Preface

Summary

For every complex problem, there is a solution that is simple, neat, and wrong!

Attributed to H. L. Mencken

We hope that this book will spark wider interest in the bioarchaeology of Southeast Asia, including the neighbouring Pacific, and will spur the development of greater synthetic and collaborative research in the region. It is a delight to read about the culture, the society, the technology, the subsistence, the settlement patterns and the environment of prehistoric populations; however, central to all this are the people themselves. Nothing brings them to life as individuals, communities and populations like the physical remains themselves. They are, or should be, central to any archaeological endeavour. In particular, we hope that it will spark the interest of indigenous researchers and encourage them to consider the study of human skeletal remains as a central component to any archaeological project (even if it is only to show us that we have got it all wrong!).

The editors would like to thank all of the authors for their contributions to this volume. Further, we wish to thank all those anonymous reviewers who spent a considerable amount of their time and energy in providing a wealth of critical and constructive comment on each and all of these chapters.