A field archaeological perspective on the Anthropocene
Abstract
In a recent Antiquity debate, Todd Braje and respondents discuss the merits or otherwise of the recently proposed and hotly contested geological ‘Age of Man’—the Anthropocene. These papers make a useful contribution to the rapidly growing literature on this epoch-in-the-making (cf. Swanson et al. 2015). Recent publications by members of the Anthropocene Working Group (AWG; http://quaternary.stratigraphy.org/workinggroups/anthropocene/) suggest a start date for this epoch of c. 1950 (Zalasiewicz et al. 2015; Waters et al. 2016; Zalasiewicz & Waters 2016), the adoption of which would challenge archaeology as a discipline concerned with deep-time socio-ecological dynamics.
Authors
* Author for correspondence.
- Felix Riede*
Department of Archaeology, Moesgård Allé 20, Aarhus University, Denmark (Email: f.riede@cas.au.dk) - Christina Vestergaard
Department of Archaeology, Moesgård Allé 20, Aarhus University, Denmark (Email: christina_vs_@hotmail.com) - Kristoffer H. Fredensborg
Department of Archaeology, Moesgård Allé 20, Aarhus University, Denmark (Email: khfnielsen@au.dk)