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Cognitive Archaeology

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Encyclopedia of Global Archaeology

Introduction and Definition

Cognitive archaeology, or the archaeology of mind, has been broadly defined by Colin Renfrew as the study of past ways of thinking through the material remains that have been unearthed (Renfrew 1982, 1993, 1994). Important to note at the outset is that cognitive archaeology does not attempt to identify what people thought, but rather how they carried out their thinking in interaction with others and the material world. In other words, the archaeology of mind is primarily interested in learning about the different situated processes of human thought as they emerge and take shape in the different cultural trajectories of our species.

The spectrum of abilities that archaeologists have delved into has been wide. Given the position of tools at the starting point of the archaeological record, the technological capacities that were required to manufacture and use them were among the first to be examined. However, it is later-emerging cognitive properties that have...

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Keble College, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK

    Antonis Iliopoulos & Lambros Malafouris

Authors
  1. Antonis Iliopoulos
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  2. Lambros Malafouris
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Correspondence to Antonis Iliopoulos .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Archaeology, Flinders University, Adelaide, SA, Australia

    Claire Smith

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Iliopoulos, A., Malafouris, L. (2014). Cognitive Archaeology. In: Smith, C. (eds) Encyclopedia of Global Archaeology. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4419-0465-2_256

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4419-0465-2_256

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