RAI / Anglo-Turkish Society joint seminar
Thursday, 5 June 2025, 6.00pm (BST)
This is a hybrid event. Booking essential: https://gunes-duru-lecture.eventbrite.co.uk
(There is a free ticket option for RAI members and those that attend via Zoom)
For any questions, contact: contact@angloturkishsociety.org.uk
Central Anatolian Neolithic:
Tracing the Emergence of Early Sedentary Communities
Speaker: Associate Professor Güneş Duru (Mimar Sinan Fine Arts University, Istanbul)
This talk explores the complexity and diversity of early Neolithic life in Central Anatolia, a region crucial to understanding the emergence of sedentary lifeways and early farming practices. Drawing on two contemporary communities—Aşıklı and Balıklı—it examines how early Anatolian societies developed distinct social and ecological strategies. While Aşıklı reflects long-term stability and internal transformation, Balıklı illustrates a more fluid and outward-oriented existence, marked by mobility and interregional connectivity. By comparing these communities, the talk challenges uniform models of Neolithic development and highlights the multiplicity of pathways through which early communities shaped their worlds in the Anatolian context.
Güneş Duru is an archaeologist and Associate Professor at Mimar Sinan Fine Arts University in
Istanbul. He specializes in the prehistory of Southwest Asia, with a particular focus on the
Neolithic period in Central Anatolia. He is the co-director of the Aşıklı Höyük Project and director
of the Balıklı Excavations. Over the years, he has contributed to numerous excavations, including
Çatalhöyük. His research explores themes such as human-material interactions, settlement
organization, and theoretical archaeology. Beyond fieldwork, Duru is a prominent advocate for
critical and reflexive approaches in archaeology and is actively involved in interdisciplinary
teaching and writing.
