Sara Ann Knutson | University of British Columbia (original) (raw)

Publications by Sara Ann Knutson

Bloomsbury Medieval Studies Lesson Plans, 2024

Journal of Interactive Technology and Pedagogy , 2024

A classroom activity for teaching and learning humanities and social science applications of intr... more A classroom activity for teaching and learning humanities and social science applications of introductory social network analysis. This activity can be used as a lesson plan or a tutorial handout for the classroom as well as an independent, self-guided learning resource. This activity assumes no prior knowledge of social network analysis or the network software Gephi.

Bloomsbury Medieval Studies, 2024

Imperial Horizons of the Silk Roads: Archaeological Case Studies , 2023

Mined from the mountainous and arid landscapes of the Islamic World, collected and transported ac... more Mined from the mountainous and arid landscapes of the Islamic World, collected and transported across Eurasian sea- and riverways, and deposited in Northern Eurasian fields and forests, silver Islamic coins circulated far and wide in transcontinental trade. Although these itinerant materials have rarely been regarded as ‘Silk Road’ coinage, Islamic silver contains unambiguous associations with people and landscapes connected by the ‘Silk Road’ network. These coins circulated throughout and helped shape the late ‘Silk Road’ network across Afro-Eurasian landscapes, namely during the eighth to tenth centuries AD. As material traces of long-distance interactions between the Islamic World and Northern Eurasia, Islamic coins provide an important case study for the ways that archaeologists can consider trade and economic interactions more broadly than simply the hand-to-hand exchange of goods between humans. To illustrate the effectiveness of this approach, I examine surviving ‘Abbāsid coin assemblages, which are housed today in museum collections around the world, from a ‘Silk Road’ network perspective that recognizes materials as influential agents that helped forge transformative interactions between Afro-Eurasian communities.

The Jugaad Project, 2023

Coins have long been important materials for examining values and exchange networks in the past. ... more Coins have long been important materials for examining values and exchange networks in the past. Housed today in museum collections around the world, Islamic coins are no exception. But Islamic coins are more than simply material traces of the past, they also hold important contemporary meanings that have been overlooked and undervalued by academics. In this article, I share how I have begun to explore the possibilities for, and ethical commitment to, community involvement in the meanings and values that are constructed around museum-based materials. I discuss some results from my cultural heritage survey of people culturally connected to the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region. This survey contains individual-reported information about how individuals affiliated with the MENA region understand their relationship to museums, Islamic materials, and the construction of heritage. These stakeholder voices reveal the understated importance of museum-housed assemblages for cultural heritage and community values, including those that span across national borders, languages, and religious beliefs. This work envisions transformative approaches to collections and museum practice in which communities are recognized for their values regarding materials from the Islamic World’s vibrant past, rather than remaining the “recipients” of museum narratives and academic research.

Religions, 2021

In recent years, the influence of Muslims and Islam on developments in medieval Europe has captur... more In recent years, the influence of Muslims and Islam on developments in medieval Europe has captured the attention of scholars and the general public alike. Nevertheless, ‘conversion’ to Islam remains a challenging subject for historical research and demands more transdisciplinary collaborations. This article examines early medieval interactions between Muslim Arabs and Northern and Eastern Europeans as a case study for whether some individuals in Northern Eurasia ‘converted’ to Islam. More importantly, we address some key examples and lines of evidence that demonstrate why the process of ‘conversion’ to Islam is not more visible in the historical and archaeological records of Northern Eurasia. We find that, despite the well-established evidence for economic exchanges between the Islamic World and Northern Eurasia, the historical and material records are much more complex, but not entirely silent, on the issue of religious change. We also conclude that religious connectivity and exchanges, including with Islam, were common in early medieval Northern Eurasia, even if it is difficult in most cases to identify conclusive instances of ‘conversion’ to Islam.

World Archaeology, 2021

In modern scholarship, the ‘Silk Road’ is used as a broad framework for networked exchanges acros... more In modern scholarship, the ‘Silk Road’ is used as a broad framework for networked exchanges across ancient Eurasia, periodized roughly between the Han dynasty’s lucrative silk trade and the decline of the Mongol Empire (ca. 200 BCE to 1400 CE). This paper identifies the ‘Silk Road’ as an important analytical model for archaeological research on transregional and global-scale phenomena. I argue that Silk Road scholarship has often engaged four key theoretical approaches. While they are not exclusive to Silk Road archaeology, this field has developed some exemplary, successful applications of these approaches to the study of global phenomena. This model is therefore poised to inform other research on global archaeological topics. As an example of research outside of core Silk Road studies that can benefit from these theoretical approaches, I examine medieval materials found in Eastern Europe from the perspective of the Silk Road model.

Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory, 2021

This paper explores the potential for Assemblage Theory to contribute to current approaches in ne... more This paper explores the potential for Assemblage Theory to contribute to current approaches in network thinking in Archaeology. I argue that Assemblage Theory offers improved explanatory models for understanding relationality and how social networks aggregate, change, and disassemble over time at multiple scales. In recent years, network approaches in Archaeology have encouraged the study of complex assemblages. To complement these studies, I argue for the productivity of broadening traditional definitions of assemblage to one that does not discriminate between assemblages of itinerant objects in dispersed networks and those situated within a self-contained site. Following Assemblage Theory, I therefore suggest that assemblage is best defined as a cluster of emergent, relational phenomena and that materials, human actants, forces, and other matter need not be confined to any one geographically delineated space in order to constitute an assemblage. To evaluate the possibilities for Assemblage Theory applications, I examine the movements of walrus ivory objects across the North Atlantic and continental Europe, ca. 800-1550 CE. A reconstruction of the extended network involved in these itinerant materials reveals patterns of material movements informed by economic behavior and political change. The application of Assemblage Theory to this model offers a valuable theoretical foundation to address the interconnected agency and relationality of network entities and components. This approach allows for greater complexity and specificity in identifying and explaining the material networks which generated economic change between medieval Europe and Africa.

Fabula, 2020

This article explores new possibilities for the interpretation of myths. It asks how people in th... more This article explores new possibilities for the interpretation of myths. It asks how people in the past configured their world and its complex interactions, to which their orally-constructed stories bear witness. It is assumed here that myths contain structures of belief, cognition, and world-making beyond their immediate subject matter. This article focuses specifically on the preservation of material objects in myths throughout their transmission from changing oral narratives to written form. We should not assume that objects in oral traditions simply color the narratives; rather, these representations of materials can provide clues into the mentalities of past peoples and how they understood the complex interaction between humans and materials. As a case study, I examine the Old Norse myths, stories containing materials that reinforced Scandinavian oral traditions and gave the stories traction, memory, and influence. In doing so, this article hopes to help bridge materiality studies, narrative studies, and folklore in a way that does not privilege one particular source type over another. The myths reveal ancient Scandinavian conceptions of what constituted an “object,” which are not necessarily the same as our own twenty-first century expectations. The Scandinavian myths present a world not divided between active Subject, passive Object as the Cartesian model would enforce centuries later, but rather one that recognized distinctive object agencies beyond the realm of human intention.

Encyclopedia of Global Archaeology, 2020

Temenos, 2019

The vivid presence of material objects in Scandinavian cosmology, as preserved in the Old Norse m... more The vivid presence of material objects in Scandinavian cosmology,
as preserved in the Old Norse myths, carries underexplored traces of
belief systems and the material experience of Iron Age Scandinavia
(400–1000 CE). This paper proposes an archaeological reading of Norse
mythology to help explain how ancient Scandinavians understood the
presence and role of deities, magic, and the supernatural in everyday
life. The Norse myths retain records of material objects that reinforced
Scandinavian oral traditions and gave their stories power, memory,
and influence. From Thor’s hammer and Freyja’s feathered cloak
to Sigyn’s bowl and Ran’s net, such materials and the stories they
colour are informed by everyday objects of Iron Age life – spun with
the magic, belief, and narrative traditions that made them icons. The
mythic objects promoted a belief system that expected and embraced
the imperfections of objects, much like deities. These imperfections
in the divine Norse objects and the ways in which the gods interact
with their materials are part and parcel of the Scandinavian religious
mentality and collective social reality. This work ultimately questions
the relationship between materiality and myth, and seeks to nuance
our current understandings of the ancient Scandinavian worldview
based on the available textual evidence.

Syllabus, 2018

"Migration and Mobility in the Viking Age: Global Perspectives" is an intensive six-week summer c... more "Migration and Mobility in the Viking Age: Global Perspectives" is an intensive six-week summer course that fulfills the second part of UC Berkeley's "Reading and Composition" requirement for lower-level undergraduates. Rooted in pedagogical practices of creating authentic learning experiences for students, the course is designed to appeal to undergraduate students across a wide variety of disciplines in order to teach them college-level academic writing. The course design uses digital technologies in the classroom and historical perspectives of the Viking Age to encourage students to think critically about human migrations, both historical and modern, and to apply issues related to cross-cultural interactions, such as race, gender, religion, and agency, to their world today. This syllabus has been slightly revised from the most recently taught version of this course, in Summer 2017.

Viking and Medieval Scandinavia, 2016

This paper reconsiders the nature of Christian conversion in Viking-Age Sweden and traditional as... more This paper reconsiders the nature of Christian conversion in Viking-Age Sweden and traditional assumptions of a centre-periphery model that places Viking and medieval Scandinavia on the periphery of Christian Europe. Notions of Scandinavians as barbarians lingered and tainted outsiders’ perception of them even after conversion, as seen in early medieval texts which portray Scandinavians’ Christian beliefs and practices as trivial or unsophisticated. The Swedish Viking-Age runestones provide evidence that challenges the assumption that Christianity was passively appropriated to Scandinavia from Europe. Instead, the runic material helps demonstrate the Scandinavians’ originality and sophisticated understanding of the new religion by exposing how they adopted and incorporated Christian beliefs and practices into their uniquely Scandinavian context. Scandinavians’ adoption and application of Christian concepts, such as the development of Purgatory and its association with bridges and Christian deeds, to their monuments in order to accommodate the new religion is particularly examined.

Papers by Sara Ann Knutson

European Association of Archaeologists (EAA) Conference, 2020

Presentation at "The Global North: Spaces, Connections, and Networks before 1700" Conference, Sto... more Presentation at "The Global North: Spaces, Connections, and Networks before 1700" Conference, Stockholm University, August 2019

"Representing Networks: Past & Present" Workshop, University of Cologne, June 2019

Book Reviews by Sara Ann Knutson

Studies in Late Antiquity, 2024