Forager-Traders in South and Southeast Asia

Specialized forager-traders have lived alongside and in exchange relationships with agriculturalists for many thousands of years in South and Southeast Asia. Here is a series of representative case-studies that pertain to a current archaeological debate. The issue concerns the extent to which historical foraging populations are to be understood as specialized adaptations to a complex economically diverse environment, rather than as throw-backs to a Paleolithic way of life.