Submit your abstracts now for The Connected Past

We are delighted to announce the next Connected Past conference (networks and complexity in archaeology and history), which will take place in Aarhus Denmark on 24-25 September. The call for papers is open now until 15 March.

CALL FOR PAPERS

The Connected Past 2020: Artefactual Intelligence

https://connectedpast.net

September 24-25, Aarhus University

Abstracts (max. 250 words) should be sent to connectedpast2020@gmail.com

Deadline: March, 15th 2020*

Please include your name, affiliation, and your choice of session format (20 minute thematic presentation or 10 minute work-in-progress presentation)

*The scientific committee will seek to communicate its decision before mid-April 2020

Our keynote speakers are Marcia-Anne Dobres on agency in archaeology and Juan Barceló on Artificial Intelligence in archaeology.

Computational models used by archaeologists are becoming increasingly complex. We create and tackle ever larger datasets, include more parameters and make machines learn by themselves. Recent approaches to network theory in archaeology, and the historical sciences more generally, have embraced agents, agency and practice theory. But where does this leave objects? Since the earliest days of the discipline, objects have been at the core of the archaeologist’s enquiry. However, until recently, objects were left heavily undertheorised. With the advance of object-related theories, such as ANT or the New Materialism approaches, agency is extended not just to humans but to the objects and materials they handle as well. Does this mean that digital archaeologists and historians are to move from Artificial Intelligence to Artifactual Intelligence? And if so, how?

Being a community of scholars interested in recent theoretical and methodological innovations in archaeology and the historical sciences, the Connected Past Conference provides a forum for presenting and discussing ongoing work on the intersection between archaeology,  history, digital approaches and theory. The conference will be preceded by a two-day practical workshop (limited capacity, open call for participants to follow soon).

This year’s conference focuses specifically on the topic of artefacts, human and material agency, artificial and artefactual intelligence and their place within archaeological and historical network studies. In addition, we also welcome presentations on any topic related to archaeological or historical network research and complexity science.

We invite abstracts for 20-minute presentations on these and related topics for consideration to the scientific committee. In addition, there will be a session on general topics related to network science in archaeology and the historical sciences. We equally welcome abstracts for 10-minute presentations on work-in-progress.

Conference organisers:

Lieve Donnellan

Rubina Raja

Søren Sindbæk

Tom Brughmans

Get in touch!

Email: connectedpast2020@gmail.com

Website: https://connectedpast.net

Twitter: #TCPAarhus

The Connected Past 2020 in Aarhus

Delighted to announce the next instalment of The Connected Past, this time in Aarhus Denmark. The call for papers deadline is 15 March, submit your abstracts to connectedpast2020@gmail.com

Conference website

#TCPAarhus

September 24-25, Aarhus University

Artefactual Intelligence

Preceded by a two-day workshop 22-23 September (more information to follow).

Call for Papers now open (deadline 15 March)

Abstracts (max. 250 words) should be sent to connectedpast2020@gmail.com

Before March, 15th 2020*

Please include your name, affiliation, and your choice of session format (20 minute thematic presentation or 10 minute work-in-progress presentation)

*The scientific committee will seek to communicate its decision before mid-April 2020

Our keynote speakers are Marcia-Anne Dobres on agency in archaeology and Juan Barceló on Artificial Intelligence in archaeology.

Computational models used by archaeologists are becoming increasingly complex. We create and tackle ever larger datasets, include more parameters and make machines learn by themselves. Recent approaches to network theory in archaeology, and the historical sciences more generally, have embraced agents, agency and practice theory. But where does this leave objects? Since the earliest days of the discipline, objects have been at the core of the archaeologist’s enquiry. However, until recently, objects were left heavily undertheorised. With the advance of object-related theories, such as ANT or the New Materialism approaches, agency is extended not just to humans but to the objects and materials they handle as well. Does this mean that digital archaeologists and historians are to move from Artificial Intelligence to Artifactual Intelligence? And if so, how?

Being a community of scholars interested in recent theoretical and methodological innovations in archaeology and the historical sciences, the Connected Past Conference provides a forum for presenting and discussing ongoing work on the intersection between archaeology,  history, digital approaches and theory. The conference will be preceded by a two-day practical workshop (limited capacity, open call for participants to follow soon).

This year’s conference focuses specifically on the topic of artefacts, human and material agency, artificial and artefactual intelligence and their place within archaeological and historical network studies. In addition, we also welcome presentations on any topic related to archaeological or historical network research and complexity science.

We invite abstracts for 20-minute presentations on these and related topics for consideration to the scientific committee. In addition, there will be a session on general topics related to network science in archaeology and the historical sciences. We equally welcome abstracts for 10-minute presentations on work-in-progress.

Conference organisers:

Lieve Donnellan
Rubina Raja
Søren Sindbæk
Tom Brughmans

Get in touch! connectedpast2020@gmail.com

The Connected Past Oxford: in numbers

Next week we will host the next edition of The Connected Past conference, this time in Oxford. The response to the conference has been overwhelming. 65 abstracts were received but only 30 could be accepted if we wanted to avoid parallel sessions. With 117 expected delegates this will be the largest event in the series. We are expecting colleagues from 17 countries and 66 institutions. Interestingly but perhaps not surprisingly, the gender split among delegates is almost 50/50 but only 32% of named authors of papers are female. This proportion is luckily increasing over the years but it’s clearly something for our community to work on.

Have a look at the infographic below. Can you spot how much wine each delegate will receive? I think it will be sufficient 🙂

The Connected Past: register now!

Registration is open for ‘The Connected Past 2017: The future of past networks?’.

More information on the conference website: http://connectedpast.net/

What? a multi-disciplinary conference on network research for the study of the human past

When? 24-25 August 2017

Where? Bournemouth, UK

Registration price: £35

Full Programme: http://connectedpast.net/other-events/bournemouth-2017/conference-programme/

Registration link: http://connectedpast.net/other-events/bournemouth-2017/registration/

Everyone is welcome to join discussions on a wide range of topics in a friendly and constructive atmosphere.

Overarching methodological topics to be addressed include:

• networks of individuals
• temporal change in networks
• networks and geographical space
• categorisation
• material similarity
• research design
• transport networks

Individual papers will cover a wide range of topics in archaeology, history, classics, physics, geography and computer science:

• medieval witness networks
• papyri networks
• networks of medieval heresy
• machine time
• the world bank in Colombia
• urban networks
• ideology
• cityscape movement
• movement along the Roman frontiers
• neolithisation
• Iron Age elites
• Neolithic material networks
• ceramics and political economies
• agent-based modelling
• protohistoric transportation networks
• Greco-Roman festivals
• shipwrecks and maritime networks

We look forward to welcoming you in Bournemouth!

The Connected Past CFP deadline 21 May and registration open now!

Registration for The Connected Past conference and workshop is now open: http://connectedpast.net/

Don’t forget to send in your abstracts: call for papers deadline 21 May. Further information below:

Call for papers The Connected Past 2017, August 24-25th 2017, Bournemouth University (UK)

The Connected Past 2017: The Future of Past Networks? 

August 24-25th 2017 

Bournemouth University (UK) 

August 22-23rd 2017 Practical Networks Workshop

http://connectedpast.net/

 The Connected Past 2017 is a multi-disciplinary, international two-day conference that aims to provide a friendly and informal platform for exploring the use of network research in the study of the human past. 

 It will be preceded by a two-day practical workshop offering hands-on experience with a range of network science methods.

Deadline call for papers: May 21, 2017

Notification of acceptance: May 29, 2017

Conference registration (includes coffee breaks and lunch): £35

Workshop registration (includes coffee breaks): £20

Keynotes: Eleftheria Paliou and discussant Chris Tilley (tbc)

Organisers: Fiona Coward, Anna Collar & Tom Brughmans

Call for Papers

Five years have passed since the first Connected Past conference (Southampton 2012) brought together scholars working in archaeology, history, physics, mathematics and computer science to discuss how network methods, models and thinking might be used to enhance our understanding of the human past. Much has happened in these intervening years: applications of network analysis have expanded rapidly; a number of collected volumes dealing explicitly with network analysis of the past have been published (e.g. The Connected Past, OUP 2016; Special Issue of the Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory 2015; Network Analysis in Archaeology, OUP 2013); and several dedicated groups of scholars are thriving, including the Connected Past itself which hosted conferences in Paris and London, but also the Historical Network Research group, Res-Hist and others. The Connected Past 2017 will provide an opportunity to take stock of the developments of the past five years and to discuss the future of network research in archaeology and history. How will new network models, methods and thinking shape the ways we study the past? 

We welcome submissions of abstracts that address the challenges posed by the use of or apply network approaches in historical/archaeological research contexts, welcoming case studies drawn from all periods and places. Topics might include, but are not limited to: 

●        Missing and incomplete data in archaeological and historical networks

●        Networks, space and place

●        Network change over time

●        What kinds of data can archaeologists and historians use to reconstruct past networks and what kinds of issues ensue?

●        Categories in the past vs categories in our analysis: etic or emic, pre-determined or emergent?

●        Formal network analysis vs qualitative network approaches: pros, cons, potential, limitations

Please submit your abstract limited to 250 words before midnight (GMT) of May 21^st 2017 to connectedpast2017@gmail.com  

 NB. If there is sufficient demand, we will endeavour to organise a crêche for delegates’ children (under 3). An extra fee may be payable for this, although fee-waivers may be available in certain circumstances. Further details would be provided in due course. In order to allow us to assess demand, please let us know in advance if this would be useful for you.  

The Connected Past 2017! Call for papers deadline May 21

It’s been five years since we hosted the first Connected Past conference. It was a hugely inspiring event and formative for my work. We held a number of other events over the years and published a few things. Now The Connected Past is back with a two-day conference in Bournemouth as well as a two day practical network science workshop. Send in your abstracts!!!!

The Connected Past 2017: The Future of Past Networks? 

August 24-25th 2017

Bournemouth University (UK) 

August 22-23rd 2017 Practical Networks Workshop

http://connectedpast.net/

The Connected Past 2017 is a multi-disciplinary, international two-day conference that aims to provide a friendly and informal platform for exploring the use of network research in the study of the human past.

It will be preceded by a two-day practical workshop offering hands-on experience with a range of network science methods.

Deadline call for papers: May 21, 2017
Notification of acceptance: May 29, 2017

Conference registration (includes coffee breaks and lunch): £35
Workshop registration (includes coffee breaks): £20

Keynotes: Eleftheria Paliou and discussant Chris Tilley (tbc)
Organisers: Fiona Coward, Anna Collar & Tom Brughmans

Call for Papers

Five years have passed since the first Connected Past conference (Southampton 2012) brought together scholars working in archaeology, history, physics, mathematics and computer science to discuss how network methods, models and thinking might be used to enhance our understanding of the human past. Much has happened in these intervening years: applications of network analysis have expanded rapidly; a number of collected volumes dealing explicitly with network analysis of the past have been published (e.g. The Connected Past, OUP 2016; Special Issue of the Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory 2015; Network Analysis in Archaeology, OUP 2013); and several dedicated groups of scholars are thriving, including the Connected Past itself which hosted conferences in Paris and London, but also the Historical Network Research group, Res-Hist and others. The Connected Past 2017 will provide an opportunity to take stock of the developments of the past five years and to discuss the future of network research in archaeology and history. How will new network models, methods and thinking shape the ways we study the past?

We welcome submissions of abstracts that address the challenges posed by the use of or apply network approaches in historical/archaeological research contexts, welcoming case studies drawn from all periods and places. Topics might include, but are not limited to:

●        Missing and incomplete data in archaeological and historical networks

●        Networks, space and place

●        Network change over time

●        What kinds of data can archaeologists and historians use to reconstruct past networks and what kinds of issues ensue?

●        Categories in the past vs categories in our analysis: etic or emic, pre-determined or emergent?

●        Formal network analysis vs qualitative network approaches: pros, cons, potential, limitations

Please submit your abstract limited to 250 words before midnight (GMT) of May 21^st 2017 to connectedpast2017@gmail.com 

NB. If there is sufficient demand, we will endeavour to organise a crêche for delegates’ children (under 3). An extra fee may be payable for this, although fee-waivers may be available in certain circumstances. Further details would be provided in due course. In order to allow us to assess demand, please let us know in advance if this would be useful for you.  

The Connected Past special issue of Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory out now!

I am super massively chuffed to announce that The Connected Past special issue of the Journal of Archaeological Method and theory is out now. It aims to provide examples of the critical and innovative use of network science in archaeology in order to inspire its more widespread use. What’s even better, the editorial is open access! And it’s accompanied by a glossary of network science techniques and concepts that we hope will prove to be a useful resource for archaeologists interested in network concepts.

My fellow editors Anna Collar, Fiona Coward, Barbara Mills and I are extremely grateful to all the authors of this special issue for their great contributions. You can read in the editorial the details of why we think these contributions are great. We would also like to thank the editors of Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory for offering us great support throughout the process, and to Springer for agreeing to make the editorial open access.

Original papers in this issue (Gotta read ’em all!):

Networks in Archaeology: Phenomena, Abstraction, Representation
by the editors Anna Collar, Fiona Coward, Tom Brughmans, and Barbara J. Mills

Are Social Networks Survival Networks? An Example from the Late Pre-Hispanic US Southwest
by Lewis Borck, Barbara J. Mills, Matthew A. Peeples, and Jeffery J. Clark

Understanding Inter-settlement Visibility in Iron Age and Roman Southern Spain with Exponential Random Graph Models for Visibility Networks
by Tom Brughmans, Simon Keay, and Graeme Earl

Inferring Ancestral Pueblo Social Networks from Simulation in the Central Mesa Verde
by Stefani A. Crabtree

Network Analysis of Archaeological Data from Hunter-Gatherers: Methodological Problems and Potential Solutions
by Erik Gjesfjeld

Procurement and Distribution of Pre-Hispanic Mesoamerican Obsidian 900 BC–AD 1520: a Social Network Analysis
by Mark Golitko, and Gary M. Feinman

The Equifinality of Archaeological Networks: an Agent-Based Exploratory Lab Approach
by Shawn Graham, and Scott Weingart

Remotely Local: Ego-networks of Late Pre-colonial (AD 1000–1450) Saba, North-eastern Caribbean
by Angus A. A. Mol, Menno L. P. Hoogland, and Corinne L. Hofman

The Diffusion of Fired Bricks in Hellenistic Europe: A Similarity Network Analysis
by Per Östborn, and Henrik Gerding

Slides Connected Past London available

The Connected Past conference in London this month was awesome! How awesome? Well you can judge that for yourself. We have made slides of most presentations available for download on Figshare. We will also make videos of most talks available online soon, so stay tuned for more!

It’s that conference season again!

This month is just raining interesting conferences again! If you’re into the kind of research I like that is: social simulation, The Connected Past, and Historical Networks Research … Ooooooh Yeeeeaaah! 🙂

Two weeks ago I was in Barcelona for the Social Simulation Conference and the Simulating the Past satellite conference. Reports of this event on my blog did not get beyond part 1. That’s just because Barcelona is so much fun and it would be a shame to sit in a hotel room writing blog posts any longer than I already did. The conference was great overall. There was a surprising number of talks presenting a project outline rather than results. Although conferences are good places to recruit people on such projects, these talks are not always as engaging as others.

Ulrik Brandes giving a keynote presentation at TCP London

Last week I co-organised The Connected Past with Tim Evans and Ray Rivers at Imperial College London, and the rest of the Connected Past team. It strikes me as a wonderful thing how every time we organise an event we attract a truly multi-disciplinary, young, and curious audience. Interestingly there is also always a slight majority of female scholars at The Connected Past events, which is very welcome given that in academia often the opposite is true. Our audience is always a particularly studious bunch. Humanities scholars looking to learn more about what that network thing is all about, and scholars from the hard sciences who want to know if they can jump on a research topic/problem/dataset that is slightly more sexy than gravity. The keynote talks by Alan Wilson, Ulrik Brandes and Joaquim Fort were brilliant! Each drew from their personal experiences of applying a different computation modelling approach to archaeological research: agent-based modelling, network modelling, and statistical modelling. In particular, I can recommend Brandes’co-authored paper entitled ‘what is network science?’, which is definitely required reading for anyone following this blog. I am sure this is not gonna be the last Connected Past event. In fact, I’ll be able to announce some cool TCP news very soon I hope.

This week it’s time for Historical Networks Research, an initiative that already received loads of blogspace here. No need to break the trend: expect reports from the keynotes and talks as the conference progresses over the coming days. I am particularly looking forward to the keynote by Claire Lemercier, who organised a fantastic TCP in Paris in April. Claire is a real pioneer in applying network science in history, and her review article on the subject is a must-read for any historians interested in networks. Stay tuned for more on Historical Networks Research soon!

Bursaries available The Connected Past London

Just a few more weeks until the next Connected Past conference! The programme is finished and again covers a good range of topics presented by scholars from different disciplines, all discussing the overlap between archaeological challenges and complexity and network science. Registration is still open so don’t hesitate to register soon. We also encourage UK-based researchers to apply for our bursaries to attend The Connected Past.

What? The Connected Past: archaeological challenges and complexity

When? 8-9 September 2014

Where? Imperial College London

Registration? https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/the-connected-past-london-2014-tickets-12300893303

More info? http://connectedpast.soton.ac.uk/london-2014/

First Connected Past publication!

Anna Collar, Fiona Coward and I started The Connected Past in 2011. Since then we have been enjoying organising a number of conferences, workshops and sessions together with our many friends in the TCP steering committee. Many collaborations and other fun things have followed on from these events but no publications yet, until now! Anna, Fiona, Claire and I recently published a paper in Nouvelles de l’archéologie. It was part of a special issue on network perspectives in archaeology edited by Carl Knappett.

Our paper’s aims are very similar to those of TCP in general: to communicate across communities of archaeologists and historians, to identify the challenges we face when using network perspectives, and to overcome them together. The paper first lists a number of challenges historians are confronted with, then a number of archaeological challenges. It argues how some of these challenges are similar and that it’s worth our while to collaborate. At the end of the paper we suggest a few ways of doing this. And it will be no surprise that one of the ways is to attend our future TCP events 🙂

You can download the full paper on Academia or via my bibliography page. You can read the abstract below.

The Connected Past will also publish a special issue of the Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory (first issue of 2015) and an edited volume (Oxford University Press, 2015). More about that later!

The last decade has seen a significant increase in the use of network studies in archaeology, as archaeologists have turned to formal network methods to make sense of large and complex datasets and to explore hypotheses of past interactions. A similar pattern can be seen in history and related disciplines, where work has focused on exploring the structure of textual sources and analysing historically attested social networks. Despite this shared interest in network approaches and their common general goal (to understand human behaviour in the past), there has been little cross-fertilisation of archaeological and historical network approaches. The Connected Past, a multidisciplinary conference held in Southampton in March 2012, provided a rare platform for such cross-disciplinary communication. This article will discuss the shared concerns of and seemingly unique challenges facing archaeologists and historians using network analysis techniques, and will suggest new ways in which research in both disciplines can be enhanced by drawing on the experiences of different research traditions.

The conference brought some common themes and shared concerns to the fore. Most prominent among these are possible methods for dealing with the fragmentary nature of our sources, techniques for visualising and analysing past networks – especially when they include both spatial and temporal dimensions – and interpretation of network analysis results in order to enhance our understanding of past social interactions. This multi-disciplinary discussion also raised some fundamental differences between disciplines: in archaeology, individuals are typically identified indirectly through the material remains they leave behind, providing an insight into long-term changes in the everyday lives of past peoples; in contrast, historical sources often allow the identification of past individuals by name and role, allowing synchronic analysis of social networks at a particular moment in time.

The conference also demonstrated clearly that a major concern for advancing the use of network analysis in both the archaeological and historical disciplines will be the consideration of how to translate sociological concepts that have been created to deal with interaction between people when the nodes in our networks are in fact words, texts, places or artefacts. Means of textual and material critique will thus be central to future work in this field.

CFP The Connected Past @ Imperial College London

Time to announce the next in our series of The Connected Past conferences. This time we will go to Imperial College London where Tim Evans and Ray Rivers will host us at the physics department. This edition of The Connected Past will focus in particular on how the challenges archaeologists are faced with when trying to understand human behaviour using fragmentary material data might be of interest to physicists. We hope this event will be another great opportunity for scholars from different disciplines to meet, share their ideas and problems, and hopefully collaborate to try to solve these issues. We will also organise a half-day hands-on workshop on network science for archaeologists. Keep an eye out for the announcement next month.

CONFERENCE INFO

The Connected Past: archaeological challenges and complexity – a one and a half day multi-disciplinary meeting to explore how concepts and techniques from network- and complexity science can be used to study archaeological data. These challenges include the use of material data as proxy evidence for past human behaviour, questions about long-term processes of social change, and the fragmentary nature of archaeological data. We aim to bring together physical scientists and archaeologists in order to highlight the challenges posed by archaeological data and research questions, and explore collaborative ways of tackling them using perspectives drawn from network and complexity science.

The meeting will take place on the afternoon of Monday 8th September and all day Tuesday 9th September at Imperial College London. A hands-on introductory workshop is planned for the morning of Monday 8th September – details to be announced.

Call for Papers. We are looking for 20 to 30 minute contributions and are inviting researchers from any relevant field to submit a one page abstract in pdf format. This should be sent to: connectedpast2014@imperial.ac.uk

The abstract should contain the title, name of proposed speaker and names of any additional authors and their associated institutions, along with a brief abstract (200-500 words). Any additional information (figure, links, bibliography, etc.) may be included within the one page limit.

Submission deadline: 20th June 2014
Decisions announced: 4th July 2014

Keynote talks. The meeting will feature keynote talks by Alan Wilson, University College London, and Ulrik Brandes, University Konstanz (a further additional keynote will be announced soon). Shorter talks will be given by other invited speakers and from researchers submitting abstracts. Finally, at a later date we will issue a call for some quick fire (five minute) talks to allow researchers at all stages of their career to participate.

Registration Fee. The registration fee is £45 (£22.50 for students) as a contribution towards local expenses. This will cover lunch on the Tuesday, coffee/tea breaks plus drinks at the informal social event on the Monday evening. Registration will open in June.

Travel Bursaries. Some support is available to cover travel and other costs of UK-based researchers attending the meeting. If you wish to be considered for such support, please send a request explaining why you should be considered for a bursary to the same address as for papers with the subject “Bursary application [your name]” (connectedpast2014@imperial.ac.uk). Bursaries will be given out from 20th June 2014 onwards while funds remain.

Further Information. The meeting is organised as part of The Connected Past series of events, funded in part by EPSRC. Full details are available on the web site at
http://www.complexity.org.uk/events/conpastlondon2014/

On Twitter follow the hashtag #tcp2014

Organisers. Tim Evans (Chair), Ray Rivers, Tom Brughmans, Anna Collar, Fiona Coward.

Registration open The Connected Past in Paris

We would like to invite you to The Connected Past conference on network analysis in archaeology and history, held 26 April in Paris (just after the Computer Applications and Quantitative methods in Archaeology conference in Paris). More info and a programme can be found below or on our website. Registration is free but since places are limited tickets will be allocated on a first-come-first-serve basis.

Looking forward to seeing you there!

The Connected Past
A satellite conference at CAA 2014, Paris

Held Saturday April 26th 2014 in Sciences Po, rooms Albert Sorel and Anatole Leroy-Beaulieu, 27 rue Saint-Guillaume, 75007 Paris (metro Saint-Germain-des-Prés or Rue du Bac). Building A on this map.

With the Support of Sciences Po, the DYREM research program, Médialab, the CAA committee, and the French network of historical network analysis.

Organisers: Claire Lemercier (CNRS, Sciences Po, Paris), Tom Brughmans (University of Southampton), The Connected Past steering committee.

The conference aims to:

• Provide a forum for the presentation of network-based research applied to archaeological or historical questions
• Discuss the practicalities and implications of applying network perspectives and methodologies to archaeological and historical data in particular
• Strengthen the group of researchers interested in the potential of network approaches for archaeology and history
• Foster cross-disciplinary dialogue and collaborative work towards integrated analytical frameworks for understanding complex networks
• Stimulate debate about the application of network theory and analysis within archaeology and history in particular, but also more widely, and highlight the relevance of this work for the continued development of network theory in other disciplines

Read the complete call for papers

The conference will be held immediately after the CAA conference (Computer Applications and Quantitative Methods in Archaeology), also happening in Paris, allowing participants to easily attend both – but participants from other disciplines, especially history, are also most welcome. A “The Connected Past” practical workshop, “Introduction to network analysis for archaeologists” will also be organized during CAA2014 in Paris (see the CAA programme).

Oral presentations will be limited to 15 minutes so as to leave room for discussion. Most talk will be given in English, but some might be given in French and accompanied by English abstracts and presentations. French questions or answers will be welcome and translated during the debates. Posters will also be displayed and, in addition to specific conversations taking place during the pauses, their authors will be given 2 minutes each for a very short oral presentation.

There are no attendance fees. Although this event is free of charge, registration is required and the number of places is limited. Places will be allocated on a first-come-first-serve basis.

The Connected Past is a community led by a multi-disciplinary international steering committee. It aims to provide discussion platforms for the development of original and critical applications of network and complexity approaches to archaeology and history. To this purpose The Connected Past organises international conferences, focused seminars and practical didactic workshops.

Programme
All the presentations and posters have been confirmed, but the exact programme is still subject to minor changes
Saturday 26 April
9-9.45 Welcome coffee and introduction
9.45-11 First session: Mobility through networks
Eivind Heldaas Seland: Tracing trade routes as networks: From Palmyra to the Persian Gulf in the first three centuries CE
Henrik Gerding and Per Östborn: Network analyses of the diffusion of Hellenistic fired bricks
Marie Lezowski: Cohesion through mobility : the networks of relics in 17th-century Lombardy
11-11.15 Coffee break
11.15-12.30 Second session: Dynamics and cross-period comparisons
Habiba, Jan C. Athenstädt and Ulrik Brandes: Inferring Social Dynamics from Spatio-Temporal Network Data in the US Southwest
Ana Sofia Ribeiro: Resilience in times of Early Modern financial crises: the case study of Simon Ruiz network, 1553-1606
Marion Beetschen: Social Network Analysis as a Complementary Methodological Tool in History
12.30-13.45 Lunch break
13.45-15 Third session: Cross-cultural networks
Angus A. A. Mol and Floris W. M. Keehnen: Tying up Columbus: A historical and material culture study of the networks that resulted from the first European voyages into the Caribbean (AD 1492-1504)
Francisco Apellaniz: Cooperating in Complex Environments: Cross-cultural Trade, Commercial Networks and Notarial Culture in Alexandria (Egypt) : 1350-1500
Florencia Del Castillo and Joan Anton Barceló: Inferring the intensity of Social Network from radiocarbon dated Bronze Age archaeological contexts
15-15.15 Coffee break
15-15.50 Fourth session: Political interactions
Stanley Théry: Social network analysis between Tours notables and Louis XI (1461-1483)
Laurent Beauguitte: Models of historical networks: A methodological proposal
15.50-16.45 Final session, including a very short (2 minutes) oral presentation for each poster, discussion of the posters and final general discussion
Posters by:
Zeynep Aktüre: The Ancient Theatre Network in the Mediterranean: A Structuralist Interpretation Inspired from Fernand Braudel’s Three Planes of Historical Time
Thibault Clérice and Anthony Glaise: Network analysis and distant reading: The Cicero’s Network
Damian Koniarek, Renata Madziara and Piotr Szymański: Towards a study of the structure of the business & science social network of the 2nd Polish Republic
Susana Marcos: Familial alliances, social links et geographical network. The example of the province of Lusitania in the Roman Empire (to be confirmed)
Stefania Merlo Perring: The ChartEx Project. Reconstructing spatial relationships from medieval charters: a collaboration between Data Mining and Historical Topography
Sébastien Plutniak: Archaeology as practical mereology: an attempt to analyze a set of ceramic refits using network analysis tools
Grégoire van Havre: Interactions and network analysis of a rock art site in Morro do Chapéu, Bahia, Brazil
Beatrice Zucca Micheletto: Network analysis and gender’s studies: some issues from the Italian case (Turin, 17th-18th centuries)
16.45 Drinks and informal discussion

—- French version —–

The Connected Past
Dans le cadre du congrès CAA 2014 (informatique et méthodes quantitatives en archéologie) à Paris

Un événement organisé par le réseau “The Connected Past”

Avec le soutien de Sciences Po Paris, du programme de recherche DYREM, du Médialab, the CAA committee, et du groupe Res-Hist, Réseaux et Histoire

Samedi 26 avril 2014 à Sciences Po, amphithéâtres Albert Sorel et Anatole Leroy-Beaulieu, 27 rue Saint-Guillaume, 75007 Paris (métro Saint-Germain-des-Prés ou Rue du Bac)

Organisation : Claire Lemercier (CNRS, Sciences Po, Paris), Tom Brughmans (University of Southampton), le comité scientifique de The Connected Past

“The Connected Past” est un groupe de chercheurs doté d’un comité scientifique international et interdisciplinaire. Son objectif est d’offrir des lieux de discussion autour du développement d’applications originales des approches en termes de réseaux et de complexité en archéologie et en histoire. Pour cela, il organise depuis 2011 des colloques, séminaires et ateliers de formation.

Les objectifs de la journée sont de :

• Proposer un lieu commun de présentation pour des recherches appliquant des approches des réseaux à des questions archéologiques ou historiques
• Discuter les spécificités et les implications de ces approches pour ces questions et types de données particuliers
• Contribuer à la constitution d’un groupe de chercheur.se.s intéressé.e.s par le potentiel de ces approches en archéologie et en histoire
• Encourager le dialogue interdisciplinaire et la recherche collective dans le domaine des réseaux complexes
• Faire vivre les débats sur l’application des théories et méthodes sur les réseaux, en histoire, archéologie, et en retour dans d’autres disciplines.

Lire l’appel à comunications complet en versions anglaise et française.
La journée de Paris se tiendra dans la foulée du congrès d’archéologie CAA, afin de permettre à ses participants d’être présents s’ils le souhaitent ; mais les propositions pour la journée émanant d’autres disciplines et notamment de l’histoire sont tout à fait bienvenues, indépendamment de toute participation au congrès CAA.

Les présentations orales seront limitées à 15 minutes, de manière à laisser un temps important aux discussions. La plupart des communications orales seront présentées en anglais, mais certaines seront en français avec des résumés et supports visuels en anglais. Il sera possible d’intervenir en français dans les discussions. Des posters seront également affichés et, en plus des discussions auxquelles ils pourront donner lieu pendant les pauses, une session sera dédiée à leur présentation orale très rapide (2 minutes) et à une discussion générale à leur sujet.

Il n’y a pas de frais d’inscription, mais, du fait de la taille des amphithéâtres, il est nécessaire de s’inscrire au préalable (en cas d’inscriptions trop nombreuses, seuls les premiers pourront entrer !).

Notez enfin deux autres événements connexes auxquels nous vous encourageons également à participer

• Un atelier pratique “The Connected Past” dans le cadre de la CAA : introduction aux réseaux sociaux pour archéologues (en anglais), voir CAA.
• Les 9-11 avril 2014 à Toulouse, les secondes rencontres Res-Hist sur l’analyse de réseaux en histoire, avec des invités étrangers, des présentations de recherches en cours et des ateliers pratiques de formation.

Programme
(certains détails d’organisation interne peuvent changer)
Samedi 16 avril
9h-9h45 Accueil, café, introduction
9h45-11h Première session : Réseaux et mobilités
Eivind Heldaas Seland : Tracing trade routes as networks: From Palmyra to the Persian Gulf in the first three centuries CE
Henrik Gerding et Per Östborn : Network analyses of the diffusion of Hellenistic fired bricks
Marie Lezowski : Cohesion through mobility : the networks of relics in 17th-century Lombardy
11h-11h15 Pause café
11h15-12h30 Deuxième session : Dynamique des réseaux et comparaisons entre périodes
Habiba, Jan C. Athenstädt et Ulrik Brandes : Inferring Social Dynamics from Spatio-Temporal Network Data in the US Southwest
Ana Sofia Ribeiro : Resilience in times of Early Modern financial crises: the case study of Simon Ruiz network, 1553-1606
Marion Beetschen : Social Network Analysis as a Complementary Methodological Tool in History
12h30-13h45 Pause déjeuner
13h45-15h Troisième session : Echanges inter-culturels
Angus A. A. Mol etFloris W. M. Keehnen : Tying up Columbus: A historical and material culture study of the networks that resulted from the first European voyages into the Caribbean (AD 1492-1504)
Francisco Apellaniz : Cooperating in Complex Environments: Cross-cultural Trade, Commercial Networks and Notarial Culture in Alexandria (Egypt) : 1350-1500
Florencia Del Castillo etJoan Anton Barceló : Inferring the intensity of Social Network from radiocarbon dated Bronze Age archaeological contexts
15h-15h15 Pause café
15h-15h50 Quatrième session : Interactions politiques
Stanley Théry : Social network analysis between Tours notables and Louis XI (1461-1483)
Laurent Beauguitte : Models of historical networks: A methodological proposal
15h50-16h45 Dernière session. Courtes présentations orales (2 mn) des posters, discussions des posters et discussion générale
Posters de :
Zeynep Aktüre : The Ancient Theatre Network in the Mediterranean: A Structuralist Interpretation Inspired from Fernand Braudel’s Three Planes of Historical Time
Thibault Clérice et Anthony Glaise : Network analysis and distant reading: The Cicero’s Network
Damian Koniarek, Renata Madziara et Piotr Szymański : Towards a study of the structure of the business & science social network of the 2nd Polish Republic
Susana Marcos : Familial alliances, social links et geographical network. The example of the province of Lusitania in the Roman Empire (to be confirmed)
Stefania Merlo Perring : The ChartEx Project. Reconstructing spatial relationships from medieval charters: a collaboration between Data Mining and Historical Topography
Sébastien Plutniak : Archaeology as practical mereology: an attempt to analyze a set of ceramic refits using network analysis tools
Grégoire van Havre : Interactions and network analysis of a rock art site in Morro do Chapéu, Bahia, Brazil
Beatrice Zucca Micheletto : Network analysis and gender’s studies: some issues from the Italian case (Turin, 17th-18th centuries)
16h45 Pot de clôture et discussions informelles

Hurray for workshops!

The last few weeks of my professional life were nice and hectic, wouldn’t want it any other way of course. There were a lot of events that kept me and my friends quite busy and happy. Here is a short personal review of a few of these: Mathematics of Networks and The Connected Past workshop.

On Monday 16 September there was the Mathematics of Networks meeting in Southampton. This was another one of those excellent multi-disciplinary events that are so popular these days. You obviously don’t hear me complaining, I love these things. But however multi-disciplinary the event, there is always a stronger emphasis on one discipline and you never quite know which one it’s going to be. So in this case it was probably maths/stats. I very much felt like the token humanist offering some light entertainment after lunch. But the questions I and other social scientists got as well as all discussions made it clear that the audience was very much prepared to think about each others problems and provide answers from their respective experiences. What always surprises me is the ability of the more mathsy people among us to come up with algorithms to solve a humanities problem during pub discussions. Love that stuff! I was particularly interested to find out about Jake Shemming and Keith Briggs’ work on Anglo-Saxon communication networks and visibility networks. All slides can be found online.

The pub session of the Mathematics of Networks meeting quickly turned into a promising start for The Connected Past Workshop. Quite a few of the delegates and tutors managed to arrive the evening of the 16th for drinks and dinner, from about ten countries in fact, some as far away as the USA, Canada and Australia. That made me feel a bit nervous, I was really hoping everyone would get out of the workshop what they were expecting. Or even better, some new ideas or research directions they never thought of. As the two days of the workshop passed everything seemed to go smoothly (except for those tiny logistical mistakes that are totally useless but tend to dominate my mind). We had some great discussions, all the delegates and tutors were really switched on, knowledgeable and contributed from their own experiences. What we ended up with (and that was only partly planned) was a set of honest statements by scholars giving their own perspectives on network science in archaeology and history, guiding us through the decisions they made, and sharing their many mistakes and revelations with us. Sometimes it felt very much like being in an Overly Honest Methods meme! Which is great because every academic knows these things actually happen. The best we can do is be aware of them and be honest. And hopefully something useful will emerge at the other end. Many delegates were surprised that we did not sell Network Science as the new hot things to answer all our research questions. Rather the message seemed to be “if it offers the best approach to your research questions then use it, if not then ditch it”. And of course that is exactly how I see network science being useful in our disciplines. We need to be able to understand what it can do for us and evaluate whether it’s the tool we are looking for. No network science in archaeology just for the sake of it, it’s no science if it doesn’t offer anything unique. We decided we will do this workshop again, modified slightly thanks to all the feedback we got. See keep an eye out for future announcements!

Connected Past workshop registration open

Workshop Announcement:

THE CONNECTED PAST: NETWORK ANALYSIS FOR ARCHAEOLOGISTS AND HISTORIANS

Networks offer one of the newest and most exciting approaches to archaeological and historical data analysis, and over the last two years, the The Connected Past team has brought together scholars from across the globe to discuss their research, with a session at Birmingham TAG 2011, the Southampton conference in March 2012, a session at the SAAs in Hawaii in April this year, and a collaboration with HESTIA this coming July.

But we’re also aware that starting to do network analysis isn’t always easy. It can be difficult to know which software to use, how to present data, what questions to ask, and what results really show. Because it’s hard for researchers at all levels who are starting to think about network analysis, we are delighted to announce that we have put together a programme for a two-day practical workshop at the University of Southampton on 17-18 September 2013.

The cost of the workshop is £20. PLACES ARE LIMITED TO 20. To register your interest, please email connectedpast@soton.ac.uk with a short statement detailing why you want to participate. We will be in touch once the registration deadline (22nd July) has passed. The programme can be found below and on The Connected Past website.

In addition, for those who want to overdose on networks, Southampton will also be hosting the 12th Mathematics of Networks meeting on 16th September. It’s very multi-disciplinary, with a focus on social science applications and the technical side of things.

Programme:

Tuesday 17th September

Morning:
• Introduction to networks in archaeology and history
• Preparing data for network analysis
• network creation and visualisation
Lunch
• Archaeological and historical case studies
• Round table discussion
Reception at the Institute for Complex Systems Simulation

Wednesday 18th September

Morning:
• Network analysis software
• Analysing network structure
Lunch
• What method to use?
• Geographical network techniques
• Issues in archaeological and historical network analysis

Tutors:
• Andy Bevan (UCL)
• Tom Brughmans (Southampton)
• Anna Collar (McDonald Institute, Cambridge)
• Fiona Coward (Bournemouth)
• Marten Düring (Nijmegen)
• Claire Lemercier (Sciences-Po, Paris)
• Angus Mol (Leiden)

Special issue Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory: The Connected Past

This is a quick reminder of the 23rd June deadline for extended abstracts for The Connected Past special issue of the Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory. The call for submissions to this special issue is now open. So don’t hesitate any longer and send us that awesome networky paper you have been working on! As you can gather from the CFP below, we want to have a focused special issue with solid case studies that illustrate how network analysis can be useful in archaeology. However, we are really keen to publish really innovative approaches, things that have not been tried before by archaeological network analysts. We look forward to reading your abstracts!

CALL FOR PAPERS

The Connected Past: critical and innovative approaches to networks in archaeology

A special issue of Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory

Edited by: Anna Collar, Tom Brughmans, Fiona Coward and Barbara Mills

Over the last decade the number of published archaeological applications of network methods and theories has increased significantly. A number of research themes deserve further exploration, however. How do particular archaeological research contexts drive the selection and adaptation of formal network methods from the wide range of existing approaches? What is the role archaeological data can play in network methods? What are the decisions we are faced with when defining nodes and ties, and what assumptions underlie these definitions? How can our theoretical approaches be expressed through formal methods incorporating empirical data? Are network theories and methods compatible? How can materiality be incorporated within existing network approaches? How can we deal with long-term network evolution within archaeological research contexts?

This special issue aims to illustrate through innovative and critical archaeological case studies that these problems can be overcome, and that by doing so the role of archaeological network analysis within the archaeologist’s toolbox will become better defined.

This special issue invites well-developed archaeological case studies in which a network-based method is formulated as the best approach to an archaeological research question. A key conviction of this special issue is that theoretical and methodological concerns should be raised through practice. As such, papers are expected to either develop a critical and detailed archaeological analysis through commonly applied network-based approaches, or to illustrate how archaeological research contexts can require the development or adoption of innovative network techniques. Such a collection of case studies will illustrate that the network is not an end-product; it is a research perspective that allows one to ask and answer unique questions of archaeological relevance.

Please send extended abstracts (1000 words) to connectedpast@soton.ac.uk by 23 June 2013.

Notification of acceptance: July 2013.

Submission of full papers for peer-review to guest editors: 22 September 2013.

Submission of revised papers for peer-review to JAMT: 24 November 2013.

Please note that the acceptance of extended abstracts and peer-review by guest editors is not a guarantee that the paper will be published in the special issue. Individual papers will have to successfully go through the JAMT peer-review process before publication can be guaranteed.

The Connected Past @ SAA tomorrow

The Connected Past is alive! We are preparing a few more events that will be announced soon. But now I am very excited about tomorrow when we will host the second Connected Past event at the Society for American Archaeologists meeting in Honolulu. We have a great line-up of speakers and Ian Hodder will act as a discussant at the session. The session itself might not provide enough time to say everything we want to say about networks in archaeology, which is why Angus Mol and Mark Golitko have organised a discussion forum on Friday called ‘re-connecting the past’.

Have a look on The Connected Past website for the full abstracts, or on the dedicated page on this blog.

A full report will follow soon after the event!

Hope to see some of you there!