Defining and Measuring Diversity in Archaeology

Metin I. Eren is an Associate Professor of Anthropology at Kent State University and a Research Associate at the Cleveland Museum of Natural History. He is Co-Director of the Kent State University Experimental Archaeology Laboratory and has conducted research in North America, Europe, Africa, and Asia. A master flintknapper, Eren knaps, uses, shoots, and breaks stone technologies from across the Stone Age to figure out how they work and to better understand technological evolution.

• List of IllustrationsForewordMichael J. O’Brien and David Hurst ThomasIntroduction: On the Challenges of Measuring Diversity in ArchaeologyBriggs Buchanan and Metin I. ErenChapter 1. Dispersion and Diversity: Parfleche Variation on the Great Plains vs. the Columbia PlateauStephen J. LycettChapter 2. The Diversity of North America’s “Old Copper” Projectile PointsMichelle R. Bebber and Anne ChaoChapter 3. Diversity in Hunter-Gatherer ArchitectureBrian Andrews, Danielle Macdonald, and Brooke MorganChapter 4. The Potential of Coverage-Based Rarefaction in ZooarchaeologyJ. Tyler Faith and Andrew DuChapter 5. Diversity and Lithic Microwear: Quantification, Classification, and StandardizationW. James Stemp and Danielle A. MacdonaldChapter 6. Intensification Mechanisms Driving Dietary Change among the Great Plains Big Game Hunters of North AmericaErik Otárola-Castillo, Melissa G. Torquato, and Matthew E. HillAppendix 6.1: Summary Information for Archaeological Sites Used in This StudyChapter 7. Challenges and Prospects of Richness and Diversity Measures in PaleoethnobotanyAlan Farahani and R. J. SinenskyAppendix 7.1: Abundance of Reproductive Plant Parts Recovered from the Las Capas Site, Southeastern Arizona, 1220–730 BCE 205Chapter 8. Quantifying Evenness of Paleoindian Projectile Point Forms within Geographic Regions of Eastern North AmericaMatthew T. Boulanger, Ryan P. Breslawski, and Ian A. JorgesonChapter 9. Thinking about Diversity in Material Culture at Multiple ScalesSteven L. KuhnChapter 10. Measuring and Comparing Class Diversity in Archaeological Assemblages: A Brief Guide to the History and State-of-the-Art in Diversity StatisticsRobert K. Colwell and Anne ChaoEpilogue: Diversity Metrics are Convenient, but Their Archaeological Meanings Are Still ObscureR. Lee LymanIndex

“I think it is an important volume for archaeologists to mine the work of all of these incredible researchers for a greater understanding of what diversity can tell us about within our assemblages and regions, and the chapters provide approaches for a diversity of archaeological materials that has something for almost any archaeologist no matter what their specialty or focus.” • Christopher Wolff, University at Albany