ANT101H5 Lecture Notes - Lecture 12: Karl August Wittfogel, Written Language, Anthropocene
Document Summary
Neolithic village to 1st urban centers - cultural change: Civilization: larger social order of states related by language, traditions, history, economics, and other shared cultural aspects. What defines a civilization: cities: urban centers, social stratification, states: centralized authority. Theories of civilizations emergence: environmental, hydraulic theory (karl wittfogel, trade networks, cultural. 1. environmental & social circumscription (rob carneiro: information theory (trigger) institutions, control of communication, social stratification due to competition for scarce resources, control of increasing production required decision making, religion (mesoamerica, divination (china, action (marcus & flannery) 1. mesopotamia: egypt, indus valley, china, mesoamerica & peru. Southwest asia (greater mesopotamia: 6500 ya ubaid villagers, 6000 4000 ya initial cultural complexity, evidence. Prevent high & unstable rates of population growth. Rights for women & children & slaves. Old kingdom (4575-4150 ya: first unification period, pharoah, hieroglyphic writing system pictographs, monumental architecture pyramids of giza. Indus valley civilization: 5300 ya, farmers came to indus floodplain, 4600 ya, several urban centers.
