Recent Advances in Archaeometallurgical Research in East, South, and Southeast Asia and the Pacific

Archaeometallurgy, the study of human : metal interactions during the production, exchange and consumption of metal artefacts and by-products, has a variable time depth and intensity around IPPA’s geographical remit. East Asian metals research has long been at the cutting edge of the field but all IPPA regions have advanced rapidly in the last decade, to the point where useful data comparisons and syntheses are now becoming viable for this potentially far-voyaging material culture medium.
The number of trained specialists remains low, especially with respect to the vast territories that remain archaeologically unexplored and the numerous excavated assemblages that have yet to be studied. Nevertheless, we are pleased to note the growing number of students and young researchers gradually bettering our understanding of how metals and their extended lifecycles were integrated and manipulated, in various spheres, particularly economic and political.
This session would like to welcome researchers and students to share with the community their work and discoveries related to the study of ancient metallurgy and metals, of any period and from across the entire IPPA remit. It is hoped that this session will serve as a venue for scholars to present, discuss, and exchange their ideas and perspectives on ancient metallurgy, so we can better understand and interpret from the scale of the atom to the phase, artefact, assemblage, site, locality, region and continent.
 
If you wish to present your paper, please express your interest to us via email (pira.venunan@gmail.com and kalayar.yinminnthu@gmail.com) no later than 15 March 2018. Abstracts of 250 words will be required by the end of March 2018.