Peter Jordan is a Professor of Archaeology at Lund University, who've studied prehistoric transformations across Northern Eurasia. During this lecture Jordan gives historic insight into societies affected by environmental disasters. This lecture is part of HT's series “Open Lectures” where researchers at the HT faculties can present their research to an open audience.

To what extant can local communities, their food systems, and social networks survive catastrophic shocks and sudden environmental disasters? Is “societal resilience” just about raw survival or is there a lingering hope that things will eventually return to some kind of normality again? Working with long-term data, archaeologists are in a unique position to investigate major environmental catastrophes in terms of immediate impacts and enduring social-ecological legacies; they now explore more complex trajectories that cannot be reduced to simplistic notions of “cultural resilience” versus “societal collapse” and the disappearance of entire cultures. This talk presents emerging scientific results from a new VR project based at Lund University that examines the human social consequences of the largest volcanic eruption in the last 12,000 years. These ancient insights are deployed to reflect on our current and future-focused perceptions of sustainability and deeper societal resilience.

Peter Jordan, professor of Archaeology.

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The event is part of Sustainability Week 2025, which runs between 5-10 May. Sustainability Week is an annual event in Lund organised as a joint venture by Lund University and Lund municipality. The week serves as a platform for bringing together ideas, raising public awareness and for inspiring sustainable change.