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1 - The context of Quaternary environmental change in southern Africa

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 June 2016

By
Jasper Knight  and
Stefan W. Grab
Edited by
Jasper Knight  and
Stefan W. Grab
Jasper Knight
Affiliation:
University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg
Stefan W. Grab
Affiliation:
University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg
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Summary

Abstract

Climate changes and tectonic processes throughout the Cenozoic, and earlier, provide the context for landscape and environmental change in southern Africa during the Quaternary. Changing land surface properties and resource availability, including rock types, topography, soils, ecosystems and drainage patterns, have exerted a strong impact on the processes and patterns of human evolution, technological innovation and behaviour over millennial timescales. The southern African landscape seen today, and the preserved imprint of its past human activities, resulted from the interplay between climate, tectonics and geomorphology over lengthy Cenozoic timescales.

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Chapter
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Quaternary Environmental Change in Southern Africa
Physical and Human Dimensions
 , pp. 1 - 17
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2016

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