Climate Change, Societal Collapse, and Resilience

Undergraduate

Why do civilizations collapse? Debates rage among anthropologists, archaeologists, and historians about societal collapse causality, the role of abrupt onset century-scale megadroughts, and adaptive resilience strategies. The seminar examines archaeological, historical, and paleolclimate data and arguments for (1) the synchronous collapses of Early Bronze Age 2200 BCE Mediterranean, West Asia, Egypt, Indus, China, (2) Late Bronze Age 1200 BCE Mediterranean, West Asia, Egypt collapses, (3) the abrupt fall of the Assyrian Empire 612 BCE, (4) Maya region disintegration ca. 800 CE, (5) Ancestral Pueblo 1300 CE abandonments, and (6) the Late Victorian Holocausts late 19th century India. To judge from the competing claims of social scientists and paleoclimatologists, we are not likely to resolve all arguments. We will, however, illuminate weaknesses, strengths, and "data frontiers. Advancing the frontiers of knowledge about the past also elevates discussion and analysis of the present. We might ask, "How are we adapting to an abrupt anthropogenic climate change?" as productively as we ask, "Is the present the past?" In the context of the abrupt climate change and societal collapse frame that we have created, the last seminar meeting examines the Anthropocene and "The Mystery of Anthropocene Causality." HU , SO 0 Course cr Th 4pm-5:55pm