The Oxford Handbook of Caribbean Archaeology (Oxford Handbooks) - Hardcover

The diversity of articles in this volume provides exposure to parts of the region unfamiliar to me and offered a deeper representation of the complexity and variability of the Caribbean archaeological record than found in previous publications. ... All in all this publication is a superb reference and research source. ... The work of all the contributors strengthens communication among Caribbeanists, makes available current and innovate views of the past, and demonstrates to archaeologists outside the Caribbean how vibrant and innovative Caribbean archaeology has become. I congratulate the editors for putting together this resourceful, imaginative and forward-looking compendium. (L. Antonio Curet, Journal of Caribbean Archaeology)

The Oxford Handbook of Caribbean Archaeology provides an overview of archaeological investigations in the insular Caribbean, understood here as the islands whose shores surround the Caribbean Sea and the islands of the Bahama Archipelago. Though these islands were never isolated from the surrounding mainland, their histories are sufficiently diverse to warrant their identification as distinct areas of culture. Over the past 20 years, Caribbean archaeology has been transformed from a focus on reconstructing culture histories to one on the mobility and exchange expressed in cultural and social dynamics. This Handbook brings together, for the first time, examples of the best research conducted by scholars from across the globe to address the complexity of the Caribbean past.

The Handbook is divided into five sections. Part I, Islands of History and the Precolonial History of the Caribbean Islands, provides an introduction to Caribbean Archaeology and its history. The papers in the following Ethnohistory section address the diversity of cultural practices expressed in the insular Caribbean and develop historical descriptions in concert with archaeological evidence in order to place language, social organization, and the native Taínos and Island Caribs in perspective. The following section, Culture History, provides the latest research on specific geographical locations and cross-cultural engagements, from Jamaica and the Bahama archigelago to the Saladoid and the Isthmo-Antillean Engagements. Creating History, the fourth section, includes papers on specific issues related to the field, such as Zooarchaeology, Rock Art, and DNA analysis, among others. The final section, World History, centers on the consequences of European colonization.