2022-10-05 - BB: Breaking the Learning Curve - F.V. De Peña
Channel: Archaeological Research Facility, UC Berkeley
Date: 07/10/2022

Breaking the Learning Curve: Assessing Flintknapper Skill at the Epipalaeolithic Site of Kharaneh IV, Jordan
ARF Brownbag | October 5 | 12:10-1 p.m. | 101 2251 College (Archaeological Research Facility)
Speaker: Felicia V. De Peña, Statistical Research Inc.
Sponsor: Archaeological Research Facility
Abstract: Learning is a fundamental aspect of the human condition. It allows us to interact within a world of socially constructed meanings and to create individual and group identities (Jarvis 2012; Lave and Wenger 1991; Wenger 1998). My research investigates knowledge transmission during the Epipalaeolithic Period at the hunter-gatherer site of Kharaneh IV (≈20,000 BP) (Maher and MacDonald 2013) and argues that stone tool production (flintknapping) can be viewed as a practice that reflects normative rules guiding the interactions of flintknapping communities in the ancient past.
Evidence of the practice can shed light on an ancient habitus related to learning and participating within a community of practice (Lave and Wenger 1991; Wallaert 2012; Takakura 2013). As flintknapping is a reductive process, debitage is the basis of analysis rather than the final tool form as each removal of flint during the production process preserves prior removal scars and indicates how an individual piece was removed. Through experimental work, I explored skill level expression among modern flintknappers in order to determine the expressed skill of Epipalaeolithic flintknappers at Kharaneh IV. Statistical analysis and refitting lithic artifacts allowed for spatial analysis of skill level expression within an Epipalaeolithic flintknapping floor and provided insight to the habitus constructed within the flintknapping community of practice at Kharaneh IV.