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Archaeology and Humanity's Story: A Brief Introduction to World Prehistory
This student-friendly textbook introduces the archaeological past from approximately seven million years ago through later politically complex societies. Archaeology and Humanity's A Brief Introduction to World Prehistory does not attempt to discuss every archaeologically important site
and development in prehistory and early history. Rather, it presents key issues from earlier prehistory and then organizes the chapters on politically complex societies using a similar framework. This allows students to easily compare and contrast different geographical regions. Each of these
chapters also highlights a specific case study in which similar themes are examined, such as the written word; resource networks, trade, and exchange; social life; ritual and religion; and warfare and violence. Each chapter includes several sidebar boxes, a timeline showing the chronology relevant
to that chapter, and "The Big Picture," "Peopling the Past," and "Evolutionary Processes" features.
and development in prehistory and early history. Rather, it presents key issues from earlier prehistory and then organizes the chapters on politically complex societies using a similar framework. This allows students to easily compare and contrast different geographical regions. Each of these
chapters also highlights a specific case study in which similar themes are examined, such as the written word; resource networks, trade, and exchange; social life; ritual and religion; and warfare and violence. Each chapter includes several sidebar boxes, a timeline showing the chronology relevant
to that chapter, and "The Big Picture," "Peopling the Past," and "Evolutionary Processes" features.
528 pages, Paperback
First published November 13, 2015
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April 13, 2018
This is a standard archaeology textbook; nothing shocked me about it but nothing blew me away either.
I like that it is fairly up to date, and doesn’t have much outdated information in it. Archaeology is changing rapidly, but this is up to date for the moment. It’s also good that Olszewski presents multiple readings of the evidence as opposed to just her own; that’s a problem with the majority of history/archaeology textbooks for me personally. The chapters aren’t too heavy to read, and are more like snapshots of information as opposed to full length, definitive texts on a topic. As expected, there is also a massive list of references that someone could look at if they found themselves interested in one aspect of the book. There was no tendency to romanticize archaeology which, in other textbooks, I have found there is since there’s such a “treasure hunting” mentality around it in other media. I find a lot of archaeologists that teach students think this “treasure hunting” image will get students interested, even though it’s not really factual at all. I also liked that it was a comparative study as opposed to looking at each society in isolation; references are made to all the other chapters of the book in almost every chapter.
What I didn’t like is that there wasn’t much about how to actually DO archaeology in this book. I’ve always felt if you have an archaeology textbook, and you mention, say, total stations or something, you should explain a little bit about how that works, have a little segment on how to actually use a total station, so that when people like myself go to field schools and digs they have at least a book smart level of familiarity with these specialty tools. Most textbooks I’ve seen don’t have this and instead focus on sites and high level theory, as opposed to the simple but equally difficult task of actually finding evidence. On top of this, the prose was legible but somewhat uninspired; though they’re short, I found myself struggling to finish some chapters if I read them at night or something because the prose was slightly boring.
I like that it is fairly up to date, and doesn’t have much outdated information in it. Archaeology is changing rapidly, but this is up to date for the moment. It’s also good that Olszewski presents multiple readings of the evidence as opposed to just her own; that’s a problem with the majority of history/archaeology textbooks for me personally. The chapters aren’t too heavy to read, and are more like snapshots of information as opposed to full length, definitive texts on a topic. As expected, there is also a massive list of references that someone could look at if they found themselves interested in one aspect of the book. There was no tendency to romanticize archaeology which, in other textbooks, I have found there is since there’s such a “treasure hunting” mentality around it in other media. I find a lot of archaeologists that teach students think this “treasure hunting” image will get students interested, even though it’s not really factual at all. I also liked that it was a comparative study as opposed to looking at each society in isolation; references are made to all the other chapters of the book in almost every chapter.
What I didn’t like is that there wasn’t much about how to actually DO archaeology in this book. I’ve always felt if you have an archaeology textbook, and you mention, say, total stations or something, you should explain a little bit about how that works, have a little segment on how to actually use a total station, so that when people like myself go to field schools and digs they have at least a book smart level of familiarity with these specialty tools. Most textbooks I’ve seen don’t have this and instead focus on sites and high level theory, as opposed to the simple but equally difficult task of actually finding evidence. On top of this, the prose was legible but somewhat uninspired; though they’re short, I found myself struggling to finish some chapters if I read them at night or something because the prose was slightly boring.
Displaying 1 of 1 review