Michael J. Rowland

Size Isn't Everything. Shells in Mounds, Middens and Natural Deposits

The problems in identifying the nature of the depositional processes involved in shell deposits in mounds, middens and natural deposits in Australia are discussed.

Climate Change, Sea-Level Rise And The Archaeological Record

There is an urgent need for heritage researchers and managers to address the issue of climate change and its impact on archaeological sites. Yet, it was apparent from discussions at the Australian Archaeological Associations annual conference at Townsville in 1990 and a recent workshop in Canberra initiated by the Department of the Arts, Sport the Environment and Territories (DASET) (May 1991) that few heritage researchers are fully conversant with greenhouse issues, and that the process of discussion has only just begun. The DASET workshop will result in a publication outlining a range of potential climate change impacts on heritage resources and a strategy for dealing with these. As a contribution to these discussions this paper attempts to provide an introduction to greenhouse literature and issues, and in particular outlines some of the potential impacts of greenhouse effects on Aboriginal coastal sites. Greenhouse impacts need to be considered in the context of other ongoing impacts and these will be addressed in an upcoming review of coastal sites in Queensland.

Pre-European coastal settlement and use of the sea: a view from Queensland

The authors draw attention to the fact that important omissions have been made in the chronology of Australian coastal occupation presented by Nicholson and Cane (1994) in their recent review of the subject. They opine that Nicolson and Cane have omitted crucial data concerning Aboriginal use of the Queensland coast though basic literature of the Queensland coast is easily available.

Accelerated Climate Change and Australia's Cultural Heritage

In the early 1990s, cultural heritage places were identified as likely to be impacted by accelerated (greenhouse) climate change. Subsequently, both at the national and international levels, cultural heritage issues have not been mentioned in agendas requiring adaptive responses. In this paper it is argued that adaptive responses, which include cultural heritage issues, need to be developed. Numerous sites could potentially be impacted by accelerated climate change, particularly in coastal locations. These sites range from indigenous middens, to early European coastal engineering structures. Coastal middens in particular, apart from their obvious value to indigenous owners and archaeologists, are a vast store of palaeo-climate, sea level and biological systems information. They also have ecotourism values. Environmental managers need to be made aware of these broad heritage values, and cultural heritage managers need to assess their professional capabilities to deal with conservation and salvage issues i...

Will the sky fall in? Global warming – an alternative view

Peter Mitchell (2008) has recently suggested in this journal that the world is facing a ‘catastrophe’ due to anthropogenic climate warming. Mitchell divides his commentary into two parts, and asks two key questions: what is the role of the archaeological community and individual archaeologists in this impending catastrophe and, how will this affect our day-to-day practice? I support most points in the second part (see Rowland 2008) but offer some alternative perspectives to issues raised in the first section of Mitchells paper. There is a multiplicity of dimensions to the debate about ‘global warming’ (also referred to as ‘enhanced greenhouse warming’, ‘human-induced climate change’ or ‘anthropogenic warming’), including the socio-political milieu, the climate science itself and resulting government policies and guidelines. Archaeologists/anthropologists have a role to play in each of these areas; in particular the longue durée of the archaeological record can provide some fresh insights, a point on which bothMitchell and I agree. Where I differ fromMitchell is that I see a need to refocus the debate toward issues of sustainability and away from the current over-emphasis on global warming.