tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2971081717687612908.post159616181716101863..comments2024-03-18T05:08:29.201-07:00Comments on Publishing Archaeology: Why archaeologists need to publish outside of archaeologyMichael E. Smithhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03942595266312225661noreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2971081717687612908.post-8325862699353404152009-06-26T06:12:15.058-07:002009-06-26T06:12:15.058-07:00Update from June, 2009:
My paper on Gordon Childe...Update from June, 2009:<br /><br />My paper on Gordon Childe's concept of The Urban Revolution has come out. It has a footnote on the errors of Jacobs, Soja, etc:<br /><br /> Smith, Michael E. (2009) V. Gordon Childe and the Urban Revolution: An Historical Perspective on a Revolution in Urban Studies. Town Planning Review 80:3-29.Michael E. Smithhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03942595266312225661noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2971081717687612908.post-80392842505072480362009-05-04T17:08:00.000-07:002009-05-04T17:08:00.000-07:00As an anthropology undergrad and now urban plannin...As an anthropology undergrad and now urban planning PhD student, I find your critique of Jacobs and Soja apposite. I've had a seminar with Ed, and had to bite my tongue at his story of urban development - namely that agriculture is a product of urbanization. My specialization in the field is very different from this debate, but one side's weaknesses are very clear.<br /><br />Nonetheless, his and Jacobs work carry a lot of currency among some planning scholars. The basic argument is that innovation, social change and processes of 'spatialization' a la Lefevre, happen when many people are in close proximity to one another. This is rather intuitive -economists and sociologists have made similar but more rigourous arguments along these lines.<br /><br />Either way, the title of this blog post is right on, as it is clear that urban theorists run into problems when trying to make diachronic generalizations about urban form and urbanization and could benefit from the work of archaeologists, among others.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2971081717687612908.post-3926450929921101862009-02-02T16:57:00.000-07:002009-02-02T16:57:00.000-07:00I'm not sure if this is what you are looking for, ...I'm not sure if this is what you are looking for, but: in every single area of the world where there have been indigenous transformations from hunting/gathering to farming (the Neolithic Revolution) and from farming to urban societies (the Urban Revolution), the Neolithic Revolution occurred several thousand years before the Urban Revolution. This has been conclusively demonstrated, with lots of archaeological evidence of well-dated sites, in the Near East, in China, in Mesoamerica and in the Andes. Just about any textbook on world prehistory or on regional prehistory will spell out the data, compiled from hundreds of sites. Here are a few examples:<BR/><BR/> Evans, Susan T. (2004) Ancient Mexico and Central America. Thames and Hudson, New York.<BR/><BR/> Fagan, Brian M. (2002) World Prehistory: A Brief Introduction. 5th ed. Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs.<BR/><BR/> Maisels, Charles Keith (1990) The Emergence of Civilisation: From Hunting and Gathering to Agriculture, Cities, and the State in the Near East. Routledge, New York.<BR/><BR/> Peregrine, Peter (2002) World Prehsitory: Two Million Years of Human Life. Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs.Michael E. Smithhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03942595266312225661noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2971081717687612908.post-30670926553456498852009-02-02T16:33:00.000-07:002009-02-02T16:33:00.000-07:00As a layperson, I'm not familiar with the unspecif...As a layperson, I'm not familiar with the unspecified archeological evidence you refer to. If you do indeed end up writing a scholarly article on the subject, I for one would be very interested to read it. In the meantime, perhaps you could give us all one or two clues about the evidence you so nebulously refer to?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2971081717687612908.post-82322892415416999032009-01-15T16:05:00.000-07:002009-01-15T16:05:00.000-07:00Well, to me a blog is a place where one is permitt...Well, to me a blog is a place where one is permitted to be facile and arrogant. In a scholarly publication, I would provide much more evidence showing that the notion of cities preceding agriculture is not at all a "credible hypothesis." And if Jane Jacobs had indeed read a texbook on world prehistory, she would have realized that this particular idea flew in the face of rather consistent archaeological evidence to the contrary.Michael E. Smithhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03942595266312225661noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2971081717687612908.post-70709993424143406522009-01-06T19:24:00.000-07:002009-01-06T19:24:00.000-07:00'Go read a textbook'?? That seems an incredibly fa...'Go read a textbook'?? That seems an incredibly facile and arrogant response to what, as far as I can see, is a perfectly credible hypothesis.<BR/><BR/>In any case, I would hope the textbooks you refer to are a lot more convincing than Marc van de Mieroop's incredibly sloppy 'straw man' argument against Jacobs' hypothesis.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com