Shayla L. Monroe
Assistant Professor of Anthropology
Department of Anthropology
Harvard University
Comparative Human Ecologies: The View from Zooarchaeology
Abstract: Zooarchaeology is a specific branch of environmental archaeology dealing with human-animal relations in the past. While zooarchaeology’s indebtedness, and co-constitutive relationships with paleoecology and paleoclimatology are well-discussed, ongoing relationships with other approaches to ecology, including Ecology (as an academic discipline), Indigenous Ecological Knowledge, Cultural Ecology, Human Behavioral Ecology, Political Ecology, Historical Ecology, De-colonial Ecology, and Feminist Ecology, require further interrogation. What does zooarchaeology have to offer, and how will zooarchaeology listen to and engage with the diverse and contrasting factions claiming a stake in shifting concepts of “ecology”? A new and ongoing course at Harvard University entitled Comparative Human Ecologies, was designed to examine the history and future of creative friction between these approaches. Here I summarize the experience of working through these intellectual tensions with students, assessing the real-world implications for interdisciplinary and inclusive discussions of multispecies relationships, past, present, and future.
Host: Professor David Haig
LOCATION:Northwest Building, B101, 52 Oxford Street, Cambridge, MA STATUS:CONFIRMED DTSTART:20260212T203000Z DTEND:20260212T213000Z END:VEVENT END:VCALENDAR