Special Issue: Innovation and the Evolution of Human Behavior.Beyond the Tools: Social Innovation and Hominin Evolution.

Abstract

Archaeological interest in innovation traditionally focuses on creativity in material culture and, in the case of the Paleolithic, particularly on the changing morphology of stone tools. However, this is only one result of a constel-lation of innovative processes that occur both between and within hominin groups evolving towards the unique modern human lifeway. The adaptations scaffolding such innovative processes include not only the cognitive mechanisms and biological and skeletal adaptations that underpin technological innovation and cultural trans-mission, but also the behavioral strategies pursued by hominin groups and individuals. In this paper, we draw from a Social Brain approach to argue that it is hominins’ innovative social and group-oriented behavioral strate-gies that drive technological developments and distinguish us from other primates. A variety of models and meth-odologies developed to investigate the interrelationships between the crucial ecological, social, and behavioral variables are reviewed here for an archaeological audience in order to stimulate research to test and refine these models with archaeological data. The “Innovation and Evolution” workshop was held at the Centre for the Archaeology of Human Origins, Uni-versity of Southampton, United Kingdom; workshop papers guest edited by Hannah Fluck (University of South-hampton; and, Landscape, Planning and Heritage, Hampshire County Council), Katharine MacDonald (Faculty of Archaeology, University of Leiden), and Natalie Uomini (School of Archaeology, Classics and Egyptology, University of Liverpool). This is article #2 of 7.