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16 Modern Perspectives on Ancient Migrations Takeyuki (Gaku) Tsuda In many ways, the recent (i.e., post-1990) renewed interest in migration among prehistorians represents an attempt to overcome the shortcomings of previous research: instead of simply using migration as a convenient explanation for sudden changes found in local material cultures, prehistorians are now developing better methods to detect and track migration. And, as this volume attests, they are also attempting to better understand migration as a complex, dynamic social process. As more than a few scholars of prehistory have noted (e.g., Anthony 1990; Burmeister 2000), sociocultural anthropologists, geographers, and sociologists have been studying modern migration for a long time. Should the concepts and theories developed by contemporary immigration specialists be applied to the study of population movements in the distant past? Some question the relevance of modern migration because of the vast differences between contemporary and past migration (e.g., Beekman and Christensen 2003; Clark 1994; Rouse 1986). There is no doubt that migration after the Industrial Revolution has been structured by capitalist wage-labor systems, nation-states and their immigration policies, and modern transportation and communications technologies, none of which existed in ancient times. Others argue that certain aspects of contemporary population movements do resemble those from the distant past and that studies of modern migration can provide them with an understanding of the social dynamics of migration, which in turn will help illuminate and better explain archaeological data.1 In fact, a number of archaeologists have reviewed the findings of modern migration theory and applied them directly to their prehistoric case studies (e.g., Anthony 1990, 1997; Burmeister 2000; Cameron 1995; Chapman 1997; Duff 1998).2 As a sociocultural anthropologist who specializes in modern migration, I tend to concur with the latter group of archaeologists about the relevance of the present to the past. However, I argue that scholars of prehistory can learn 314 Takeyuki (Gaku) Tsuda from the present not because population movements have basically remained the same over the course of human history. Instead, my objective in this chapter is to assess from the perspective of a contemporary immigration specialist the extent to which current population movements may be different from (as well as similar to) those in the distant past. As Duff (1998) has pointed out, if archaeologists are to use theories and knowledge about modern migration to better understand the prehistoric record, they must also be aware of the aspects of migration that have been constant over human history and those that have changed, often quite dramatically. In the process, I will also reflect on whether the apparent differences between present and past are partly related to methodological limitations inherent in studying the distant past. In certain respects, humans today may migrate in somewhat similar ways as their distant ancestors. Bridging a Temporal and Conceptual Divide in Migration Studies Migration is a very important research topic for anthropologists because of its great significance throughout human history. Since at least 250,000 years ago, human beings have migrated vast distances to populate all corners of the globe. Despite the prevalent notion that societies became sedentary as they evolved from nomadism to agricultural villages and states, continuous migration may have been a greater part of even late prehistory than was previously believed, as Fowles (this volume) points out. Today, migration remains as significant as ever. According to United Nations estimates, the number of people living outside their country of birth or nationality doubled between 1970 and 2005 to 191 million, and the total volume of international migration will undoubtedly continue to increase in the twenty-first century. However, with very few exceptions (e.g., Manning 2005), migration research is characterized by an unfortunate temporal divide, with virtually no collaboration between scholars who examine contemporary and those who examine prehistoric migrations. Modern immigration specialists focus exclusively on the present with little to no interest in ancient migrations (e.g., Brettell and Hollifield 2000; Castles and Miller 2003; Cohen 1995; Portes and Rumbaut 1996). Even research by historians (especially those studying EuroAmerican migration) mainly covers the last couple of centuries and rarely ventures farther into the past (e.g., see Daniels 1990; Diner 2000; Hoerder 2002; Takaki 1993). Meanwhile, scholars of prehistoric and ancient migrations examine population movements during or before the first millennium A.D. and generally do not engage with modern migration scholars. This temporal division of labor in migration studies is highly problematic, if [18.223.106.232] Project MUSE (2024-04-26...

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