Developing Demographic Proxies for Archaic Faunal Database Integration

In conjunction with multi-scalar integrative faunal research on the use of aquatic resources by Archaic period hunter-gatherers, the EAFWG has been required to focus on both environmental and demographic reconstructions for both specific locales and larger regions within the interior of the North American Eastern Woodlands. Although the importance of social and ethnic factors has increasingly been recognized, both environmental change and variability and human population growth and aggregation have been cited as explanations for spatial and temporal variation in the intensity with which aquatic fauna were utilized by Archaic people. However, reconstruction of human demographic variability has not been consistently considered across the region nor have methods of estimating demographic change among hunter-gatherers been fully explored. Archaeological site file data, although incomplete and inadequate, must be the basic source of information on population growth and aggregation. In this poster I review possible approaches to these problems and report on our pilot study of demographic proxies. It is our contention that as archaeologists increasingly address macro-scale research projects, new methodological approaches must be developed.