Seeing and Knowing

David S. Whitley, Nick Walker, Eva Walderhaug, Patricia Vinnicombe, Benjamin Smith, Tore Saetersdal, Neil Price, Sven Ouzman, David Morris, Johannes Loubser, Lawrence L. Loendorf, Imogene L. Lim, Knut Helskog, Julie E. Francis, Edward B. Eastwood, Margaret W. Conkey, Clottes Jean, Christopher Chippindale, Geoffrey Blundell

Description

It is largely through the work of David Lewis-Williams that San rock art has come to be understood so well, as a complex symbolic and metaphoric representation of San religious beliefs and practices. The purpose of this volume is to demonstrate the depth and wide geographical impact of Lewis-Williams’ contribution, with particular emphasis on the use of theory and methodology drawn from ethno­graphy that he has used with inspirational effect in understanding the meaning and context of rock art in various parts of the world. Seeing and Knowing explores how to understand and learn from rock art with and without ethnography. Because many of the chapters are based on solid fieldwork and ethnographic research, they offer a new body of work that provides the evidence for differentiation between knowing and simply seeing. This volume is unique in that it focuses exclusively on rock art and ethnography, and covers such a wide geographic range of examples on this topic, from southern Africa, to Scandinavia, to the United States. Many of the chapters explore studies in rock art regions of the world where variation and constancy can be observed and explored across distances both in space and in time. The editors have entitled the book Seeing and Knowing to echo Lewis-Williams’ Believing and Seeing published almost thirty years ago; they say ‘seeing’ again because looking at rock art is and will always be central, and then what is seen when human eyes and minds look; they say ‘knowing’ in recognition that, by his work and by his example, archaeologists now know a little more than they knew before. Even so, as Lewis-Williams will be the first to say, we still know only a fraction.

Sujets

• Social Science
• Sociologie, société et politique
• Archaeology
• Anthropology
• Social
• Culture

Informations

• Publié par: WITS University Press
• Date de parution: 01 décembre 2010
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781868148059
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 6 Mo

Extrait

This collection of essays makes a relevant and significant contribution to the field of rock art research. Many of the chapters are based on solid fieldwork and ethnography that offer a new body of evidence for differentiation between knowing and simply seeing.
- JANETTE DEACON
SEEING AND KNOWING
UNDERSTANDING ROCK ART WITH AND WITHOUT ETHNOGRAPHY
This is the third volume in the Rock Art Research Institute Monograph Series
Other titles in the series:
People of the Eland (2009) - Patricia Vinnicombe
The Eland s People (2009) - Edited by Peter Mitchell and Benjamin Smith
SEEING AND KNOWING
UNDERSTANDING ROCK ART WITH AND WITHOUT ETHNOGRAPHY
EDITED BY
GEOFFREY BLUNDELL
CHRISTOPHER CHIPPINDALE
BENJAMIN SMITH
Published in South Africa by
Wits University Press
1 Jan Smuts Avenue
Johannesburg
South Africa
http://witspress.wits.ac.za
Published edition copyright Wits University Press 2010
Compilation copyright Edition editors 2010
Chapter copyright Individual contributers 2010
First published 2010
The publishers gratefully acknowledge financial support for this publication from the Rock Art Research Institute, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg.
All royalties from the sale of this book will be donated to the Rock Art Endowment Fund of the Rock Art Research Institute.
ISBN 978-1-86814-513-3 (print)
ISBN 978-1-86814-805-9 (EPUB - IPG)
ISBN 978-1-86814-806-6 (EPUB - ROW)
ISBN 978-1-86814-716-8 (PDF)
ISBN 978-1-77614-143-2 (MOBI)
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the written permission of the publisher, except in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright Act, Act 98 of 1978.
Edited by Lee Smith
Cover design by Hothouse South Africa
Layout and design by Hothouse South Africa
Printed and bound by Ultra Litho (Pty) Limited
This volume is dedicated to David Lewis-Williams
Contents
Contributors
Acronyms
Chapter 1 Rock art with and without ethnography
GEOFFREY BLUNDELL, CHRISTOPHER CHIPPINDALE AND BENJAMIN SMITH
The Lewis-Williams revolution: Studying rock art in southern Africa and beyond
The dual ethnographic-neuropsychological approach: The classic style of study in the classic area
Extending beyond the classic style of study in the classic area
From South Africa to the world, from informed methods to formal methods
Understanding rock art: Informed methods, formal methods, and the uniformitarian issues
This book
Chapter 2 Flashes of brilliance: San rock paintings of heaven s things
SVEN OUZMAN
Heavenly bodies, human imaginations
Heaven on earth in Africa
Stellar sites in South Africa
Age determinations
Potency, astral travel and agency
Future horizons
Chapter 3 Snake and veil: The rock engravings of Driekopseiland, Northern Cape, South Africa
DAVID MORRIS
Driekopseiland
Who, and why? Stow s account
Bushman or Korana - and other preoccupations
What, and how old?
Towards an archaeological context
Towards meaning
Driekopseiland landscape and history
Chapter 4 Cups and saucers: A preliminary investigation of the rock carvings of Tsodilo Hills, northern Botswana
NICK WALKER
Tsodilo Hills
The carvings
Local beliefs
Antiquity
Meaning
Conclusions
Chapter 5 Art and authorship in southern African rock art: Examining the Limpopo-Shashe Confluence Area
EDWARD B. EASTWOOD, GEOFFREY BLUNDELL AND BENJAMIN SMITH
Rock art and regionality
The study area, its environs, and rock art traditions
Towards understanding the historical context
Evidence from excavation
Evidence from archaeo-linguistic studies and historical sources
Evidence from the rock art
Implications
Chapter 6 Archaeology, ethnography, and rock art: A modern-day study from Tanzania
IMOGENE L. LIM
Tanzania: Rock art and ethnography
Location, location, location
Sandawe praxis: Iyari
Metaphors for fertility: Objects and colour
Rain-calling
Archaeology and ethnography in rock art studies: Lessons from the Sandawe
Chapter 7 Art and belief: The ever-changing and the never-changing in the Far West
DAVID S. WHITLEY
Ethnography and North American rock art
Beyond the tyranny of the ethnographic record
The conservatism of culture
The essentialist challenge
Situating cultural stability and change
Making supernatural power personal: The emergence of Numic bands and headmen
Long-term uses of summarising symbols
Elaborating symbols: Where power becomes personal
Conservatism versus change
Chapter 8 Crow Indian elk love-medicine and rock art in Montana and Wyoming
LAWRENCE L. LOENDORF
Love-magic and the American elk
Elk images at rock art sites in Montana and Wyoming
Summary
Chapter 9 Layer by layer: Precision and accuracy in rock art recording and dating
JOHANNES LOUBSER
Background: Informed and formal approaches in conjunction
El Rat n and its rock paintings
People of the Sierra de San Francisco
Recording methods and techniques
Relative stratigraphy and dating at El Rat n
Provisional sequence at El Rat n and some implications for interpretation
Placement and depiction of motifs in El Rat n
Chapter 10 From the tyranny of the figures to the interrelationship between myths, rock art and their surfaces
KNUT HELSKOG
The tyranny
Choosing the surface
The panels
Understanding the elk
Conclusion
Chapter 11 Composite creatures in European Palaeolithic art
JEAN CLOTTES
Identifying composite creatures
Man-beast
Beast-man
Humans and animals
Chapter 12 Thinking strings: On theory, shifts and conceptual issues in the study of Palaeolithic art
MARGARET W. CONKEY
After a founding text
On theory and theorising
Shifts in and for the study of Palaeolithic art
Intellectual shifts and new perspectives
Thinking strings: Some different conceptual directions
Are there conclusions ?
Chapter 13 Rock art without ethnography? A history of attitude to rock art and landscape at Fr ysj en, western Norway
EVA WALDERHAUG
Rock art and ethnography
Rock art of western Norway and western Mozambique
Pre-contact natural history and ethnohistory at Fr ysj en
The post-contact period: A grand discovery, and its aftermath
Fr ysj en ethnography and the making of the hunting-magic explanation
After hunting magic: The past in the present
Romancing a mountain: Folklore and myth at Fr ysj en
In the footsteps of Gjessing until paths divide: A brief return to southern Africa
The value of present-day ethnographies and ethnohistory
Chapter 14 Meaning cannot rest or stay the same
PATRICIA VINNICOMBE
What is the meaning of your work?
Fluidity of oral tradition
Images are real
A seamless unity
Mimesis
Access to power
Structure
Chapter 15 Manica rock art in contemporary society
TORE S TERSDAL
Studying rock art in Manica Province, Mozambique
The geography of Manica
The rock art of Manica
Manica Valley
Art in the Guidingue area
Archaeological excavations
Shona history and ethnohistory
Discussion: Art then and art now
Chapter 16 Oral tradition, ethnography, and the practice of North American archaeology
JULIE E. FRANCIS AND LAWRENCE L. LOENDORF
The changing shape of North American archaeology
Rock art and the new archaeology
Rock art and the newer archaeology
Examples: Ethnography, oral tradition and understanding
Integration of ethnographic information and traditional archaeological data: Implications for archaeology
Chapter 17 Beyond rock art: Archaeological interpretation and the shamanic frame
NEIL PRICE
Introduction: Southern African rock art research, in southern Africa and elsewhere
Diversity and definition in a shamanic archaeology
Shamanism: The big question
The antiquity of shamanism
Shamanism and the indigenous voice
Archaeological interpretation and the shamanic frame
List of figures
List of tables
List of publications by David Lewis-Williams
Index
Contributors
Geoffrey Blundell
Rock Art Research Institute, University of the Witwatersrand, Private Bag 3, PO WITS 2050, South Africa
[e-mail]
Christopher Chippindale
Cambridge University Museum of Archaeology Anthropology, Downing Street, Cambridge CB2 3DZ, England; Rock Art Research Institute, University of the Witwatersrand, Private Bag 3,PO WITS 2050 Gauteng, South Africa; School of Archaeology Anthropology, Australian National University, Canberra ACT 0200, Australia
[e-mail]
Jean Clottes
11 rue du Fourcat, 09000 Foix, France
[e-mail]
Margaret W. Conkey
Archaeological Research Facility and Department of Anthropology, University of California, Berkeley, CA. USA 94720-3710
[e-mail]
Edward B. Eastwood
Ed Eastwood passed away during the preparation of this volume. The editors pay tribute to an archaeologist who made an exceptional contribution to the field of rock art studies.
Julie E. Francis
1403 Curtis Street, Laramie WY 82070, USA
[e-mail]
Knut Helskog
Department of Cultural Sciences, Troms University Museum, 9037 Troms , Norway
[e-mail]
Imogene L. Lim
Department of Anthropology, Vancouver Island University, formerly Malaspina University-College. 900 Fifth Street, Nanaimo, BC, V9R 5S5 Canada
[e-mail]
Lawrence L. Loendorf
Albuquerque, New Mexico, USA
[e-mail]
Johannes Loubser
Stratum Unlimited, LLC, 10011 Carrington Lane, Alpharetta, GA 30022, USA
Rock Art Research Institute, University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa
[e-mail]
David Morris
McGregor Museum, PO Box 316, Kimberley, Northern Cape 8300, South Africa
[e-mail]
Sven Ouzman
Department of Anthropology and Archaeology, University of Pretoria, Tswane 0002, South Africa
[e-mail]
Neil Price
Department of Archaeology, University of Abe