Scott Lyons

Postdoctoral Associate in East Asian Studies and Lecturer in Anthropology

Council on East Asian Studies

Academic Year: 2024-25

J. Scott Lyons is an anthropological archaeologist focused on historical ecology and archaeometallurgy in Japan. His dissertation combined a new synthesis of legacy paleoenvironmental data with archaeometallurgical analyses to recover landscape management practices embedded in ironworking technology at the fifth- and sixth-century ironworking site of Ōgata in Osaka Prefecture, Japan. Scott completed his Ph.D. in Anthropology at the University of California, Berkeley in 2022, and previously received an A.B. in Japanese and Archaeology from Washington University in St. Louis, and an M.A. in Archaeology from Kyoto University. Prior to coming to Yale, he was a Japan Society for the Promotion of Science Postdoctoral Fellow at Kyushu University where he began ethnoarchaeological research in collaboration with traditional ironworkers.

scott.lyons@yale.edu

Courses

Archaeology of Protohistoric Japan

EAST 428, ANTH 425, ARCG 425

Where and when are the origins of Japanese culture? In this seminar we will examine the archaeology of the Japanese archipelago from the introduction of paddy rice agriculture through the end of the 8th century with an eye toward this question. Examining excavated materials and early textual accounts, we will confront myths—both ancient and modern—of Japanese origins, and interrogate the framing of these time periods. Students will explore the interplay between event and process; and between local developments and outside influence through topics including the arrival of immigrant populations and rice agriculture, political and trade relationships within the archipelago as well as on the Asian continent, and the emergence of political “statehood.”

Seminar

Fall 2024

M 3:30 PM - 5:20 PM