What Steward Got Right: Technology, Work Organization, and Cultural Evolution

Human behavioral ecology and dual inheritance theory are related theoretical approaches with obvious applicability to the problems that occupy lithic analysts. While each has its strengths, neither satisfactorily replaces the elegant, though decidedly less formalized cultural ecology of Steward. In order to use the methodological advances of lithic analysis to understand prehistoric human behavior, a perspective incorporating technology as well as behavior, history, and process is necessary. Examples of lithic technological change from the California archaeological record are used to illustrate how current and past evolutionary theory can inform models of lithic technology.