Nature as Kin: Reconsidering evidence of ‘incipient agriculture’ in  southwest Amazonia in the early and mid-Holocene

Humans have been modifying landscapes in the southwestern Amazon for 10 000 years. Yet this modification did not comprise the intensive horticultural activities generally defined as ‘agriculture’ within archaeological discourses. Instead of pursuing plant species’ domestication, local communities prioritised mixed-resource economies, in situ cultivation, and intentional biodiversity. These subtle but complex practices left a marked footprint on Amazonian soils, tree distributions, and biodiversity patterns. This thesis brings together palaeoenvironmental evidence of this footprint, to paint a picture of how humans managed landscapes in southwest Amazonia in the early and middle Holocene. It then approaches this ecological and archaeological data using anthropological theory and ethnographic evidence; these disciplines can (a) clarify the visibility of human-plant interactions in the eco-archaeological record, and (b) aid in interpreting what this record signifies about past lifeways...Show moreHumans have been modifying landscapes in the southwestern Amazon for 10 000 years. Yet this modification did not comprise the intensive horticultural activities generally defined as ‘agriculture’ within archaeological discourses. Instead of pursuing plant species’ domestication, local communities prioritised mixed-resource economies, in situ cultivation, and intentional biodiversity. These subtle but complex practices left a marked footprint on Amazonian soils, tree distributions, and biodiversity patterns. This thesis brings together palaeoenvironmental evidence of this footprint, to paint a picture of how humans managed landscapes in southwest Amazonia in the early and middle Holocene. It then approaches this ecological and archaeological data using anthropological theory and ethnographic evidence; these disciplines can (a) clarify the visibility of human-plant interactions in the eco-archaeological record, and (b) aid in interpreting what this record signifies about past lifeways. This transdisciplinary approach acknowledges the importance of considering cosmology when studying human-plant interactions, and how they can manifest materially. Human-nonhuman reciprocity is a prominent principle in many contemporary Amazonian ontologies, and is used in this thesis as a central paradigm for studying human ecological manipulations through time. Where conventional archaeological models of agriculture emphasise the central role of landscape domestication, the evidence from southwest Amazonia indicates that human horticultural activities comprised a process of active landscape co-creation. This thesis thus emphasises the need to rethink how we study human-plant interactions in archaeology, with critical implications for how we understand ‘agriculture’ as a whole – in Amazonia and elsewhere.Show less

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Nature as Kin: Reconsidering evidence of ‘incipient agriculture’ in southwest Amazonia in the early and mid-Holocene