SESSIONS

Ethnobiology, a bridging discipline between environmental ethics and ecological science, investigates human biological impacts on species and traditional biological knowledge and practices of communities worldwide. Ethnobiological approaches in archaeology have conventionally relied on analogies with contemporary cropping and herding systems to reconstruct past practices, grounded in the uniformitarian assumption that biological and ecological constraints have remained broadly consistent over time. This session proposes a shift of perspective: can insights drawn from past systems inform contemporary strategies for sustainable farming and how should we frame archaeological data to enhance its relevance and utility?

Agroecology combines scientific and socio-political approaches: it applies ecological principles to farming systems while simultaneously recognizing and empowering the knowledge and decision-making authority of indigenous groups and smallholder farmers. In contrast to conventional agronomy, which emphasizes yield maximization, agroecology focuses on “ecological intensification”, prioritizing ecological processes to guide farm management, thus shifting the focus from production optimization and food security to food sustainability and inclusivity. Archaeology offers empirical insights into long-term interactions between human activity and ecosystem processes that are not evident from observations of contemporary systems alone. Despite this potential, archaeological evidence has been underutilized in informing agroecological theory and practice. This session examines how integrating archaeological data can strengthen the development of knowledge-based, sustainable, and resilient agroecological strategies.

Agricultural anthropology addresses global sustainability challenges while remaining attentive to local contexts, exploring how environmental conditions, technological choices, and cultural practices shape agricultural systems. It emphasizes the pivotal role of indigenous knowledge, smallholder practices, and locally adapted solutions, highlighting how communities historically managed their environments to maintain productive and resilient agroecosystems. Different regions have followed distinct agricultural trajectories, shaped by environmental constraints and historical legacies. In many areas of the world, traditional knowledge has been lost, making archaeology a key source for reconstructing local long-term agroecological trajectories. This session explores how long-term perspectives can help develop contemporary and future farming and food systems through a dialogue between past and present knowledge.