Rebecca Gowland

Christopher Knüsel

Human bones form the most direct link to understanding how people lived in the past, who they were and where they came from. The interpretative value of human skeletal remains (within their burial context) in terms of past social identity and organisation is awesome, but was, for many years, underexploited by archaeologists. The nineteen papers in this edited volume are an attempt to redress this by marrying the cultural aspects of burial with the anthropology of the deceased.

Social Archaeology of Funerary Remains

Lindsay Powell

William Southwell-Wright

Care-giving is an activity that has been practiced by all human societies. From the earliest societies through to the present, all humans have faced choices regarding how people in positions of dependency are to be treated. As such, care-giving, and the form it takes, is a central experience of being a human and one that is culturally mediated. Archaeology has tended to marginalise the study of care, and debates surrounding our ability to recognise it within the archaeological record have often remained implicit rather than a focus of discussion. These 12 papers examine the topic of care in past societies and specifically how we might recognise the provision of care in archaeological contexts and to open up an inter-disciplinary conversation, including historical, bioarchaeological, faunal and philosophical perspectives. The topic of ‘care’ is examined through three different strands: the provision of care throughout the life course, namely that provided to the youngest and oldest members of a society; care-giving and attitudes towards impairment and disability in prehistoric and historic contexts, and the role of animals as both recipients of care and as tools for its provision.

Archaeological and Interdisciplinary Perspectives

Care in the Past

Christopher Knusel

The Social Archaeology of Funerary Remains

Tim Thompson

Few things are as interesting to us as our own bodies and, by extension, our own identities. In recent years, there has been a growing interest in the relationship between the body, environment and society. Reflecting upon these developments, this book examines the role of the body in human identification, in the forging of identities, and the ways in which it embodies our social worlds. The approach is integrative, taking a uniquely biological perspective and reflecting on current discourse in the social sciences. With particular reference to bioarchaeology and forensic science, the authors focus on the construction and categorisation of the body within scientific and popular discourse, examining its many tissues, from the outermost to the innermost, from the skin to DNA. Synthesising two, traditionally disparate, strands of research, this is a valuable contribution to research on human identification and the embodiment of identity.

Human Identity and Identification

Siân Halcrow

Over the past 20 years there has been increased research traction in the anthropology of childhood. However, infancy, the pregnant body and motherhood continue to be marginalised. This book will focus on the mother-infant relationship and the variable constructions of this dyad across cultures, including conceptualisations of the pregnant body, the beginnings of life, and implications for health. This is particularly topical because there is a burgeoning awareness within anthropology regarding the centrality of mother-infant interactions for understanding the evolution of our species, infant and maternal health and care strategies, epigenetic change, and biological and social development. This book will bring together cultural and biological anthropologists and archaeologists to examine the infant-maternal interface in past societies. It will showcase innovative theoretical and methodological approaches towards understanding societal constructions of foetal, infant and maternal bodies. It will emphasise their interconnectivity and will explore the broader significance of the mother/infant nexus for overall population well-being.

Rebecca Gowland

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