Fumie Iizuka
Position title: Assistant Professor
Email: iizuka2@wisc.edu
Phone: 608-265-1992
Address:
5317 Sewell Social Science Building
Fumie Iizuka
Ph.D., Anthropology, The University of Arizona (2013)
Area of Focus
Archaeology, Eastern Eurasia, archaeometry, ceramics, paleoenvironments, hunter-gatherers and early farmers, transitions from pre-ceramic to ceramic periods, late Pleistocene to early and mid-Holocene
Research
Fumie Iizuka is an archaeologist studying decisions made by hunter-gatherers and early farmers to adopt pottery and associated technology in response to climate and ecosystem changes. She critically evaluates geochronology in these contexts. She has examined pre-ceramic to ceramic period transitions in Eastern Eurasia: Japan, Mongolia, and Siberian Russia. Her work builds on long-term research on these transitions conducted in Latin America, especially in Panama, and with some emphasis in Colombia. Incorporating approaches developed in geology and materials science, Iizuka reconstructs ceramic production processes and evaluates performance characteristics and producers’ intended functions as well as assesses degrees of sedentism, mobility, and exchange among producers and users. She explores associations between behavioral changes and environmental variability and shifts.
Iizuka’s ongoing primary project is in southern Kyushu of southern Japan. With funding from the National Science Foundation (#2218884), she directs excavation projects of the Naganosaki Site of the terminal Upper Paleolithic period and the Hiramatsu B site of the Incipient Jomon period on Tanegashima Island. Iizuka evaluates the precise timing of the end of the Upper Paleolithic and the onset (between ~14,000 to 13,500 cal BP) of the Incipient Jomon, and the causes of the transition from highly mobile hunting and gathering to increasingly sedentary foraging, marked by the first use of ceramics and some evidence of inter-island contacts. She collaborates with experts in paleobotany, sedimentary ancient DNA, and ocean science, to reconstruct vegetational, faunal, and sea level changes, and with specialists of lithic technologies and soil micromorphology.
Because the pre-ceramic to ceramic period transitions in the late Pleistocene northeastern Eurasia overlaps with the timing when hunter-gatherers are inferred to have migrated toward the Americas, by ~16,000 cal BP prior to the opening of the Ice-Free Corridor, Iizuka tests a coastal migration model with her colleagues. Iizuka furthermore studies the origins of ceramics in the Selenga River basin of northern Mongolia, bordering Transbaikal, because Transbaikal has debatable geochronology associated with the first pottery period (starting as early as ~14,000 cal BP or as late as ~8800 cal BP or later). This is part of a project investigating the Early Upper Paleolithic to early pottery periods in Mongolia led by an international team of researchers.
Iizuka’s research has been published in peer-reviewed journals including PLOS One, Quaternary International, Geoarchaeology, PaleoAmerica, Science, and Science Advances.
Current call for papers:
Joint special issue in Quaternary Science Advances and Quaternary Environments and Humans
Iizuka, F., Davis, L., Terry, K., Yokoyama, Y. (Guest Editors), Human Ecodynamics in the Late
Pleistocene Pacific Rim: Technology, Migrations, and Adaptative Responses to Variable Environmental Changes.
Teaching
Anthro 490 The Emergence of Ceramics: Concepts, World-Wide Cases, and Problems
Service
Active service engagement: Editor of Quaternary Environments and Humans (QEH), a new open access journal of the International Union for Quaternary Research (INQUA)-Elsevier; Chair of the Art Archaeology and Conservation Science Division of the American Ceramic Society; Editorial Board member of a Springer book series, Interdisciplinary Contributions to Archaeology; Recommender for a new peer-reviewed preprint system, Peer Community In (PCI) Archaeology.
Outreach
Ongoing outreach activities on Tanegashima are on climate change of past and present. Clips are found here:
Potential graduate students interested in working with Iizuka: Please contact her well in advance. Ideally, students should work with her in field or laboratory prior to applying. Students interested in reconstructing human behavioral changes from technological and ecological perspectives with preparation in scientific methods are preferred.
Publications
Edited Journal Special Issues
2022 Iizuka, F. & Terry, K. (Guest Editors), Old World Ceramic Origins and Behavioral Contexts from the Late Pleistocene to Mid-Holocene: Unresolved and New Problems. Quaternary International 608-609: 1-262 (published online, November 2021).
Journal Articles
Accepted Morisaki, K., Iizuka, F., Izuho, M., Aldenderer, M., More on Mobility and
Sedentism: Changes in Adaptation from Upper Paleolithic to Incipient Jomon, Tanegashima Island, Southern Japan. PLOS One.
2023 Iizuka, F. & Carvajal-Contreras, D., Un Análisis Visual de Técnicas de
Manufactura y Tecnología de la Cerámica del Sitio Puerto Hormiga, Colombia: Reconsideraciones Sobre las Observaciones de Reichel-Dolmatoff. Revista Arqueología y Patrimonio 2(1):9-29 (in Spanish).
2022 Davis, L., Madsen, D., Sisson, D., Valdivia-Becerra, L., Higham, T., Stueber, D.,
Bean, D., Nyers, A., Carroll, A., Ryder, C., Sponheimer, M., Izuho, M., Iizuka, F., Li, G., Epps, C. & Halford, F.K. Dating of a Large Tool Assemblage at the Cooper’s Ferry Site (Idaho, USA) to ~15,785 cal yr B.P. Extends the Age of Stemmed Points in the Americas. Science Advances 8(51): DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.ade1248.
2022 Iizuka, F., Ferguson, J. & Izuho, M., Late Pleistocene Pottery Production and
Exchange: Provenance Studies of Hunter-Gatherer Wares from Southern Kyushu, Japan by Neutron Activation Analysis. PLOS One 17(3): e0265329. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0265329
2022 Handa, N., Izuho, M., Takahashi, K., Iizuka, F., Tsogtbaatar, B., Gunchinsuren, B.,
Odsuren, D. & Ishtseren, L., The Whoolly Rhino (Coelodonta Antiquitatis) from Ondorkhaan, Eastern Mongolia. Boreas. DOI: 10.1111/bor.12582.
2021 Iizuka, F. & Terry, K., (Editorial) Old World Ceramic Origins and Behavioral
Contexts from the Late Pleistocene to Mid-Holocene: Unresolved and New Problems. Quaternary International 608-609: 1-7 (print issue: January 2022). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.quaint.2021.10.002.
2021 Izuho, M., Iizuka, F., Buvit, I. & Konstantinov, M., Problems on the Age
Determination of the Oldest Pottery Yielding Horizons at Studenoe 1 Site, Transbaikal (Southern Siberia). Quaternary International 608-609: 120-136 (print issue: January, 2022). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.quaint.2021.02.002.
2021 Iizuka, F., Vandiver, P., Morisaki, K., Izuho, M., Okita, J. & Aldenderfer, M.,
Early Ceramic Technology and Variability from Kagoshima, Japan (No. 4): The Incipient Jomon Pottery from the Onigano, Nihonmatsu, and Okunonita Sites. Kagoshima Journal of Archaeology 50: 241-254 (in Japanese).
2020 Iizuka, F., Izuho, M., Wada, K., Barnard, H., Vandiver, P., Morisaki, K., Wendt,
- & Aldenderfer, M., Of the Sea and Volcano: A Petrographic Provenance
Investigation of Locally Produced and Imported Ware of Pre-Younger Dryas
Tanegashima Island, Japan. Quaternary International 608-609: 88-111 (print issue: January 2022). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.quaint.2020.10.009.
2020 Weber, M., Valencia, V., Caballero, J., Villada, B., Cardona, A. & Iizuka, F.,
U-Pb Dating of Zircon: A Sourcing Method for Pottery from the La Morena Archaeological Site, NW Colombia. Archaeometry 62(3):439-468. https://doi.org/10.1111/arcm.12532.
2019 Davis, L., Madsen, D., Becerra-Valdivia, L., Higham, T., Sisson, D., Skinner, S., Stueber, D., Nyers, A., Keen-Zebert, A., Neudorf, C., Cheyney, M., Izuho, M., Iizuka, F., Epps, C., Burns, S., Willis, S. & Buvit, I., Late Upper Paleolithic Occupation at Cooper’s Ferry, Idaho, USA, ~16,000 Years Ago. Science 365(6456): 891-897. http://doi.org/10.1126/science.aax9830.
2019 Iizuka, F., Izuho, M., Vandiver, P. & Aldenderfer, M., Early Pottery Technology and Variability from Kagoshima, Japan (No. 3): The Incipient Jomon Pottery from the Nakao and Mukaigakoijo-Ato Sites. From Jomon no Mori: Bulletin of Kagoshima Prefectural Archaeological Center 11: 33-52 (in Japanese).
2018 Iizuka, F., The Timing and Behavioral Context of the Late Pleistocene Adoption of
Ceramics in Greater East and Northeast Asia and the First People (Without Pottery)
in the Americas. PaleoAmerica 4(4): 267-324. https://doi.org/10.1080/20555563.2018.1563406.
2018 Iizuka, F., Izuho, M., Vandiver, P., Fukano, N. Nagano, Y. & Aldenderfer, M.,
Early Ceramic Technology and Variability from Kagoshima, Japan (No. 2): The Incipient Jomon Pottery from the Kenshojo-Ato and Soujiyama Sites. Kagoshima Journal of Archaeology 48: 57-76 (in Japanese).
2018 Iizuka, F., Izuho, M., Gunchinsuren, B., Tsogotbaatar, B. & Odsuren, D., Manufacturing Techniques and Formal Variability of Pottery from Five Neolithic Sites in Eastern Steppe and the Gobi Desert, Mongolia. Studia Archaeologica Instituti Historiae Et Archaeologici Academiae Scientiarum Mongolici XXXVII: 5-16.
2017 Iizuka, F., The Earliest Panamanian Pottery: Reconstructing Production and
Distribution of Monagrillo Ceramics through Petrographic Provenance Analysis.
Geoarchaeology 32(5):575-595. https://doi.org/10.1002/gea.21626.
2017 Iizuka, F. & Izuho, M., Late Upper Paleolithic-Initial Jomon Transitions, Southern
Kyushu, Japan: Regional Scale to Macro Processes a Close Look. Quaternary International 441(Part B):102-112. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.quaint.2016.12.040.
2017 Handa, N., Izuho, M., Takahashi, K., Iizuka, F., Tsogtbaatar, B., Gunchinsuren, B.,
Odsuren, D. & Ishtseren, L., Discovery of a Late Pleistocene Rhinocerotic Fossil
from Ondorkhaan, Eastern Mongolia. The Journal of the Geological Society of Japan
123 (12): V-VI. https://doi.org/10.5575/geosoc.2017.0058 (in Japanese).
2016 Iizuka, F., Izuho, M., Vandiver, P. & Okubo, K., Manufacturing Techniques and Variability: Incipient Jomon Pottery from the Sankakuyama I Site, Kagoshima, Japan. From Jomon no Mori: Bulletin of Kagoshima Prefectural Archaeological Center 9: 31-50 (in Japanese).
Book Chapters
2014 Iizuka, F., Cooke, R., Frame, L. & Vandiver, P., Inferring Provenance, Manufacturing Technique, and Firing Temperatures of Monagrillo Ware (3520-1300 cal BC), Panama’s First Pottery. In Craft and Science: International Perspectives on Archaeological Ceramics, edited by Martinón-Torres, M. pp. 19-29. UCL Qatar Series in Archeology and Cultural Heritage, Volume 1, Doha, Qatar: Bloomsbury Qatar Foundation. http://dx.doi.org/10.5339/uclq.2014.cas.ch3.
Book Review
2015 Iizuka, F., Science before Modernity, Archaeology of the Present; Book Review:
The Archaeology of Science: Studying the Creation of Useful Knowledge, Michael Brian Schiffer. New York: Springer, 2013, Current Anthropology 56(1): 146-148. doi.org/10.1086/679592.