involve assessment of the relative behavioural complexity of a process. For lithic studies this can be the number of discrete production steps (Perreault et al., 2013, S398) or degree of “indirect thinking” (Köhler, 1925; Muller et al., 2017, 166).

To what degree do the results of experimental archaeology confirm or contradict prior assumptions about the evolutionary trajectory of behavioural complexity? How should we interpret expedient or ad hoc behaviour?

Experimental archaeology can also be used to test hypotheses about alternative methods of production. Should we expect different human populations or species to display the same evolutionary pathways for tool production?

This session invites contributions from authors who have used experimental archaeology to investigate cognitive or behavioural complexity, or to test new hypotheses about stone tools or other materials – whether for the Palaeolithic or more recent prehistory.

9:10am | A “leap” too far? Experimental archaeology and the nature of the Oldowan-Acheulean transition | James Clarke

9:30am | Cognitive extensions: Hand-tool interaction and visuospatial integration in human evolution | Annapaola Fedato

9:50am | Re-thinking about bipolar technique: New Approaches to the Bipolar Flaking Technique: Qualitative, Quantitative, and Kinematic Perspectives | Görkem Cenk Yeşilova, Adrián Arroyo, Andreu Ollé & Josep Maria Vergès

10:10am | Cognition and the origins of aceramic cooking: An experimental study of wet-cooking in organic vessels | Andy Needham

10:30am | Walking a mile in their shoes: An experimental approach to the question of Neanderthal footwear. | Phoebe Baker

11:10am | Bringing Neanderthals in from the cold: introducing an experimental methodology to test the hide cutting and piercing capacities of Mode 3 technology  | Helen Hampton & Andy Needham

11:30am | Many ways to get to the point: Experimental insights into the behavioural complexity involved in Middle Stone Age point-making | Antoine Muller

11:50am | The replication and hafting experiments of Balde and Flake Technology in Late Palaeolithic Settlement of Laranga, North Karanpura Valley, Jharkhand. | Pronil Das & Shubham Rajak

12:10pm | Different bronze alloying techniques, different possibilities: how experimentation shapes existent histories of technology | Julia Montes-Landa

12:30pm | Discussion |

12:30pm | Discussion |

Full paper abstracts available here:
https://tag2024.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/tag-2024-session-abstracts-1.pdf

S4 Abstract: Archaeology is often romanticized as a discipline for its discoveries and insights into past civilizations. However, the profession encompasses a variety of uncomfortable situations that practitioners encounter, ranging from fieldwork to academic settings. This session explores the multifaceted nature of discomfort experienced by archaeologists, digging into personal anecdotes, language barriers, systemic issues when trying to publish, feedback from reviewers, or the implications of past scholarly works, to mention a few.

In fieldwork, archaeologists often demonstrate remarkable resilience in the face of harassment and hostility, whether due to gender, ethnicity, or other personal attributes. Additionally, working within or alongside communities can present challenges when there is resistance to external researchers or when crossing complex socio-political landscapes. These encounters can strain professional and personal well-being, necessitating strategies for conflict resolution while fighting for safer working conditions.

Within academic institutions, students and professionals alike confront uncomfortable realities. Experiences of overt and subtle discrimination can hinder academic progress and personal growth. Moreover, the academic journey often includes engagement with historical and contemporary scholarship that perpetuates racism, misogyny, and other forms of subalternisation. These moments of discomfort are critical for promoting a reflective practice that questions and challenges the ethical dimensions of our work.

This session aims to encourage archaeologists to share their experiences, promoting an open dialogue about the uncomfortable aspects of our profession. By addressing these issues head-on, we aim to inspire a more inclusive and ethical field of archaeology. The discussion will highlight the potential for creating supportive networks, implementing institutional changes, and promoting a critical examination of the discipline’s foundations and methodologies.

S18 Abstract: Last year we ran a TAG session that looked at interrogating and disrupting the ways language operates in theory, archaeology, academia and life on a whole. We identified different experiences, limitations and methodologies that addressed the challenges of English being the lingua franca in academia, culminating in an upcoming publication on the topic. But this conversation is not confined to a 10-page special issue nor needs to stay within the four walls of the lecture theatre at UEA. This year we will continue facilitating a conversation around how and what language is doing to our research and communities.

The theme of TAG 45 touches on this topic in an interesting way. Evolution is based on the concept of progress, which is generally perceived as positive. However, this does not align with the message we wish to convey. We instead acknowledge that communication is a never-ending changing and evolving activity. By choosing one language and/or dialect and expecting its full proficiency would mean interrupting this change which would then be perceived as a barrier that all individuals are expected to overcome. Therefore, this session explores: How can we create an evolving academic environment where all voices are heard without imposing one language over another? How can we address a multilingual academia and what might this look like in the classroom? Specifically, how can we decolonize archaeology as a discipline?

We invite all to join us in a workshopping session where we will discuss, disrupt and try to build a praxis on how we can foster more inclusive and accessible language diversity in our daily practices.

9:20am | Discomfort is the key to everlasting comfort: a personal account in field archaeology   | Susana Henriques

9:35am | I am an outsider, and I don’t know how to deal with it: Reflections on Archaeological Practice, Empathy, and Discomfort.  | João Sequeira  

9:40am | Voices of Discomfort - Silenced Emotions in the Archaeology of Asylums  | Elias Michaut & Joel Santos

10:05am | Challenging Discomfort: The psychological side of learning theory   | Joel Santos & Tânia Manuel Casimiro

10:20am | Discussion |

11:00am | Margins: Journey of A Gay Chinese Archaeology Student in China and the UK   | Guo Peng Chen 陈国鹏

11:15am | The “2000 Words” theatre/archaeology performance in Koutroulou Magoula, Greece: an experiential approach to decolonizing archaeology through language | Jason Goodman  & Efthimis Theou

11:30am | The intricacies of multilingualism in archaeology: Sa Limba Sarda as a decolonial path from publication to outreach   | Mauro Puddu

11:45am | Walking towards a wider academic language(s)  | Judith M. López Aceves & Alvaro Felipe Ortega González

12:00pm | Discussion/workshop |

Full paper abstracts available here:
https://tag2024.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/tag-2024-session-abstracts-1.pdf

Framing the session title in an interrogative way, at one level is a nod towards remembering Alfred Russell Wallace, who conceived the theory of evolution through natural selection independently of Charles Darwin, who lived in Bournemouth and was buried in Broadstone cemetery in 1913. At another level the theme prompts the question of whether evolutionary models are still relevant for understanding culture-change through archaeology. And at yet another level the theme raises the matter of changing archaeological practice and where current trends in fieldwork might be taking us: is archaeology as a discipline ‘evolving’?. But the theme should not be seen as a constraint on contributions; it is a starting point! Posters on any aspect of theoretically grounded archaeology are welcome.

9:30am | Neanderthal Cultures in Britain and Doggerland: a computational investigation into selected Middle Palaeolithic assemblages.  | Alexandra Barroso
9:30am | Tigers in Film: Past, Present and Future Perspectives   |  Farah Benbouabdellah
9:30am | The evolution of object biography: cauldron’s obituary   | Wenqing Zhang

The world is an awesome and wondrous place. Harris and Sørensen (2010) describe emotion as the “act of being moved,” and human encounters with places of beauty and magnificence, monumentality and atmosphere, whether natural or anthropogenic, invoke sensorial and emotional responses. Though emotion is often considered to be high on archaeology’s “ladder of inference,” recent works, especially in the realm of death and burial, have demonstrated the potential to understand emotions in the archaeological record. This session seeks to expand upon that work to explore the human relationship to landscape, place and space through those sensual encounters. Many places are imbued with magic and wonder and draw people together through communal experience. How can we archaeologically interpret the impressions left on the ancient observer? How can we identify the affective fields and atmospheres that stimulate emotional responses to past environments? This session welcomes varied approaches to understanding the emotional resonance of places, whether through theoretical understanding, material culture and iconography, or computational approaches such as viewshed analysis or spatial reconstruction.

11:00am | Marks of affect, awe, violence and wonder  | Rachel Crellin, Oliver Harris, Matt Hitchcock, Dawid Sych and Christina Tsoraki 

11:20am | The Ruthwell Cross: Early Medieval Emotions, Written in Stone  | Ciarán Walsh 

11:40am | Monument construction in 6th century Scandinavia: bringing people together as the world fell apart  | Andreas Ropeid Sæbø

12:00pm | Spectres of the Past: Uncertainty, Awe, and Haunting  | Anna Collar 

12:20pm | Seeing the Sea: an awesome and emotional experience  | Max MacDonald 

12:40pm | “It may be awesome …but you’d better not believe it!” Overcoming the denial of belief and emotional affectivity in archaeological thought.  | Farès K Moussa 

2:00pm | Becoming Affective Through Rock Art: A Material & Sensorial Case Study in Guanajuato, Mexico  | José Chessil Dohvehnain Martínez-Moreno 

2:20pm | Being moved, on the move: a case for ‘persistent routeways’ and ‘natural avenues’ in Neolithic Britain  | Jack Rowe 

2:40pm | A Groovy Kind of Love with the Tangible World.  | Sarah Botfield 

3:15pm | Triple Bronze and Oak: Emotion in Ancient Mediterranean Seafaring  | Madison Scrabeck 

3:35pm | Discussion |

Full paper abstracts available here:
https://tag2024.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/tag-2024-session-abstracts-1.pdf

This session will explore creative and academic approaches to archaeology as it is presented through new and old media for the purposes of research, leisure and entertainment, and/or for public engagement. This session aims to showcase more nuanced and complex understandings of the potential of the subject field, and in turn the significance of archaeology and ‘pastness’ in digital media, film, television, and popular entertainment, and its relevance to broader social and cultural histories. This session also invites the submission of media objects, creative responses, and other critical practice-based engagements with the session theme, as well as papers presented in the traditional conference format. Scholarly perspectives are invited that explore newspaper media, radio, podcasting, film, television, contemporary art, photography, video games, mobile technology, 3D image capture, digitization, social media and other media forms. Discussions are especially welcome on archaeology on TV or in film, archaeology and social media, digital/multi-media storytelling, documentary, archaeogaming, popular understandings of archaeology, and archaeology/media futures.

11:30am | Archaeology & Media Studies: Public Archaeology Theory for the 21st Century?  | Lorna Richardson

11:50am | Barriers to Digital Heritage Engagement.  | Catriona Cooper & Katie McGown

12:10pm | Romancing the Ruins: Science Communication Through Popular Depictions and Perceptions of Archaeology  | Matilda Siebrecht & Raven Todd DaSilva  

12:30pm | The Site has been Spotted!’: Role of Newspapers in Recovering Vulnerable Archaeological Heritage Sites in India  | Simran Kaur

2:00pm | The Price of a Good Story: TV Production and Emotive Storytelling from Bonekickers  | Mia Coe

2:20pm | Bioarchaeology & the Media   | Ellie Chambers

2:40pm | Human Evolution and the ‘History of Humankind’ YouTube channel  | Carys Phillips

3:20pm | Discussion |

Full paper abstracts available here:
https://tag2024.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/tag-2024-session-abstracts-1.pdf

Plants are essential to life. We depend upon them for the oxygen we breath, for sustenance and for the materials required to produce the ‘stuff’ of human existence. Plant life is vulnerable to human existence, but is also highly adaptable, emerging in a multitude of ways as relations of co-dependence develop, are erased and mutate. This session seeks to explore the intersections between archaeology and plant life in two ways.

Firstly, we ask how can we develop approaches to archaeobotanical and wider environmental datasets which engage with the precarity, resilience and emergence of forms of plant life in the past, to better understand the forms of more-than-human life that they sustain, stimulate or place under threat. Examples might include the impact of cultivation on species diversity and relational dependencies, the ways in which plants life makes new spaces and the responses of plant life to anthropogenic processes which both create potential for emergent co-dependencies between forms of life, and threaten their very existence.

Secondly, we ask how the plant-based thought of writers such as Emanuele Coccia, Michael Marder and Lesley Stern might shape the way in which we approach the past beyond the study of plants themselves. For example, within Deleuze and Guattari’s assemblage thought the rhizome is a key concept which has been adopted by archaeologists, whilst they also use other botanical processes as touchstones in their writing. Thinking through plants opens us to worlds of co-dependence, complexity, temporality and becoming which create the potential to understand past lives, past becoming(s), from novel perspectives, creating a means to effectively de-stabilise the anthropocentrism of archaeological thought by approaching life differently.

It is our hope that this session will stimulate archaeologists to think through more-than-human life in novel and exciting ways, which take seriously the contribution of plants both to how we live in the world, but also how we think about it.

2:10pm | A Lasting and Bitter Relationship: Hops and Humans in the past  | Brian Costello & Barry Taylor

2:30pm | Compost Communities: Reconstructing Biorhythms of Medieval English Towns  | Kate Autumn Evetts

2:50pm | Cropmarks as autographic memories: plants, growth, and duration in archaeological research  | Andrew Jones & Paul Reilly

3:20pm | Disturbance and Urban Atmosphere in Medieval England  | Ben Jervis

3:40pm | Reconstructing Past Entanglements in the face of Climate Devastation  | Anna Den Hollander

4:00pm | Plant Encounters: Engaging students with the botanical world through archaeological accounts of plant lives  | Amy Gray-Jones & Barry Taylor

4:20pm | Discussion |

Full paper abstracts available here:
https://tag2024.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/tag-2024-session-abstracts-1.pdf

The impact of the unprecedented rate and scale of change in the 21st century is being felt in al areas of personal and professional lives across the world. Despite the informative and transformative potential of natural and cultural heritage to both challenge and contribute work in this area remains piecemeal, lacking focus and cohesion and therefore any sense of its effectiveness. If archaeology is to fulfil this potential, then a critical assessment of current practice is required. Are we asking the right questions? Working with the right people? Using the right approaches? Do we have the data, tools, funding, roles and structures we need?

This half-day, inter-disciplinary workshop aims to bring together a broad, representative group of archaeologists and heritage practitioners and will follow the ‘Futurescaping’ speculative design protocol (CoHERE, 2019) developed specifically for innovation and change the Cultural Heritage Sector by Areti Galani and Gabriella Arrigoni (Newcastle University) and their partners at the Copenhagen School of Design and Technology.

Grounded in critical theory and while future-oriented, speculative design is not about predicting the future. Leveraging collective intelligence its purpose is to suspend present-day constraints in order to ask questions about the politics and values in the sociotechnical systems that we currently experience (or might want to experience in the future) by creating an imagined world configured differently from our own. It is speculative in that it re-imagines the world to be organised into different social, political, economic, and technological configurations, or what Auger (2013: 12) terms “alternative presents”.

However, speculation alone is insufficient. The final action in this workshop will evaluate what is needed to deliver the desired future outcomes, against current capabilities and capacities to provide a starting point for a strategic sectorial response to unprecedented change.

2:00pm | N/A | N/A

Full paper abstracts available here:
https://tag2024.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/tag-2024-session-abstracts-1.pdf

4:30pm | The potential and limits of conducting archaeologies of the Northern Ireland Troubles and peace process: reflections over 20 years | Laura McAtackney

The question that has haunted me through my research career has been what are the potentials and limits of material culture in revealing unresolved aspects of difficult recent pasts, most specifically in the conflict and peace in the North of Ireland? It is a question I have been trying to answer for over twenty years and one that has involved engaging with various material forms that have constantly been in motion and in flux. My first inclination was to turn to an ‘icon’ of the conflict, Long Kesh / Maze prison, as a monumental and materially rich site that was largely off-limits to researchers. The politics of its inaccessible dereliction meant I had to consider it in an expansive way as a place with ‘distributed self’ (2014) that materially and psychically reached far beyond its confines and deep into communities. It was in those communities that I eventually started traversing streets and noting their ever changing configurations of murals, graffiti, and grassroots memorials creating memoryscapes alongside enduringly materialized segregation, so-called ‘peace walls’. More recently, I have thought on how  my understandings of the conflict has been shaped not only by presences but also absences; a place with a desire for peace but also fear of forgetting injustices. Ultimately, my faith and despair in material answers to loaded questions has evolved in ways that I could never have foreseen at the start and so this lecture will consider what under-explored pasts have been revealed and what are the limits of the material in knowing the contemporary.