Recent years have seen an increase in political narratives and propaganda focused on boundaries, borders and walls, primarily based on a mentality of ‘us’ versus ‘them’. At the same time, contemporary archaeological research has seen a resurgence of studies into prehistoric demography, driven by cross-disciplinary methods and techniques. Looking closely at issues of human migration and cross-cultural interaction across time and space, this session aims to highlight the value of archaeology as a tool for challenging current attitudes towards migrants. To this end, we invite papers that develop new archaeological narratives on co-existence, co-operation, conflict and/or exchange between different communities, thus demonstrating the significance of cross-cultural interaction to the human condition, as well as the long-term benefits of hybrid or ‘mixed’ communities. These narratives should however be placed firmly in the current socio-political context. What are the contemporary implications and entanglements of archaeological research focused on questions of demography, migration, and interaction? To enable this dialogue, we particularly welcome papers that approach these issues through a broad array of archaeological methods, including archaeological sciences (zooarchaeology, geoarchaeology, archaeobotany, osteoarchaeology), material culture studies (ceramics, lithics and metallurgy), and anthropological studies. We seek to discuss these topics from a broad temporal and geographical perspective, covering examples from the Palaeolithic to the Modern era, and from a diverse array of regions around the Globe. We particularly seek case studies from the Americas, Africa, Middle East, Asia, and Oceania.We encourage early career researchers, women and minorities to apply.
Organisers: Ana Catarina Vital; UCL Institute of Archaeology • Gwendoline Maurer; UCL Institute of Archaeology
14:00 | Ana Catarina Vital, UCL Institute of Archaeology; Gwendoline Maurer, UCL Institute of Archaeology | Introduction
14:10 | Gwendoline Maurer, UCL Institute of Archaeology | Diaspora Subsistence Strategies: The Kura Araxes in the 3rd Millennium BC Southern Levant
14:25 | Alicia Núñez-García, University of Edinburgh | Ubuntu! Phoenicians in Iberia, Syrians in Europe
14:40 | Yuyang Wang, Stanford University | Looking into the Shattered Mirrors: A Study of Destroyed Bronze Mirrors in Qin, Han, and Xiongnu Tombs
14:55 | Christian Langer M.A., Freie Universität Berlin | Researching ancient Egyptian deportations: political economy and scholarly discourse
15:10 | Sara Simões, Cambridge Archaeological Unit / STARQ- Sindicato dos Trabalhadores de Arqueologia (Portuguese Union for Archaeologists); Tânia Casimiro, IHC-NOVA University of Lisbon; José Pedro Henriques, IAP – Universidade NOVA de Lisboa; Vanessa Filipe, Independent Researcher | An archaeological perspective of African mobilities in Portugal between the 15th and the 19th centuries
15:25 | - | BREAK
15:55 | Lucy Timbrell, Professor Marta Mirazón Lahr, Leverhulme Centre of Human Evolutionary Studies, University of Cambridge | Characterising and exploring patterns of cranial shape variation in recent Aboriginal Australians
16:10 | Konstantinos P. Trimmis, University of Bristol; Christianne L. Fernée, University of Southampton | Εuromobile: Exploring migration narratives and mobility routes in the South East Europe from prehistory to the present
16:25 | Marte Spangen, Førsteamanuensis/Associate professor, Arctic University of Norway | Roads of the North – movement, interaction, and landscape negotiation in northern Norway
16:40 | Lauren Nicole Coughlin, University of Southampton | If nowhere else, they belong when they are in that class
16:55 | Alexandra E. T. Kriti, Headland Archaeology Ltd. / Kingston University of London | Cooking [at] the borders: The Taste of the Aegean Internationality(-ies)
17:10 | Ana Catarina Vital, UCL Institute of Archaeology; Gwendoline Maurer, UCL Institute of Archaeology | Discussion
17:30 | - | END
