Ecological Approaches Provide a Strong

¶ … ecological approaches provide a strong perspective to understanding complex relationships between humans & the biosphere?

Whether the thesis statement regarding ecological approaches giving rise to a strong understanding of complex relationships between humans and the biosphere is accurate is a function of the knowledge obtained via archeological studies and digs that have revealed information into the interrelationships between human society and the biosphere. This essay will take a critical assessment by reviewing the literature on the topic of ecological approaches in investigation human history to determine whether these approaches provide a 'powerful perspective' for understanding complex interrelationships between humans and the biosphere.

Prior to continuing the discussion, the statement must be addressed according to the stated definition(s) for the various ecological approaches. According to Balee (1998), "Ecological factors never operate in a cultural vacuum nor do the enduring patterns of language, kinship, and cultural values that every individual inherits prevent adaptation to a material environment -- R.McC. Netting (1986:101) (Balee, pg. 13, 1998)

Here we have the identifiers that archaeologists will look to obtain through research in the field. Patterns of language change as evidenced through writing tablets and other forms of communication including stone and clay writing. Social mores including kinship and cultural values (Balee, 1998) in many societies prevent the population from becoming intertwined with the ecological environment around them. Arguably, the Native Americans and the early primitive tribes during the Neolithic and Dark Ages would not fit this description.

Therefore, the notion of humans throughout the evolution cycle having different relationships with the environment, some not having a connected relationship with the environment, has existed throughout the tenure of man's existence on the planet Earth. According to Balee (1998), "Historical ecology concerns itself with interrelationships between human beings and the biosphere, that part of the earth suffused with life. Historical ecology clearly requires data drawn from a multitude of disciplines (Crurnley, 1996), even though it is centered on humans." (Balee, pg. 13, 1998)

Historical Ecology

Historical ecology ostensibly is the ecological approach of interest. Here, we have the historical examination of the interrelationship between humans and the biosphere. The draw from multiple disciplines includes primarily that of archeology, but also of anthropology, linguistics, languages, and history. According to Balee (1998), "If the human species is somehow unique in its relationship to the biosphere, this many not necessarily be because it has always and everywhere influenced other life forms on Earth. Rather, humans may demonstrate historically a greater potential than any other species to affect biodiversity and the biosphere generally. In addition, they have evinced high adaptability to a wider range of habitats, as well as technologies that are distinctive properties with historical implications." (Balee, pg. 15, 1998)

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Some important points, according to Balee (1998), "I would reiterate in this context a definition of resource management: "the human manipulation of inorganic and organic components of the environment that brings about a net environmental diversity greater than that of so-called pristine conditions, with no human presence" (Balee, 1994; 116; emphasis in the original). Once archaeological research in France and England during the 1850's proved that human beings and extinct animals of the Pleistocene had been contemporaneous, the famous geologist Charles Lyell declared that the antiquity of man "throws great light on extermination of animals, and in Denmark, of trees" (quoted in Grayson 1984b:24). (Balee, pg. 17, 1998)

Now that we've established a link between humans and the biosphere using archeological artifacts as evidence, we can look into the benchmark data that is available regarding the ecological approach. An introduction into population benchmarks is provided by McNiven & Bedingfield (2007), "A common issue with managing endangered species is establishing pre-impact population benchmarks using a combination of modern ecological and historical data, and determining the appropriateness of these benchmarks as targets for modern conservation (e.g. Jackson et al., 2001; Marsh et al., 2005; Roman and Palumbi, 2003). (Balee, pg. 17. 1998)

McNiven & Bedingfield (2008) point to an example of archeological research that uncovers early records of animal "superabundances" in what is now geographically "California are inappropriate as management benchmarks as such observations were not of pre-colonial intact, pristine populations but of rebound populations after local Native American hunting decreased drastically in the wake of depopulation through introduced diseases (Broughton, 2004). Clearly, modern conservation management can benefit from archeological research (e.g. Lyman, 1996; Lauwerier and Plug, 2004). (McNiven, Bedingfield, pg. 505, 2008)

The relationship between the biosphere and humans perhaps can be analyzed by the relationships between the biosphere and the Dugong dugon (McNiven, Bedingfield, 2008). According to McNiven & Bedingfield (2008), "The dugong, Dugong dugon is a herbivorous marine mammal growing to about 3 m in length and 400 kg in weight. Torres Strait, located between the Australian and New Guinean mainlands, is considered 'the most important dugong habitat in the world' (Heinsohn et al., 2004: 417). As such, successful management of dugong populations in Torres Strait is considered prerequisite to the long-term viability of the species globally (Marsh et al., 2002). (McNiven, Bedingfield, pg. 505-506, 2008)

The biosphere gives rise to the habitat of the Dugong dugon and enables the species to thrive. According to McNiven & Bedingfield (2008), "Archeological excavation of dugong bones from settlement sites reveals that dugong hunting in Torres Strait has an antiquity of at least 4000 years (Crouch et al., 2007)." (McNiven, Bedingfield, pg. 506, 2008) Hunting and hunting techniques were borne and shaped by early humans to enable the proliferation of the species in adaptable environments. The rate of adaptability is a function of one's ability to successfully engage the environment.

The biosphere appears to be a cultivator of human activity rather than humans as an engager into an interrelationship with the biosphere. From the evidence submitted for consideration as presented through archaeological finds, up to this point, there appears to be a link between earth and species that originate or thrive based on carbon life and the biodiversity that enables carbon-based life to thrive.

According to Luby & Gruber (1999), "Archaeological sites which contain the remains of shellfish as their primary constituent are common in several coastal areas of the world. Usually called 'shellmiddens' or 'shellmounds', sites of this kind are found in Australia and New Zealand (Bailey 1975); Baily et al. 1994; Jones 1968; Lourandos 1997; Shawcross 1967; Stratham 1892; Sullivan 1984), South Africa (Buchanan 1988; Henshilwood et al. 1994; Jerardino & Yates 1997; Parkington 1991), and Japan (Aikens & Higuchi 1982; Aikens & Rhee 1992; Akazawa 1986). We believe that shellmounds, as places of habitation and burial, may offer a key, in and of themselves, for understanding the early inhabitants of the San Francisco Bay area and other central California coastal peoples." (Luby Gruber, 1999)

Given the propensity for garnering an understanding of early peoples to the Bay area, the correlation that coastal primitive peoples from the aforementioned locations will be as strong and as positive for San Francisco's Bay area is probable. These positive effects of using ecological approaches to study and investigate human history have generated a viable understanding of the interrelationship between humans and the biosphere. By understanding the relationship of other mammals including the dugon via archaeological evidence, insight into early human history beyond the limited archeological evidence that goes back from 5,000 to 400,000

years.

The ecological historical approach appears to have generated the most useful analysis of human interaction and engagement with the biosphere as a function of investigation into human past. Some may argue that the evidence is rather circumstantial and not factually verifiable as would be through empirical testing. Perhaps that is a negative of the historical ecological approach.

The next phase of the research will investigate the human impact on ancient ecosystems (Erlandson, Rick, 2010). According to Erlandson & Rick (2010), "There is growing interest in the archaeological study of human impacts on ancient ecosystems, including the dynamic roles humans have played in the extinction of animal species, habitat changes, and the collapse of complex cultures (Diamond 2005, Lyman & Cannon 2004, Redman et al. 2004). Proving that humans were the primary cause of ancient animal extinctions can be complicated (Grayson 2001), but significant human contributions to extinctions or other environmental impacts have been proposed for late Pleistocene Australia (Miller et al. 1999, Roberts et al. 2001) and the Americas (e.g., Martin 2002), some Caribbean Islands in the early Holocene (Steadman et al. 2005), and many Pacific Islands in the late Holocene (Anderson 1989, Kirch & Hunt 1997, Steadman 2006). (Erlandson, Rick, pg. 234, 2010)

Archaeological evidence pointing to human involvement in the extinction of late Pleistocene Australian species is circumstantial evidence of animal extinctions as a negative impact onto the biosphere. The ecological approach of Anthropogenic Ecological Change (Erlandson, Rick, pg.234, 2010) has positive and negative aspects as an ecological approach to explain the interrelationship using archeological means. This approach chooses to pit humans against other mammals within its environment and consider the hunt for resources as a cause of extinction of a species. The positive aspect is to describe the nexus between the biosphere and early human development.

According to Fitzpatrick & Keegan (2010), "This use of historical ecology to study "the complex, historical interactions between human populations and the ecosystems they have inhabited" (Kirch 1997a, p.2; see also Crumley (ed.) 1994), has been applied in other parts of the world to observe anthropogenic changes through time. Archaeologists, influenced by a wide array of scientific fields, have taken a keen interest in understanding how humans adapted, influenced, modified, and impacted their environment. This is a difficult endeavor, however, because "environments change and the magnitude of change are never constant" (O'Brien 2001, pp. 29-30). (Fitzpatrick, Keegan, pg. 30, 2007)

Fitzpatrick & Keegan point to the uses of historical ecology to investigate the interrelationships between humans and the biosphere. The importance of noting environmental changes as separate from human involvement may be erroneous. Environmental changes are hinted by proponents of historical ecology to have been initiated by humans through their interaction with the environment. The negative aspect of historical ecology, through the interaction, the killing of other species for survival, and the depletion of life sustaining natural resources such as trees and plants, archaeological findings have determine human's early complex interrelationship with the biosphere.

According to Bird et al. (2002), "The relative importance of various types of shellfish in contemporary Meriam diets is not reflected in either the contemporary accumulations of shell or in the proportional representation of shells in the prehistoric assemblage. Overall, the results of our analysis show that the variability in both contemporary and prehistoric Meriam shell assemblages is consistent with the hypothesis that foragers in the past selected a similar range of prey types and field processed them in a manner that increase the rate at which edible flesh could be delivered to a central locale." (Bird et al., pg. 467, 2002)