Quantification in Zooarchaeology: Calculating and Critiquing NISP, MNI, and MNE

Quantification in Zooarchaeology: Calculating and Critiquing NISP, MNI, and MNE

Instructor: Gillian Wong

This course is designed for archaeologists at any stage in their career (including students and late career stage) who are not specialists in zooarchaeology or who do not work with the quantification units used regularly in zooarchaeology. We will focus on learning about three of the most commonly used quantification units: Number of Identified Specimens (NISP), Minimum Number of Elements (MNE), and Minimum Number of Individuals (MNI). We will learn how to calculate these units and the history of their development, but, more importantly, will also learn how to interpret them and evaluate their use and applicability to research questions. This course will be broken up into lecture, practical, and discussion portions that will give participants the tools to easily and more accurately interpret zooarchaeological studies that use these three units. Additionally, reference materials, lecture slides, and study examples will be provided to all participants.

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