“An ethnographic seduction”: how qualitative research and Agent-based models can benefit each other

We provide a general analytical framework for empirically informed agent-based simulations. This methodology provides present-day agent-based models with a sound and proper insight as to the behavior of social agents — an insight that statistical data often fall short of providing at least at a micro level and for hidden and sensitive populations. In the other direction, simulations can provide qualitative researchers in sociology, anthropology and other fields with valuable tools for: (a) testing the consistency and pushing the boundaries, of specific theoretical frameworks; (b) replicating and generalizing results; (c) providing a platform for cross-disciplinary validation of results

Repatriation, doxa, and contested heritages: the return of the Altai princess in an international perspective

Using Pierre Bourdieu's concepts of habitus and doxa, the authors analyze the contested heritage debates surrounding the sensational Scythian burial discovery of the Altai Princess, also called the Ice Maiden, on the Ukok plateau. Her 2012 repatriation to a special Gazprom-funded museum in the Altai Republic of Russia is politically contextualized and compared to cases of the Kennewick Man in the United States and the Lake Mungo Burials of Australia. The authors stress the importance of "heritage in the making" and conclude that diverse approaches to the Altai Princess must be understood through the historically constituted dispositions of various agents and their interaction with the structures governing society

Contributions to an anthropological approach to the cultural adaptation of migrant agents

This thesis proposes the use of Cultural Anthropology as a source of inspiration for solutions to the problem of adaptation of autonomous, intelligent, computational agents that migrate to societies of agents with distinctive features from the ones of the society where those agents were originally conceived. This has implications for interoperation of disparate Multi-Agent Systems. In particular, the cognitive approach to anthropology is argued to be a suitable theoretical foun-dation for this topic. Fieldwork practice in social anthropology is also indicated as an useful source of ideas. A pragmatic theory of intensionality is incorporated in this anthropological approach, resulting in a mechanism that allows agents to ascribe intensional ontologies of terms to societies that use unfamiliar means of communication; also, taxonomical relations among the terms in such ontologies can be retrieved, by means of a process inspired by the counterpart activity of ethnographers. This is presented using the Z notation for formal specification of systems, and illustrated on a set of terms from the game of cricket. Subsequently, a simulation of a game of cricket is described where one of the players is unfamiliar with the game, and therefore needs to learn the game by observing the other players. A reasonable behaviour for such a player is obtained, and the simulation offers grounds for further anthropologically-based studies. Further, a study of theories of moral sentiments is presented, and the Iterated Prisoner's Dilemma is used in simulations based on those ideas. The results of the simulations show clearly the positive impact, on groups of agents, of altruistic behaviour; this can only be coherently obtained in autonomous agents by modelling emotions, which are relevant for this project as anthropologists recognise them as an essential cross-cultural link. Finally, the consequences of this project to conceptions of Distributed Artificial Intelligence are discussed

Reading Clay: The Temporal and Transformative Potential of Clay in Contemporary Scientific Practice

Clay has a long history in the global south and has been extensively studied by ‘Western’ social scientists particularly anthropologists and archeologists in relation to histories of earlier civilisations and cultural practices. Clay in relation to contemporary ‘science’ has received less attention in social science despite the emergence of the sub-discipline of ‘clay science’ and its increasing focus on clay to transform wide ranging aspects of social life. In this paper we work towards an exploration of clay in science. We begin with the question of ‘what is clay?’ from the perspective of a multidisciplinary group of scientists, whilst being alert to culturally located and past knowledges of clay that shape current scientific knowledges and practices. Drawing on interviews with six clay scientists we explore the ontological and epistemological process for scientists in ‘reading’ clay to reveal how clay is ‘classified’, ‘worked upon’ and ‘partnered’. Our findings suggest that clay comes into being for scientists by being read as an informational and temporal medium and agentic matter with transformative promise to remedy specific threats to human and environmental health

Homo anthropologicus: unexamined behavioural models in sociocultural anthropology

Inferences from ethnography in sociocultural anthropological arguments frequently rely on an unexamined model of the human mind and behaviour. Across a range of theoretical approaches, human thought and behaviour are implicitly understood as coherently following a single underlying cultural logic, described in terms such as of ‘ontology’, habitus, political strategy. We term this implicit model Homo anthropologicus, by analogy with Homo economicus. Both simplify human behaviour and can thus lead to errors in its interpretation. We examine examples of Homo anthropologicus in anthropological approaches to ontology, caste, state evasion, and habitus. We propose that such accounts are erroneous in light of the multiple cognitive systems involved in human thought and behaviour, discussed with close reference to dual process theory. Unlike Homo anthropologicus, Homo sapiens’ behaviour is frequently inconsistent. Whilst anthropologists have long acknowledged this is the case, in practice, as we demonstrate through our examples, inconsistency is frequently seen as a problem to be explained away rather than as a feature of behaviour to be accounted for in its own right. We therefore conclude by calling for a greater degree of methodological reflexivity when making inferences from ethnography

The Commodification of Indigeneity as a Tool for Ongoing Settler Colonization in Canada

The initial settler colonization of Canada involved the implementation of the settler colonial Doctrine of Discovery on Indigenous lands to make them ‘open’ for white settlement and ownership, along with capitalism and heteropatriarchy to assert white settler dominance over Indigenous lands, cultures, and bodies. Although it has been over 500 years since first contact between white Europeans and Indigenous peoples in Canada, the ideologies that paved the way for white settlement in Canada are continually reproduced through social institutions, such as the legal system, to maintain settler domination. This thesis explicates the connections between settler colonialism, capitalism, and heteropatriarchy within Saskatchewan and Canadian law to analyze the commodification of Indigeneity as a tool for ongoing settler colonization. Grounded in a Métis feminist theoretical framework, I investigate how and why The Heritage Property Act (1979-80) steals and commodifies Indigenous cultural artifacts for settler government profit. Through a critical literature review, case study of the above-mentioned act, and dream-work, I identify two themes: the Settler Timeline and the Commodification of Indigeneity. Importantly, this thesis recognizes that many Indigenous individual and community identities evolve through links between the past and present, which Indigenous peoples reflect on to move into a good future. As such, cultural artifacts are paramount to cultural identity and continuity within Indigenous nations and communities. The findings of this thesis reveal that the ongoing settler conceptualization of Indigenous peoples as uncivil epistemically justifies the commodification of Indigenous cultural artifacts. This thesis also suggests that, just as decolonization within the settler colonial context necessarily requires the repatriation of all lands, it also requires the repatriation of all stolen and commodified Indigenous cultural artifacts

The pasts and presence of art in South Africa: Technologies, ontologies and agents

In 2015, #RhodesMustFall generated the largest student protests in South Africa since the end of apartheid, subsequently inspiring protests and acts of decolonial iconoclasm across the globe. The performances that emerged in, through and around #RhodesMustFall make it clear how analytically fruitful Alfred Gell’s notion that art is ‘a system of social action, intended to change the world rather than encode symbolic propositions about it’ can be, even when attempting to account for South Africa’s very recent history. What light can this approach shed on the region’s far longer history of artistic practices? Can we use any resulting insights to explore art’s role in the very long history of human life in the land now called South Africa? Can we find a common way of talking about ‘art’ that makes sense across South Africa’s long span of human history, whether considering engraved ochre, painted rock shelters or contemporary performance art? This collection of essays has its origins in a conference with the same title, arranged to mark the opening of the British Museum’s major temporary exhibition South Africa: the art of a nation in October 2016. The volume represents an important step in developing a framework for engaging with South Africa’s artistic traditions that begins to transcend nineteenth-century frameworks associated with colonial power

Before Mimesis. Reflections on the Early Greek Technologies of Looking

Πριν από την μίμησιν: σκέψεις για τις πρώιμες ελληνικές τεχνολογίες της όρασηςΤο άρθρο αναλύει την έννοια της εμπρόθετης υλικότητας, την ιδέα δηλαδή ότι τα άψυχα αντικείμενα – τα «πράγματα» – έχουν την ιδιότητα να διαδρούν με τους κατασκευαστές, τους χρήστες και τους θεατές τους. Αν και στο ουμανιστικό πλαίσιο εντός του οποίου συλλαμβάνουμε, παραδοσιακά, τις έννοιες του πολιτισμού, της τέχνης, της δημιουργίας, και της επικοινωνίας, η σκέψη ότι άψυχα αντικείμενα (τα οποία εννοούμε να βλέπουμε και να βιώνουμε ως «τέχνεργα») εκδηλώνουν πρωτογενείς πρωτοβουλίες μοιάζει εξωπραγματική, ανορθολογική και παράλογη, η πρόσφατη αρχαιολογική έρευνα, κινούμενη προς μια σαφώς μετα-ουμανιστική κατεύθυνση, αντιλαμβάνεται πλέον τα άψυχα πράγματα που μας περιβάλλουν ως εμπρόθετους δράστες. Στο άρθρο, μια σειρά από παραδείγματα επιλεγμένα από την πρώιμη ελληνική ιστορία αναλύονται υπό το πρίσμα της διάδρασής τους με τον κόσμο των ζωντανών. Με βάση ανθρωπολογικές προσεγγίσεις στις έννοιες της υλικότητας (materiality), της εμπρόθετης δράσης (agency), και της προσωποθεσίας (personhood), αναλύονται οι αρχαιοελληνικές τεχνολογίες της αναπαράστασης, και επισημαίνεται ο κοινωνικός ρόλος της ιστορικοτεχνικής κατασκευής (που παραδοσιακά προσλαμβάνουμε ως τεχνοτροπική ιδιοσυγκρασία ή «στιλ») στην πρώιμη ελληνική τέχνη.Material agency has been puzzling archaeologists for almost three decades now. The idea that artifacts, a priori perceived as passive and inert ‘creations’ subject to human volition, have the capacity to interact with their makers, users, or viewers may be seen as a challenge to archaeologists and their inherently humanist discipline. Classical archaeology, and the study of Greek and Roman art in particular, seem to have been avoiding the issue, choosing instead to privilege artistic agency or – in more recent years – a cultural-historical discourse primarily informed through linguistics and sociology. This paper explores the concepts of materiality, agency, and personhood as cultural mediators in order to investigate the ways Greeks interacted with the images they created. Through a number of case studies borrowed from the wider repertoire of early Greek ‘art’ it is argued that artifacts are invariably conceived as animate entities, at least in early Greece; moreover, that technologies of representation in early Greek art (what art historians understand as ‘styles’) are devised and promoted as cultural agents within Greek society

Providing Information and Public Outreach Across Three U.S. State Archaeology Offices During the Age of Open Access

Archaeology in the United States has been transformed into a mainstream, practical science over the past fifty years by Cultural Resource Management (CRM) and the federal regulations imposed by the National Historic Preservation Act (NHPA) of 1966. However, this form of archaeology has been plagued with criticisms since the NHPA’s enactment including issues of access and use of data maintained by state site files. State archaeology is publicly funded yet state and federal legislation often exempts CRM data from freedom of information laws. To mitigate this contradiction and stem the growing body of “gray literature”, new open-access (OA) technologies are being developed to connect the general and academic publics with archaeological research. This thesis explores to what extent a consensus exists between state outreach and access features and how the implemented polices could be adapted with recent developments in OA information systems. Understanding these questions requires information directly from state archaeologists. As such, seven interviews were conducted with personnel from three state archaeology departments across the country. To establish a survey of state policy offerings, these professionals were asked a series of questions as they related to their state’s implementation of data access and public outreach outlets. Furthermore, each interviewee provided comments on their state’s investment in OA development. Over sixty pages of transcripts revealed a consensus on the concepts of data access and public outreach. This agreement was checked by considerable variation in state policy offerings. A grounded theory analysis was applied to the transcripts to uncover why this variation in policy existed. Initially it appeared that underfunding of programs was the primary factor. However, a comprehensive assessment though revealed that concerns with data security led states to implement strict yet largely unstandardized data access and public outreach policies. As such, I put forth that state archaeology departments across the nation look to implement Open-Access data management systems like the Digital Index of North American Archaeology (DINNA). Implementing such systems will provide a new platform for efficient researching and help in the fight against the growing body of gray literature. What is more, systems like DINAA will act as a clearinghouse of linked comprehensive data sets for state archaeologists, academic, and CRM researchers to utilize for broad geographic analyses needed to understand the threats posed to archaeological sites nationwide