Networks in Archaeology: An Introduction

The application of method and theory from network science to ar- chaeology has dramatically increased over the last decade. In this article, we document this growth over time, discuss several of the important concepts that are used in the application of network approaches to archaeology, and introduce the other articles in this special issue on networks in archaeology. We argue that the suitability and contribution of network science techniques within particular archaeological research contexts can be usefully explored by scruti- nizing the past phenomena under study, how these are abstracted into concepts, and how these in turn are represented as network data. For this reason, each of the articles in this special issue is discussed in terms of the phenomena that they seek to address, the abstraction in terms of concepts that they use to study connectivity, and the representations of network data that they employ in their analyses. The approaches currently being used are diverse and interdisciplinary, which we think are evidence of a healthy exploratory stage in the application of network science in archaeology. To facilitate further innovation, application, and collaboration, we also provide a glossary of terms that are currently being used in network science and especially those in the applications to archaeological case studies.

This review aims to expose the potential of formal network methods for archaeology by tracing the origins of the academic traditions, network models and techniques that have been most influential to archaeologists. A brief discussion of graph theoretic applications in archaeology reveals how graph visualization and analysis was used since the 1960’s in a very similar way to later network analysis applications but did not seem to have influenced the more widespread adoption of network techniques over the past decade. These recent archaeological applications have been strongly influenced by two academic traditions, social network analysis and socio-physics. The most influential and promising techniques and models adopted from these traditions are critically discussed. This review reveals some general trends which are considered to be the result of two critical issues that will need to be addressed in future archaeological network analysis: (1) a general unawareness of the historicity and diversity of formal network methods both within and outside the archaeological discipline has resulted in a very limited methodological scope; (2) the adoption or development of network methods has very rarely been driven by specific archaeological research questions and is dominated by a few popular models and techniques, which has in some cases resulted in a routinized explanatory process. This review illustrates, however, the great potential of formal network methods for archaeology and argues that, if this potential is to be applied in a critical way, a broad multi-disciplinary scope is necessary and specific archaeological research contexts should dominate applications.

Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory, 2015

The application of method and theory from network science to archaeology has dramatically increased over the last decade. In this article, we document this growth over time, discuss several of the important concepts that are used in the application of network approaches to archaeology, and introduce the other articles in this special issue on networks in archaeology. We argue that the suitability and contribution of network science techniques within particular archaeological research contexts can be usefully explored by scrutinizing the past phenomena under study, how these are abstracted into concepts, and how these in turn are represented as network data. For this reason, each of the articles in this special issue is discussed in terms of the phenomena that they seek to address, the abstraction in terms of concepts that they use to study connectivity, and the representations of network data that they employ in their analyses. The approaches currently being used are diverse and interdisciplinary, which we think are evidence of a healthy exploratory stage in the application of network science in archaeology. To facilitate further innovation, application, and collaboration, we also provide a glossary of terms that are currently being used in network science and especially those in the applications to archaeological case studies.

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Cambridge Archaeological Journal 24 (2), 2014

It is run on a non-proi t, voluntary basis by postgraduate research students at the University of Cambridge. Although primarily rooted in archaeological theory and practice, ARC increasingly invites a range of perspectives with the aim of establishing a strong, interdisciplinary journal which will be of interest in a range of i elds.

2007

The following discussion provides an introduction to the set of four papers that follow. All of these papers focus on Network Analysis and were presented in a symposium at CAA 2006 organized by the authors. As reflected by the many papers elsewhere in this volume and in previous CAA proceedings, the use of Geographic Information Systems (GIS) in archaeology is now a fundamental for any work with a spatial component. Since the publication of Interpreting Space (Allen et al. 1990), the landmark volume that introduced GIS to the archaeological world, many different aspects of GIS applications in archaeology have developed and flourished. Approaches to landscape analysis have generated some heated theoretical debate as well as innovative methodologies, while data management in general and Cultural Resource Management specifically, are now embedded within these spatial technologies. Interestingly, though, Network Analysis (NA) has largely remained outside of these developments. As descri...

2014

It is run on a non-proi t, voluntary basis by postgraduate research students at the University of Cambridge. Although primarily rooted in archaeological theory and practice, ARC increasingly invites a range of perspectives with the aim of establishing a strong, interdisciplinary journal which will be of interest in a range of i elds.

It is run on a non-proi t, voluntary basis by postgraduate research students at the University of Cambridge. Although primarily rooted in archaeological theory and practice, ARC increasingly invites a range of perspectives with the aim of establishing a strong, interdisciplinary journal which will be of interest in a range of i elds.

Social Network Analysis in Economic Archaeology - Perspectives from the New World, 2019

Understanding connectivity is a key to understanding decision making. Social network analysis offers formalized ways of describing and thus comparing attributes of actors related to each other in networks. Using quantitative spatial data, social network analysis promises deeper insights into how social positions are achieved and developed, as mirrored in the ancient flows of materials. The volume collects contributions of an international conference on network analysis in archaeology, held in 2015 at the University of Cologne as part of the DFG Research Training Group 1878 ‘Archaeology of Pre-Modern Economies’.