FOR A GEOGRAPHIC ARCHEOLOGY OR ARCHAEOLOGICAL GEOGRAPHY OF THE HIGHLANDS OF THE STATE MINAS GERAIS – REFLECTIONS ON THE USE OF THE CULTURAL CONCEPT OF LANDSCAPE IN THE ARAÇUAÍ HIGH VALLEY

Abstract

This article aims to synthesize and present an acute reflect on how culturalist geographical concept of landscape has been applied to the archaeological research developed in Serra Negra area, northeastern side of Southern Espinhaço Range, Araçuaí High Valley, state of Minas Gerais, Brazil. To this end, the geographic concept of landscape comprises a mean to relate research and has been considered fundamental for the understand the dynamics, space-time and technological organization, and historical trajectories (lifestyle) of groups that occupied the region for millennia. In this case, the landscape is part of human life, which only exists based on our judgment, appreciation, understanding, etc., that is, it is a human construction, not only existing in materiality, but constituting layers of sociocultural practices, narratives and existences (ancestral and current). Occupations are established, appropriated and reinterpreted previous ones and, therefore, contemporary ones. We understand that landscape and humans are vectors of interrelationships, negotiations, and reciprocities. There is no landscape without humans, there is no humanity without landscape.