Volcanic Activity and Human Ecology

Payson D. Sheets, Donald K. Grayson, Payson D. Sheets, Donald K. Grayson

• Publisher: Academic Press
• Year: 2013
• Print ISBN:
  9780126391206
• eBook ISBN:
  9781483263182
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Anthropology
• Index: Social Sciences

Volcanic Activity and Human Ecology deals with dating, chronology, stratigraphy, volcanic activity, and with the impacts of volcanism on animals, plants, human populations, and the environment. Some of the chapters explain how such findings must be weighed against other causes that influence human behavior and survival, such as factors of social customs, climatic change, shifting biogeographic patterns, disease, and the ability to adapt. Each of the chapters that assess the possible human response to volcanism does so by searching for multiple explanations of the archaeological record, avoiding the simple argument that people were dramatically and inevitably overcome by catastrophic geologic events. The book begins with discussions of volcanism as seen by geologists and pedologists. These include s a general overview of volcanoes and volcanism; a review of the production, dispersal, and properties of tephra and of the geologic methods used to study tephra; and the nature of volcanic soils and their economic impact. Subsequent chapters use the geologic and modern records to examine volcanoes as hazards to people. The final series of papers deals with the interrelationships between volcanism and human occupations as seen through the archaeological, paleobotanical, and paleozoological records.

Table of contents

• Front Cover
• Volcanic Activity and Human Ecology
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• Dedication
• List of Contributors
• Foreword
• Chapter 1. Introduction
• Chapter 2. Volcanoes and Their Activity
• Chapter 3. Geologic Methods in Studies of Quaternary Tephra
• Chapter 4. Soils Derived from Tephra
• Chapter 5. On the Damage Caused by Volcanic Eruptions with Special Reference to Tephra and Gases
• Chapter 6. Volcanoes as Hazard: An Overview
• Chapter 7. Volcanic-Hazards Studies in the Cascade Range of the Western United States
• Chapter 8. Contemporary Responses to Volcanism: Case Studies from the Cascades and Hawaii
• Chapter 9. Effects of the Eruption of Paricutin Volcano on Landforms, Vegetation, and Human Occupancy
• Chapter 10. Impact of Parícutin on Five Communities
• Chapter 11. The Significance of Volcanism in the Prehistory of Subarctic Northwest North America
• Chapter 12. People and Pumice on the Alaska Peninsula
• Chapter 13. Pollen Influx and the Deposition of Mazama and Glacier Peak Tephra
• Chapter 14. Mount Mazama, Climatic Change, and Fort Rock Basin Archaeofaunas
• Chapter 15. Sunset Crater and the Sinagua: A New Interpretation
• Chapter 16. Comparative Effects of Climatic Change, Cultural Impact, and Volcanism in the Paleoecology of Flagstaff, Arizona, A.D. 900-1300
• Chapter 17. Environmental and Cultural Effects of the lIopango Eruption in Central America
• Chapter 18. The Eruption of Thera and Minoan Crete
• Chapter 19. Pompeii and Mount Vesuvius, A.D. 79
• Chapter 20. Volcanic Disasters and the Archaeological Record
• Subject Index