A Very Remote Storage Box Indeed: The Importance of Doing Archaeology with Old Museum Collections

Although our practice has come to be defined by a focus on excavation as the trademark of archaeological research, research on archaeological collections lies at the scientific heart of the discipline. We demonstrate through two very different case studies how a return to primary sources (in this case, boxes of artifacts) can upend our understanding of the objects themselves and create new narratives of social and technological change. At the same time, access to museum collections is becoming increasingly difficult as institutions struggle with the growing pressure to enhance public outreach and modernize data management, while simultaneously contending with persistent budget cuts. As archaeologists who work closely with museum curators and museum collections, we offer suggestions for how researchers can work with museums to ensure that future generations of researchers and the general public can learn from the ancient materials preserved within their collections.     

Archaeological Ethnography,Heritage Management,and Community Archaeology: A Pragmatic Approach from Crete

This article examines the introduction of archaeological ethnography as an approach to establish positioned research and bring context-specific and reflexive considerations into community archaeology projects. It considers recent critiques of heritage management in archaeology and the role of archaeologists as experts in it, contending that smaller and less prominent sites exist in different contexts and pose different problems than large-scale projects usually addressed in the literature. We describe how the ‘Three Peak Sanctuaries of Central Crete’ project, investigating prehistoric Minoan ritual sites, involves communities and stakeholders and what demands the latter pose on experts in the field. Archaeological work is always already implicated in local development projects which create and reproduce power hierarchies. It is therefore important that archaeologists maintain their critical distance from official heritage discourses, as they are materialized in development programmes, while at the same time engaging with local expectations and power struggles; they also have to critically address and position their own assumptions. We use examples from our community archaeology project to propose that these goals can be reached through archaeological ethnographic fieldwork that should precede any archaeological project to inform its methodological decisions, engage stakeholders, and collaboratively shape heritage management strategies.     

The Production and Exchange of Marine Shell Prestige Goods

Marine shell ornaments have several characteristics that make them significant for archaeological analysis. Made from a raw material valued by cultures throughout the world and imbued with water, life, health, and fertility symbolism, shell objects have functioned as prestige goods. Shell prestige goods circulated between individuals, groups, and societies and materialized interpersonal relationships, making them valuable for archaeologists shifting focus from objects to the people in past societies. Shell ornaments had multiple roles, including ornamentation, wealth, marking status, and as ritual paraphernalia, and had varying symbolic associations even within a society. The rich ethnographic literature on shell use provides a source for archaeological model building. Marine shell artifacts often moved between societies and across long distances, offering a way for archaeologists to explore regional relationships and the interactions between ancient societies. To do this requires using several scales of analysis to investigate archaeological residues of a system that includes marine shell ornaments, the social organization of their production and exchange, and the people who made, displayed, and circulated them.     

Archaeological Research in Conflict Areas: Practice and Responsibilities

This paper discusses the relationships between ethics and archaeological fieldwork. It represents the author’s reflections on her own archaeological work in an area, Lebanon, which has in recent times been wracked by considerable violence. The stimulus for the paper came mainly from the question posed by the session organizers and editors of this issue: what would constitute ethical archaeological practice, especially in situations of war and violence but also in cultural contexts in which different approaches to understanding and valuing historical knowledge predominate than those typically held by archaeologists. Two concrete examples from my own fieldwork in Beirut and Kamid el-Loz make clear how the scientific interests of historical-archaeological research and those of people who live in the research area can be reconciled despite specific instances in which they diverge.     

Global Application of Indigenous Archaeology: Community Based Participatory Research in Turkey

What does Indigenous archaeology offer archaeologists who do not work on Native land, at Indigenous sites, or with Indigenous people? This article demonstrates the broad applicability of Indigenous archaeology and the way it can be utilized by archaeologists working in any locale. Through recent fieldwork in south central Turkey working with a non-indigenous community of local residents near the archaeological site of Çatalhöyük, I demonstrate ways that the theories and methodology of Indigenous archaeology are a useful and relevant part of practice for archaeologists working in areas that are neither on Native land nor involve sites related to indigenous heritage. It also points to the need for further investigation into collaborative methods for the development of a set of best practices within archaeological and heritage management settings.     

Re-visiting the field: Collaborative archaeology as paradigm shift

Abstract

The emphasis of the JFA on field methods resonates strongly with current disciplinary interest in multivocality and participatory research. In this new epistemology of inclusiveness, communities play an active role in the production of archaeological knowledge as well as in the conservation of cultural heritage. From the perspective of archaeologists trained in the U.S. who conduct research in Latin America, we historicize changes in the triadic relationship among archaeologists, contemporary communities, and things of the past. This examination focuses on the evolving social context of archaeological practice. The social milieu within which archaeology is conducted is explored further by reference to a recent survey of archaeologists that elicited comments on grand challenges to archaeology. A few examples of the many forms that an engaged archaeology might take are offered from the Maya region. Although collaborative research poses challenges that emerge as communities entangled with archaeological practice become research partners, we suggest that the enhanced relevance that accompanies this transformation is well worth the effort.     

Inconspicuous Consumption: Non-Display Goods and Identity Formation

In the study of ancient material culture, archaeologists have primarily focused on the use of objects for display and communication. This social function of material culture could only have developed on the basis of individual cognitive capacity for the use of goods as materializations of symbolic behavior. To explore the deeply held relationship of identity to material culture, this paper focuses on goods that are utilized away from the gaze of others. Using examples from the ethnographic present such as pharmaceuticals, underwear, and hygiene products, I develop the idea of “reflexive identity” to describe how people use material objects in private to define themselves prior to and independent of their social roles as perceived by others. The act of daily identity creation and affirmation through goods, particularly those that are inexpensive and disposable, indicates the extent to which human cognition and psychological sense of self are inextricably linked to the handling of material culture. The archaeological application of a reflexive identity enables us to understand how ordinary goods are a fundamental component of identity formation prior to and independent of individuals’ engagement with others.     

Contexts for Conflict: Conceptual Tools for Interpreting Archaeological Reflections of Warfare

Abstract

There has been a long history of interest in the material remains of conflict, but in the last two and a half decades archaeologists have made strides in the study of war and warfare. Techniques have been developed, refined, and borrowed to expose the material record of combat. Sites associated with other military undertakings have been discovered and the material culture of conflict has been documented. This growth has expanded an understanding of past conflicts and challenged previously held ideas about warfare. Although archaeologists do not currently have interpretive frameworks to link the diverse sites and objects that form the archaeological record of war, modern military planners have developed such models. This paper uses sites from the North American Great Plains to suggest that military models of conflict analysis can contribute to a synthetic archaeological interpretation of conflict.     

考古发掘与考古发现

考古发现和考古学理论方法是考古学赖以进步的两条腿。考古发现不断刷新考古学家的视野并为考古学研究的深入提供新的资料,考古学理论方法使考古学的眼睛更加明亮,分析和思考更具有科学的力量。理论方法让考古学家对考古发现有更深入的认识,考古发现同时也推动综合研究和理论方法的进步。此外,考古发现往往会引起社会的关注,考古发现和考古学知识的普及可以为考古学的进步提供良好的社会环境,从而对考古学的发展产生强大的推动力量。考古学的持续发展要求考古学家必须正确处理考古发现、考古学自身理论方法的完善以及考古学与化遗产保护、公众知识状况和社会需求的关系。     

Archaeometric Clearinghouse XVII

Abstract

Rapid escalation of fieldwork costs during the past years has required archaeologists to pursue innovative methods for maximizing the amount of fieldwork for the funds available. One of the more labor intensive aspects of fieldwork is the recovery of cultural materials through the use of manual shaker screens. During the past several years, several archaeologists in the midwestern United States have utilized slightly modified, commercially-manufactured agricultural machines for this task. The result is a very cost-efficient method of artifact recovery which drastically reduces the amount of time spent at this task, allowing excavators to spend much more of their field time in excavation and data recording. It has also proved to be very nondestructive to artifacts passing through the machine. Instructions for modifying and using the machine are presented.     

Twelve Timely Tales: On Biographies of Pioneering Women Archaeologists

Breaking Ground, edited by Cohen and Joukowsky, presents biographies of twelve female American and European archaeologists who pursued fieldwork in the Old World in the late 19th and 20th centuries. Though accurately grounded in archival sources and careful citation, readers would need guidelines to theoretical and methodological issues to better understand the type of scholarly products that the various biographies represent. As explicit historiographic and gender discussions are avoided, focus is placed on these pioneers' individual experiences. The anthology provides a wide-ranging but somewhat fragmented understanding of the gendered character of the archaeological discipline.     

Ceramics, Ethnohistory, and Ethnography: Locating Meaning in Southern African Iron Age Ceramic Assemblages

For ceramics to be relevant in the Southern African Iron Age, archaeologists must broaden their theoretical base to include social and other contexts when interpreting material culture items such as pottery. Pottery remains critical in understanding cultural dynamics in the region for the past two millennia, but current usage is narrow in scope. Using ethnohistorical data and archaeological examples from South Africa and Zimbabwe, we argue that pottery provides valuable information on the region's Iron Age, if archaeologists address the social meaning of ceramic assemblages. Ceramic production among rural communities provides the basis on which a wide range of social issues are discussed and used to critique pottery recovered from archaeology. Ethnography suggests that ceramic assemblages are context specific, and archaeologists are cautioned against making generic statements on the basis of similarities of vessel shape and decoration motif.     

A historical review of ethnological and archaeological analyses of mortuary practice

For over a century, anthropologists have analyzed death-related phenomena to acquire knowledge concerning religion, social organization, and economic cooperation. There have been notable epistemological shifts in this inquiry by socioculturalanthropologists, with a “time lag” prior to concomitant archaeological shifts in explanation of similar phenomena. This article reviews many sociocultural and archaeological contributions to the development of a theory of mortuary practice. It is felt that although many advances in method have been made by modern archaeologists in terms of mortuary practice, they have been restricted by an exclusive British functionalist approach. Finally, it is suggested that incorporation of structuralist theory and examinations of the entire trajectory of death-related behavior may be an aid to archaeologists.     

Artefacts,archaeologists and American Indians

Abstract

Archaeologists traditionally have observed the style and technology of artefacts and used this to classify archaeological assemblages, describing the repeated association of artefact groups as a ‘Culture’. We continue to place overwhelming reliance on our ability to derive meaningful information about past culture from artefacts, yet the importance these objects had for the members of the cultural group (past and present) is not adequately considered. The typological approach sidelines the creative role of the artisans, we find out a little about their economy, gain momentary glimpses of their religion, but learn almost nothing about their humanity. Archaeologists tend to focus on the physical, technological or esoteric attributes of an artefact, while indigenous populations tend to focus on the object's ritual or social importance. This is most apparent in the treatment of funerary artefacts. Until recently, many American Indian tribal groups have seen no distinction between ‘grave robbing’ and ‘archaeological excavation’ it made no difference to them whether the dead were disturbed by looters or by qualified archaeologists. By involving indigenous populations in the design, practice and dissemination of archaeological research, we can add humanity to our study of the human past, and take a step toward a truly worldwide archaeology.     

Advisory Commissions for Archaeology — Sense or Nonsense? The Case of Belgium

Abstract

Belgium has a long tradition of consultative commissions, responsible for the preservation of heritage. In the 1940s and 1950s, Belgian archaeologists expressed a need for such an institute, specifically competent for archaeology and the supervision of excavations. Only in 1965, the first members of a National Commission for Excavations were appointed. They had modest powers, but were able to advocate the value of archaeological heritage and, to a limited extent, supervise fieldwork performed by amateurs. The Commission was also asked to prepare a legal text that would protect archaeological heritage. However, ratified laws were not accomplished and, despite much regret of Belgian archaeologists, the Commission was abolished in 1979.

During the 1980s, Belgium underwent several state reforms which ultimately resulted in the complete regionalization of archaeology (1988–89). Throughout this period, a shift in opinion occurred between Walloon (French-speaking) and Flemish (Dutch-speaking) archaeologists. This resulted in different arrangements of governmental agencies responsible for immovable heritage and archaeology. Nonetheless, as UNESCO had recommended in 1968, all three Belgian regions (including the Brussels-Capital Region) installed advisory commissions that were involved in the preservation in situ of archaeological remains. However, these consultative bodies had little influence on politics and policy. Especially in Flanders, the Archaeological Council achieved very little. Probably, the lack of continuity retained the Council from building up a reputation and authority. Nevertheless, advisory commissions for archaeology do make sense in Belgium. They provide a necessary ‘forum’ to discuss problems and to express undivided opinions; they form a ‘channel’ to communicate with policy makers; and they present an ‘instrument’ for advocating the preservation of archaeological heritage.     

Where are the witches of prehistory?

Why are certain common classes of ritually destroyed objects (persons, artifacts, or architecture), such as persecuted witches, so difficult to identify in the archaeological record? Although a common topic in cultural anthropology, witches seldom receive the attention of archaeologists. The difficulties archaeologists face in the study of religion derive, in part, from the lack of correlates linking ritual activities to the formation of archaeological deposits. This paper defines ritual as a technology and employs an object life history approach that draws upon ethnographic, archaeological, and experimental research to begin building such linkages—including those describing the presecution and deposition of witches, sorcerers, and other victims of ritual violence. These new directions are illustrated through a case study of anomalous deposits of human skeletal remains from the North American Southwest     

Building Bundles,Building Memories: Processes of Remembering in Adena-Hopewell Societies of Eastern North America

Over the past 20 years, archaeologists have grown increasingly interested in exploring the relationships between humans and things. In part, this focus on materiality has been fueled by the integration of modern philosophical perspectives and considerations of non-Western ontologies and the New Materialisms. In North America, much emphasis has been placed on exploring the relational aspects of American Indian ontologies in the past and present. In this article, I build upon these perspectives by integrating memory as an important infrastructure through which these relationships are cast and maintained. I refer to these memory-based practices as processes of remembering. I argue that identifying these discursive memory processes provides an opportunity to refine how we understand objects like bundles and the social process of bundling—one way archaeologists have framed complex human/thing relationships. I use an Adena-Hopewell burial mound from the Middle Woodland period in Eastern North America (ca. 200 BCE–CE 500) as a case study to illustrate how societies during this era were, at least in part, organized and sustained through the rituals involved in revising bundles of ancestors, objects, and memories of human action. I argue that bundling assemblages of the past managed social dissonance by stabilizing or transforming perceptions of kinship in social coalitions.     

In Search of the Social: Steamboats, Square Wheels, Reindeer and Other Things

This paper examines the concept of the ‘social,’ particularly from an archaeological perspective, and explores how it relates to the ways in which we seek to understand the processes of technological innovation and change. It is demonstrated that the concept ‘social’ is far from well defined and that enquiry is bedevilled by artificial polarization between subject-centred approaches and object-centred particularism. Through the medium of early United States steamboat technology a different approach is forged through the melding of people and things with the idea of viewing artefacts as active social actors along with people. Ultimately, it is argued that maritime archaeologists should be more bullish in their approaches to material things—instead of adopting social theories ‘wholesale,’ we should insist that they include the things we study: boats, material objects, people, artefacts, landscapes and animals.     

Places in Interaction: The National Archaeological Park Project as an Integrated Approach to Public Archaeology in China

The aim of this paper is to re-examine how concepts of public archaeology have been established and developed in varying social and political contexts in China, and how the recent national archaeological park project is structured as an important approach for improving public-archaeology relationships and promoting the public uses of archaeology. Since all archaeological activities in China are exclusively regulated by the state, all archaeological resources are administered for the benefit of the public. As such, concepts of public archaeology demonstrate the efforts of Chinese archaeologists to re-evaluate public-archaeology relationships and uses of archaeology through public engagement as well as archaeological communications with the public. The national archaeological park project was launched in 2006 to expand the practice of archaeology with the creation of archaeological communications, public space, and community-driven programmes. The project facilitates multiple perspectives on public archaeology practice through public education, community cohesion, re-creation of public space, and local economic development.     

Digital Support for Archaeology

Abstract

We describe an interdisciplinary approach in which computer scientists develop techniques to support archaeology. In the Reading Images for the Cultural Heritage (RICH) project, a variety of methods have been developed to support archaeologists in the visualization, categorization, and characterization of archaeological objects, such as medieval glass, coins, ceramics, and seeds. The methods are based on image processing and machine learning algorithms that are tailored to the task at hand. We describe the algorithms and illustrate their application on archaeological datasets. The virtues and pitfalls of the interdisciplinary approach to archaeology are discussed.