#313 Robert Kelly: The Fifth Beginning, And The Lifeways Of Hunter-Gatherers
RECORDED ON JANUARY 13th, 2020.
Dr. Robert Kelly is Professor of Archaeology at the University of Wyoming. Dr. Kelly has shaped and contributed much to our understanding of hunter-gatherer societies. He has a deep interest in Western North American archaeology, especially in the Great Basin area. Current understanding of hunter-gatherer mobility and foraging patterns are also influenced strongly by his research, fieldwork, and ethnology. By examining the Pleistocene colonization of the Americas by examining artifacts and lithic technology, Dr. Kelly reconstructs past life-ways and compares them to current foraging societies, and examines human adaptation to climate change during different periods in the past. He’s the author of books like The Foraging Spectrum: Diversity in Hunter-Gatherer Lifeways, and The Fifth Beginning: What Six Million Years of Human History Can Tell Us about Our Future.
In this episode, we focus for the most part on Dr. Kelly’s book, The Fifth Beginning. But first we discuss the discipline of Archaeology in its strengths and limitations. Then, we get into the meat of the book, and talk about the first four beginnings: the beginning of technology; the beginning of culture; the beginning of agriculture; the beginning of the State; and the fifth beginning, which we are going through now, starting around 1500 CE. We also tackle how we might get to solve current urgent global-scale problems, like climate change. As a final topic, we explore issues surrounding hunter-gatherers, how we think about them as a monolithic social entity, and we also refer to thinks like variability, human universals, and evolutionary psychology and “human nature”.
Time Links:
The limitations of Archaeology as a science, but also how fascinating is it
Five big shifts in human evolution and history: the beginning of technology
The role of fire
The beginning of culture. And isn’t technology part of culture?
The biological bases of culture
Gene-culture coevolution
The agricultural beginning/transition
The short-term negative consequences of adopting agriculture
The beginning of the State
The fifth beginning
Are we able to improve international cooperation and solve problems like climate change?
What are “hunter-gatherers”?
About human universals
About evolutionary psychology and “human nature”
Follow Dr. Kelly’s work!
Follow Dr. Kelly’s work:
Faculty Page: http://bit.ly/2CgKQ32
ResearchGate profile: http://bit.ly/36xbQsR
Books on Amazon: https://amzn.to/2Cd0ign
The Fifth Beginning: What Six Million Years of Human History Can Tell Us about Our Future: https://amzn.to/2POOXeI
The Lifeways of Hunter-Gatherers: The Foraging Spectrum: https://amzn.to/2FIdI63