Anett Dittrich, "Neolithization in Progress – The Advent of Domesticates in Northeastern Africa", in: Stefan Burmeister and Reinhard Bernbeck (Eds.), The Interplay of People and Technologies. Archaeological Case Studies on Innovation, Berlin: Edition Topoi, 2017, 61–103

Abstract

The neolithization of Northeastern Africa is currently studied in terms of the successful incorporation of domesticates as an active response to climatic changes, by carefully dividing between pre-pastoral and pastoral modes of life or wild and domestic species, respectively. However, it becomes obvious that interest in domesticates is a long-term commitment to other species, given that numerous intended and unintended consequences arose from this particular change in human-environmental relations. According to Gabriel Tarde, innovation can be studied as an act of ‘imitation’ that produces ‘variation’. This would defocus from the subject position of initiators of innovations and rather stress other agents in this process, both human and non-human.

Published In

Stefan Burmeister and Reinhard Bernbeck (Eds.), The Interplay of People and Technologies. Archaeological Case Studies on Innovation, Berlin: Edition Topoi, 2017