Call for Papers

I think this is a great opportunity for someone from an industrial archaeology background to overview current research in IA on quarries and industry...

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From Gabriel Cooney:

Call for Papers: World Archaeology's special issue on stone mines and quarries

New approaches to stone mines and quarries; materials and materiality
A forthcoming issue of World Archaeology (Vol 43 No. 2)

Submission by September 2010 for publication in June 2011. 

It is now over twenty five years since the publication of a World Archaeology issue on stone quarries (WA 16.2). Since that time our understanding of the significance of the recognition, extraction and production of artifacts from particular stone sources has changed dramatically. Analytical approaches allied to the application of a range of scientific techniques have facilitated the discrimination of the use of sources, the tracking of the process of working stone, the nature and scale of production zones and the geographical extent of movement of objects. These advances have been matched by a recognition that in the past stone was not viewed as neutral and inert but rather as animate, alive, with rich symbolic potential and that is useful to think in terms of objects having cultural biographies. The extraction and working of particular stone sources formed an active medium in the creation of identities and memory in a range of social contexts and practices. The value of relating and linking the human working of and engagement with stone at different scales, from the microlithic to the megalithic, is increasingly being recognised. Quarries occur in specific locations but rather than categorising them as peripheral, industrial sites when they are evaluated in the context of the symbolic value placed on stone from particular sources and places in social landscapes, their wider importance can be appreciated. Papers are invited which consider these themes and in particular how advances in investigative approaches have contributed to our understanding of the social role and significance of the working and use of stone in the past.