Pavlo Shydlovskyi
Marta Arzarello
Sara Garcês
Albert Hafner
Marie-Hélène Moncel
Stéphane Péan
Marta Połtowicz-Bobak
Iwona Sobkowiak-Tabaka
Vitalii Usik
Abstract Schedule
International educational project “Nature and Society in Prehistoric Europe”
The project of the Center of Paleoethnological Research is supported by European Union by the House of Europe programme
The stressful situation caused by the pandemic has become a powerful factor for the introduction of new methods and forms of education. The field of archaeological education was no exception. In this educational year, teachers and students fully experienced both the advantages and disadvantages of distance learning in the field of archaeology and museum studies. Creating online courses in archaeology and prehistory has its own specifics, which is manifested in the complexity of transmitting information about artifacts and field objects remotely.
Modern archaeological and paleoecological research allows us to develop models of interaction between the environment and human society for different chronological facies. The development of such models is currently relevant, given the need to understand the processes of increased anthropogenic and industrial pressure on the environment in the modern world. Due to the significant expansion of scientific knowledge about the early stages of human culture, there is a need to include these data in the courses of higher education institutions using scientific experience and the latest achievements of European scientists in the field of prehistory and paleoecology.
Purpose of activity
The project is to create an English-language training course “Nature and society in Prehistoric Europe” through the creation of multimedia products such as video lectures, visual materials and online publications, which will widely present data and research results from Europe and Ukraine in particular. The main purpose of the course is to combine science and education through the interaction of student audiences with the professional environment by transmitting scientifically significant and relevant information about the interaction of society and nature from researchers to students and young scientists. In connection with the transfer of the learning process and the work of higher education institutions online, the project plans to develop multimedia materials that would provide professional delivery of knowledge and interaction between teacher and student.
Tasks of the project are:
– to include modern scientific knowledge about the interaction of nature and prehistoric societies in educational material for higher education institutions;
– to acquaint international audiences with the latest research in the field of prehistoric archaeology and paleoecology of Eastern Europe and Ukraine in particular;
– to acquaint Ukrainian students with modern research hold by scientists and teachers from a number of higher education institutions in Italy, France, Switzerland and Poland and to teach them modern English terminology in the fields of archaeology and paleoecology.
In course of implementation of the project, it is important to use international scientific experience and new scientific data on the prehistoric sites in the process of teaching, to involve students and young scientists in research in the field of prehistoric archaeology.
The training course will consist of several components, interconnected by internal logic: author’s lectures, seminars with leading European scientists, illustrative and textual material.
During the development of the course, a number of online seminars on specific topics will be held with leading scientists from educational and research institutions in EU, Switzerland and Ukraine. The seminars will discuss issues and consider relevant concepts relating to the interaction of nature and society in prehistoric times, presentations of current research. In addition, it is planned to hold joint discussions in which all participants will have the opportunity to express their thoughts on specific scientific topics.
The final editing of the video lectures using online presentations will be done by the production group Wild Fox Films https://www.youtube.com/user/wildfoxfilm .
The main participants of the educational course
The keynote speakers are renowned experts on the interaction of the environment and prehistoric societies of European and world level – professors of well-known scientific and educational centers and who are leaders of programs and projects to study the ancient past of Europe:
Associate Professor Pavlo Shydlovskyi (Project Manager), Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv (Ukraine), Department of Archaeology and Museum Studies. Head of the Center for Paleoethnological Research, specialist in prehistoric archaeology of Eastern Europe.
Prof. Marta Arzarello, University of Ferrara (Italy), Professor of Prehistory and Protohistory, Departament of Humanities, General Secretary of the Executive Committee in International Union of the Prehistoric and Protohistoric Sciences (UISPP). Main areas of research: technology and economic behaviour during the Middle and Lower Palaeolithic in Italy; the first peopling of Europe; the Middle Palaeolithic cultures of the Sahara, Lithic technology and experimentation.
Research fellow Sara Garcês, Polytechnic Institute of Tomar; Geosciences Centre University of Coimbra; Instituto Terra e Memória (Portugal), Quaternary and Prehistory Group (CGEO), Coordinator of the Rock Art Laboratory – Prehistoric Rock Art and the Sacred Tagus Valley Museum, Mação. Areas of Interest: rock art, prehistory, archaeological experimentation, experimentation in rock art, pigment analysis, 3D-photogrammetry, virtual heritage, virtual archaeology; rock art documentation.
Prof. Dr. Albert Hafner, University of Bern (Switzerland), full professor for prehistoric archaeology and director, Institute of Archaeological Sciences and Oeschger Centre for Climate Change Research (OCCR). Leader of a number of projects to study climate change and the interaction of nature and society in Southern and Central Europe, a specialist in the field of Neolithic – Bronze Age archeology.
Director of research Marie-Hélène Moncel, CNRS, National Museum of Natural History (France). Scientific interests: first population in Western Europe, technical strategies and territories, regional cultural areas, first phases of the Acheulean -Neanderthal behaviours, impact of environmental conditions on strategies.
Associate professor Stéphane Péan, Muséum national d’histoire naturelle (France), Departement Homme et Environnement. Head of research team Néandertaliens et Hommes anatomiquement modernes : comportements émergents, dynamique culturelle, mobilité territoriale (NOMADE), specialist in the field of Pleistocene zooarcheology.
Associate Professor Marta Połtowicz-Bobak, University of Rzeszów (Poland), Institute of Archaeology. Project manager for the study of Epigravettian sites in the Dniester valley. Specialist in the field of Upper Palaeolithic and lithic technology in prehistoric societies.
Associate Professor Iwona Sobkowiak-Tabaka, Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznan. (Poland). The President of the Commission of Final Palaeolithic of Northern Eurasia at International Union of the Prehistoric and Protohistoric Sciences (UISPP). Research interests: Upper Palaeolithic and Mesolithic settlements, chronostratigraphy and environmental variables of settlement locations.
Research fellow Vitalii Usik, Archaeological Museum, Institute of Archaeology of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine. Research interests: lithic technology in prehistoric societies.
Young researchers from Ukrainian institutions are involved in seminars and lectures as experts:
Marharyta Chymyrys, Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv, Interdepartmental Laboratory of the Faculty of History, specialist in Pleistocene zooarchaeology;
Ostap Tsvirkun, National Museum of History of Ukraine, specialist in Upper Paleolithic archeology of Eastern Europe;
Yevhen Pichkur, Archaeological Museum of the Institute of Archaeology of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, specialist in Neolithic-Chalcolithic archaeology.
Participation in the project will allow these scientists to improve their own communication skills, deepen their knowledge of specialized terminology, and represent the results of their own research at the international level.
According to scientific interests, these lecturers fully correspond to the chosen topic of the course, have all the opportunities to reveal the content in terms of time (from the appearance of humans in Europe to the Bronze Age) and territory. Presentations of research results will be presented in chronological order (Palaeolithic, Mesolithic, Neolithization processes, formation of agricultural communities), with analysis of the regional context (Western, Central and Eastern Europe) and the definition of conclusions of a European level.
Publication
In order to fully disclose the subject of the course, it is planned to publish a collection of scientific papers in English and Ukrainian, which would be more widely presented materials on each topic, with working title “Dwellings of Prehistoric Europe: social adaptations in variable environments”. Lecturers are invited to participate in the collection, which will give them the opportunity to more fully demonstrate the results of their own research and thoroughly argue their point of view.
This collection will be a guide for in-depth study of the course with the necessary references to modern scientific literature. The volume will be published in English and Ukrainian in online and printed versions by the Center for Paleoethnological Research in VITA ANTIQUA series, 2021: http://vitaantiqua.org.ua/en/main . Each article will have a DOI (digital object identifier) in the Crossref system.
Priority objectives of the project:
– Getting to know the professional cultures of the EU.
In the course of the project implementation, the presentations and lectures of key speakers – leading scientists and teachers of European higher education institutions will be listened to and considered. Constant communication, joint seminars and consultations will allow to better understand and feel the peculiarities of teaching practices in different European countries, to see the ethics of communication between teacher and student, to learn from the best methods of developing lectures and presentations.
– Practices and principles of teaching in the EU.
In the process of creating a multimedia course, students and young prehistorians will have direct communication with outstanding scientists and teachers in this field, which will ensure the direct transfer of scientific experience and information to students.
– Foreign language learning and multilingual education.
When creating a course at the seminars there will be communication in English. In addition, the course itself will also be conducted in English. The participation of students and young scientists will help them to navigate in modern terminology and increase their ability to absorb information presented in a non-native language.
– Online education
The result of the project will be an online product in the form of a multimedia course, a gallery of photos and digital illustrations and an online publication of a collection of scientific articles.
Outcomes
The development and implementation of the curriculum of the course “Nature and society in prehistoric Europe” will allow to attract more foreign audiences to study in Ukraine and will stimulate Ukrainian students to master modern terminological and methodological principles of paleoecology and prehistoric archaeology.
For the Center for Paleoethnological Research, the project will influence the expansion of international activities, will allow to reach the international level of cooperation, promote scientific and site protection activities of NGOs among students.
The publication of online materials in the publication of the Center for Paleoethnological Research VITA ANTIQUA will increase the role of this publication among domestic and foreign colleagues and students.
This course will establish close cooperation with representatives of educational institutions in Italy, France, Switzerland, Poland and Ukraine, which will in the future create a consortium of teachers specializing in the interaction of nature and society in different historical epochs.
All participants of the multimedia course will have free access to the results of the project – author’s lectures, illustrative material, online publications. It will be suggested to place a multimedia course on the websites of partner organizations.
“Nature and Society in Prehistoric Europe” educational project is supported by the European Union under the House of Europe programme https://houseofeurope.org.ua/en
