Projects
Documenting the Bantu Languages of the Last Hunter-Gatherer Communities of the Mai-Ndombe and Lower Kasai Regions (DRC): A Pioneering Phonetic and Laboratory Phonological Study Ghent University
Linguistic diversity is disappearing (almost) as fast as biological diversity: very soon, we may no longer be able to know the sounds and structures of many of the world's languages. As for sounds, phonetic documentation is thus essential to preserve this disappearing heritage, and to learn more about our linguistic and cognitive evolution. This is particularly crucial in those areas of the world where language density is higher, such as the ...
Lost tributaries of the Scheldt: reconstructing the Mesolithic hunter-gatherer river landscape of the Waasland polders Ghent University
During the last two decades, large infrastructure works along the Lower Scheldt river, in particular in
the Waasland Scheldt polders (NW-Belgium), have revealed deeply buried and well-preserved
prehistoric landscapes and archaeological sites from the end of the last ice age about 11.000 years
ago until the arrival of the first farmers about 6500 years ago. The combination of the
paleolandscape and archaeological data ...
An archaeological approach on early interactions between hunter-gatherers and sedentary food-producers in Western Central Africa. Ghent University
The question of prehistoric contact between indigenous hunter-gatherers and the first sedentary
communities in Western Central Africa has so far mainly been addressed by linguists, geneticists
and historians in relation to the Bantu Expansion, which is the initial migration of Bantu-speaking
communities across sub-Saharan Africa. Unlike in other parts of the continent and the world,
archaeologists have never ...
The life and thought of northern prehistoric hunter-gatherers: ethnographical and ethnoarchaeological theory and analysis of the behavioral and material expression of the relationship between ideology and ecology Ghent University
The research proposal consists of the application of the new anthropological paradigm to the study of northern European prehistoric hunter-gatherers with specific focus on the relationship between ecology - the reality of the world in which human beings must survive - and ideology - the human cognition and perception of that world. The new anthropological paradigm sees ecology and ideology as dynamic and dialectic entities, whose relationship ...
Skin microbiome and metabolome analysis across human societies Ghent University
Today, the majority of humans spend their lives indoors. About 10,000 years ago all humans spend their lives outdoors and lived in close contact with nature. This radical shift in lifestyle has led to an increase in skin allergies, acne and eczema. By sampling hunter-gatherers in South-America and Africa and comparing with more urbanized areas in Brazil, USA and Europe we aim to identify differences in bacteriome, mycobiome and metabolome. ...
Climate change and human response at the Pleistocene-Holocene transition in the Belgian Meuse basin (13,000-6000 cal BP) Ghent University
This interdisciplinary project aims at investigating climate variability on a local/regional level and its impact on human lifeways at the transition from the Pleistocene (Younger Dryas) to the Early Holocene in the Meuse valley of southern Belgium. Climate reconstruction, focusing on the detection of Rapid Climate Changes (RCCs) will be conducted through high-resolution analyses of trace elements and stable isotopes from speleothems. This ...
Rapid climate changes during the Mesolithic: impact on man and environment in the southern part of the NW European plain. Ghent University
During the Early Holocene, starting ca. 11650 cal BP (or ca. 9700 cal BC) and corresponding to the Mesolithic, at least four abrupt centennial-scale Rapid Climate Change events (RCC) have occurred, which have been globally identified by recent climate records. However, still little is known about the impact of these RCCs on Mesolithic societies and their ecosystems. The ambition of this multidisciplinary project is to assess the effects and ...
Language contact and linguistic reconstruction: (pre)historic Bantu-Khoisan interactions in Southern Africa in a historical linguistic perspective Ghent University
The Southern African linguistic landscape is dominated by Bantu languages, which form Africa’s largest language family and are spoken by the vast majority of Southern Africans. Nonetheless, the first Bantu-speaking communities arrived in Southern Africa less than two thousand years ago, where they came into contact with and gradually replaced the languages of pre-existing hunter-gatherer and pastoralist communities, known as “Khoisan” ...
Investigating the role of rivers during the Late Glacial recolonization of NW Europe: a multidisciplinary assessment of Final Palaeolithic sites in the Scheldt valley (Belgium) Ghent University
The Late Glacial (c. 12,700-9700 cal BC) is the final stage of the Pleistocene before the current warm Holocene and comprises several warm (e.g. Allerød) and cold (e.g. Younger Dryas) stages. During the Late Glacial, NW Europe was gradually recolonized by Final Palaeolithic hunter-gatherers belonging to different successive traditions. These groups preferably settled in sheltered environments (e.g. caves and rock shelters) and along river ...