UCL INSTITUTE OF ARCHAEOLOGY
ARCLG193:
Themes, Thought and Theory in World Archaeology: Foundations
2015-16: Term I
MA Core Module (15 credits)
Turnitin Class ID: 2971076
Turnitin Password: IoA1516
Co-ordinator:
Prof. Todd Whitelaw
t.whitelaw@ucl.ac.uk
Office 207, Tel 020 7679 7534
Office hours: stop-in if door is open,
or e-mail to arrange an appointment.
1. OVERVIEW
Short Description
This course provides an intensive graduate-level introduction to archaeological theory and archaeological
interpretation, as well as a global perspective on the discipline. Set readings will be used to review the
modern history of archaeological ideas, and to explore and evaluate the interpretative frameworks
developed by different schools of archaeological thought and the range of approaches currently pursued in
studying the archaeological record, material culture, social behaviour and long-term cultural change.
This handbook contains basic information about the content and administration of this course. If you have
queries about the organisation, objectives, structure, content or assessment of the course, please consult the
Course Co-ordinator.
Further important information, relating to all courses at the Institute of Archaeology, is to be found on the
IoA website, in the general MA/MSc handbook, and in your degree handbook. It is your responsibility to
read and act on this information. This includes information about originality, submission and grading of
coursework, disabilities, communication, attendance and feedback, not duplicated here (see Appendix).
Week-by-week summary of seminar topics
1. 05/06 October:
Archaeology, theory and practice.
2. 12/13 October:
Culture history: objectives and assumptions.
3. 19/20 October:
The New Archaeology: a new optimism.
4. 26/27 October:
Processual Archaeology: pragmatism and retrenchment.
5. 02/03 November: Post-processual Archaeology: critique and re-directed optimism.
Reading Week
6. 16/17 November: Marxism: change, power and ideology.
7. 23/24 November: Structuralism, Post-structuralism and meaning.
8. 30 Nov./01 Dec.:
Social evolution and complexity.
9. 07/08 December: The diversification of Interpretative Archaeologies.
10. 14/15 December: Archaeological theory today: diversity, pluralism or chaos?
Basic Texts
Trigger, B. 2006. A History of Archaeological Thought. (2nd edition). Cambridge: Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press. A solid and insightful history of archaeology, more abbreviated for the late 20th century.
Johnson, M. 2010. Archaeological Theory: An Introduction. (2nd edition). Oxford: Blackwell. A good
introduction, with attempt at balanced coverage.
Bentley, R.A., Maschner, H.D.G. and Chippindale, C. (eds.) 2008. Handbook of Archaeological Theories.
Lanham: AltaMira Press. Individual chapters by specialists, variable in quality and coverage; we will dip
into it for specific topics. Available through UCL Explore as an e-book.
Hodder, I. and S. Hutson 2003. Reading the Past. (3rd edition). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. A
lively and polemical review of many major recent perspectives, engaging but biased on any perspective
other than their own. Available through UCL Explore as an e-book.
Urban, P. and E. Schortman 2012. Archaeological Theory in Practice. Walnut Creek: Left Coast Press. A
general introduction to approaches to archaeological interpretation, with developed examples.
Gardner, A., M. Lake and U. Sommer (eds.) Forthcoming. The Oxford Handbook of Archaeological Theory.
Oxford: OUP. Available through UCL Explore as an e-book in advance of publication; search for
individual contributions by author < http://www.oxfordhandbooks.com.libproxy.ucl.ac.uk/browse?t0
=ORR:AHU00020>. Still in press, individual chapters by specialists; we will dip into it for specific
topics.
Methods of Assessment
This course is assessed by 4,000 words of coursework, divided into two essays, one of 1,500 words
(contributing 33% to the overall course mark) and the other of 2,500 words (contributing 67% to the overall
mark).
Teaching Methods
The course is taught through seminars which have weekly required readings, which students will be expected
to have read, to be able fully to follow and actively to contribute to discussion. The course is taught through
discussion rather than lecture, so reading in advance of the seminar is absolutely essential.
Workload
There will be 20 hours of seminars for this course. Students will be expected to undertake around 80 hours of
reading for the weekly sessions, plus 50 hours preparing for and producing the assessed work. This adds up
to a total workload of some 150 hours for the course.
Prerequisites
This course does not have a prerequisite; however, if students have no previous background in
archaeological theory, it may be advisable for them also to attend (but not be assessed for) the undergraduate
lecture course ARCL2028, Current Issues in Archaeological Theory (Mondays, 2-4pm, Birkbeck College,
Malet Street B20) to ensure that they have the background to get the most out of the Masters-level seminars
in this course.
2. AIMS, OBJECTIVES AND ASSESSMENT
Aims
The course provides an intensive graduate-level introduction to archaeological theory, research approaches
and reasoning, within a seminar framework based on set readings. It aims to review the recent history of
archaeological ideas and to discuss and debate approaches and key general themes in current archaeology
from historical, theoretical and comparative perspectives.
Objectives
On successful completion of this course a student should:
•
have an understanding of current theoretical debates across a broad range of archaeology;
•
understand the nature of the debates as a basis for developing their own theoretical position; and
•
be able to use the knowledge to develop an innovative PhD proposal or carry out soundly-based
research in their particular field of archaeology.
Learning Outcomes
By the end of the course students should be able to demonstrate:
•
critical analysis of ideas;
•
construction of a theory-based argument;
•
application of acquired knowledge; and
•
verbal discussion skills.
Coursework Deadlines
Essay 1 (1,500 words): Friday 20 November 2015.
Essay 2 (2,500 words): Thursday 24 March 2016.
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Assessment questions
For Essay 1 (1,500 words; 1,575 absolute maximum), answer one of the following questions:
1.
What do you consider to be the most important (ca. 2-3) foci of Cultural Historical archaeology, and in
what ways are they still relevant to archaeology today?
2.
What do you consider to be the most important (ca. 2-3) new points developed in of Processual
archaeology, and in what ways are they still relevant to archaeology today?
3.
What do you consider to be the most important (ca. 2-3) new points developed in Post-processual
archaeology, and in what ways are they still relevant to archaeology today?
For Essay 2 (2,500 words; 2,625 absolute maximum), answer one of the following questions (please
remember, if a question has multiple components, to address all of them):
1.
What constitutes an explanation in archaeology?
2.
To what extent does the political context of the emergence of archaeology in 19th century Europe still
shape the character of the discipline? [Do not answer, if you answered Q1 for essay 1.]
3.
In what sense(s), if any, is archaeology a science?
4.
Did Cognitive-Processual archaeology, as defined by Colin Renfrew, address the principal Postprocessual criticisms of Processual archaeology?
5.
What are the strengths and weaknesses of Marxist approaches to the past, considering the major
interpretive goals of both Processual and Post-processual archaeologies?
6.
What were the insights gained from considering ‘material culture as text’, and to what degree have these
helped archaeologists to interpret past meanings of the material record?
7.
What are the principal limitations of the Neoevolutionary social evolution framework for archaeological
explanations of social complexity, and what alternatives are there to this conceptual framework?
8.
How have archaeologists dealt with the relationship between structure and agency in past societies? Is it
possible for Processualists and Post-processualists to find common ground in exploring this
relationship?
9.
Is it realistic or effective to advocate plural perspectives to archaeological interpretation? Address
either in terms of alternative academic archaeological perspectives (e.g. Processualist, Marxist,
Feminist, etc.), or the perspectives of different parties/stakeholders concerned with the past (e.g.
academics, the general public, indigenous peoples, etc.).
If you are unclear about the nature of an assignment, you should contact the Course Co-ordinator. The
Course Co-ordinator will be willing to discuss an outline of your approach to an assessment, provided this is
planned suitably in advance of the submission date. Students are not permitted to re-write and re-submit
essays in order to try to improve their marks.
Coursework content
For this course your essays should examine theoretical issues rather than the archaeology of any particular
period or area. The questions may be explored through whatever relevant examples are familiar to you, but
the focus of your argument should address (and demonstrate your understanding of) the theoretical issues,
not the case study per se. Bearing in mind that you cannot get credit for the same work twice, either in the
same or different courses that are assessed as part of the same degree, you must avoid any significant overlap
in your assessed work with that for other courses. If you have concerns about potential overlaps, please
discuss this with the Co-ordinators of the relevant courses.
Like almost any satisfactory piece of academic writing, your essays should present an argument supported by
analysis. Typically your analysis will include a critical evaluation (not simply summary or description) of
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concepts relevant to some subset of archaeology’s theoretical literature. You need to identify and evaluate
the principal or most relevant previous ideas and arguments, and develop your own reasoned argument,
supporting, critiquing, or combining elements of earlier scholarship, or developing a new perspective or
synthesis. You should draw upon readings from multiple seminars (and potentially other courses), examine
some of the primary literature in addition to secondary literature and use references to that literature to
support your argument.
Some guidelines on academic essay writing will be circulated closer to the essay submission date, but two
points relevant to all MA essay writing deserve mention now. First, express your arguments in your own
words; your essay is meant to demonstrate your understanding of an issue. Some submitted essays are
essentially just a string of quotations illustrating what others have said, but this does not demonstrate a
critical assessment of those claims, or a clear understanding of the issues. The worst essays end up being
little more than a paraphrase of Trigger, Johnson or another general source. These simply demonstrate that
you have read those sources, not that you understand them. Use a range of sources to engage with different
perspectives on a topic, and you will have something to critically assess and adjudicate between, or even
pick and choose points from, and synthesise your own perspective. Second, do not rely on web sources.
There is no vetting system on the web (unlike academic publications), so anyone can publish whatever
nonsense they wish. You should be extremely cautious about relying on information from websites, and
should not, normally, use them as sources for academic essays. The reliable information in them has almost
invariably come from some other source, and if they are academically reputable sites, they should be
properly referenced, so you can chase ideas back to their original source. If you feel information from a
website is essential to your argument and you cannot track it back to an original published source, ask the
Course Co-ordinator whether it is reputable, before relying on it.
Coursework production and submission
General policies and procedures concerning courses and coursework, including submission procedures,
assessment criteria, and general resources, are available in your Degree Handbook and on the following
website: <http://wiki.ucl.ac.uk/display/archadmin>; see also the Appendix. It is essential that you read and
comply with these. Note that some of the policies and procedures will be different depending on your status
(e.g. undergraduate, postgraduate taught, affiliate, graduate diploma, intercollegiate, interdepartmental). If in
doubt, please consult the Course Co-ordinator.
For this course, please do not use fancy fonts or, for the text, a font size less than 11 point, and use 1.5 line
spacing to allow the marker space to make comments on the text. A smaller font size (8-10) and 1.0 line
height may be used for the bibliography (to reduce printing costs), as long as it is still readable, and twosided printing is welcome (to save paper and trees). Please leave at least 1 inch/2.5 cm margins to allow
room for comments. There is no need to use a separate title page for essays (why pay for the extra page), and
please do not use plastic folders, covers, etc. (I just have to take them off to read it). Illustrations are
welcome, but only if they are directly relevant to your argument (i.e. not as generic filler).
For this course, for Friday submissions, ensure your essay has been submitted to Turnitin by midnight on the
specified due date. You can submit the hard copy on the following Monday. If you have a last-minute
problem submitting your essay to Turnitin, contact the Turnitin adviser for help, but also e-mail a copy of
your final version to the Course Co-ordinator, to ensure it is registered as submitted on time.
If any procedures or details are not clear, please discuss these with the Course Co-ordinator.
The Turnitin 'Class ID' for this course is 2971076 and the 'Class Enrolment Password' is IoA1516.
To accord with UCL regulations on anonymous marking, all coursework cover-sheets must be identified
with student Candidate Numbers only, not names. This is a 5 digit alphanumeric code and can be found on
Portico; it is different from the Student Number/ID. The filenames for all assessed work submitted through
‘Turnitin’, should include the student’s Candidate Number, not name as a unique identifier (e.g. YBPR6
_G193_Assessment_1). Please do this, as otherwise it is difficult to match hard-copy of your essay with the
Turnitin version on-line.
3. SCHEDULE AND SYLLABUS
Seminars are held in the Institute of Archaeology building: Mondays 11am-1pm, 2-4pm and Tuesdays 24pm; all in room 410. You will be asked to sign-up for a specific session, which you should normally attend.
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If, for a specific session, you cannot attend your normal session, please attend another, rather than miss that
week. With nearly 50 students on the course, it is essential that we keep attendance balanced among the
three sessions, so that none become too large, which inhibits discussion.
The Essential readings are those necessary to keep up with the topics covered in the course sessions, and it is
expected that students will have read these prior to the seminar for which they are listed. Pdfs of most
individual articles and chapters identified as Essential readings are available from on-line journals, or held
on-line (where permitted by copyright; with links from the course on-line reading list:
<http://readinglists.ucl.ac.uk/lists/35ABE61B-D6D9-0A79-ADF4-E729B45A7D47.html>), or the volumes
are in the reserve collection behind the Issue Desk in the IoA library. There are also often additional copies
of the volumes available on the normal library shelves; you can find out what is available via UCL Explore.
For recent publications, it is worth looking by author on the www.Academia.edu and www.Researchgate.net
sites, where researchers increasingly make pdfs of their papers available to the public.
Recommended readings are noted as a starting point for students to follow-up particular issues in which they
are interested and provide a range of references to start to explore for essay writing.
The ‘discussion focus questions’ listed are simply some of the issues which may be addressed during the
seminar. It may be helpful to have these in the back of your mind when reading the essential reading.
Seminar 1. 05/06 October: Archaeology, theory and practice.
Since this course is focused on theoretical issues in archaeology, we begin by looking at several views of
what constitutes archaeological theory and the role of theory in relation to archaeological practice.
Essential:
Johnson, M. Forthcoming. What is theory for? In A. Gardner, M. Lake and U. Sommer (eds.) The Oxford
Handbook of Archaeological Theory. Oxford: OUP. [Available through UCL Explore as an e-book in
advance
of
publication;
search
on
‘Johnson’
at
<http://www.oxfordhandbooks.com.libproxy.ucl.ac.uk/browse?t0=ORR:AHU00020>.
Hodder, I. 1999. The Archaeological Process: An Introduction. Oxford: Blackwell. (Chapter 5: Towards a
reflexive method.) [<link to PDF through on-line reading list>; ISSUE DESK IOA HOD 19; INST
ARCH AH HOD]
Johnson, M. 2009. The theoretical scene, 1960-2000. In C. Gosden, B. Cunliffe and R. Joyce (eds) The
Oxford Handbook of Archaeology. Oxford: OUP. [INST ARCH AH CUN (Reference only); Available as
e-book through UCL Explore.]
Wylie, A. 1993. A proliferation of new archaeologies: 'beyond objectivism and relativism'. In N. Yoffee
and A. Sherratt (eds.), Archaeological theory: who sets the agenda? Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press:20-26. [INST ARCH AH YOF]
Recommended:
Bentley, R.A. and Maschner, H.D.G. 2008. Introduction: on archaeological theories. In R.A. Bentley, H.D.G.
Maschner and C. Chippindale (eds.) Handbook of Archaeological Theories. Walnut Creek: AltaMira
Press.
Bintliff, J. and M. Pearce (eds.) 2011. The Death of Archaeological Theory? Oxford: Oxbow Books.
Clarke, D.L. 1972. Models and paradigms in contemporary archaeology. In D.L. Clarke (ed.) Models in
Archaeology. London: Methuen:1-60.
Clarke, D.L. 1973. Archaeology: the loss of innocence. Antiquity 47:6-18.
Conkey, M. 2007. Questioning theory: is there a gender of theory in archaeology? Journal of
Archaeological Method and Theory 14:285-310.
Courbin, P. 1988 [1982]. What is Archaeology? An Essay on the Nature of Archaeological Research.
Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Dunnell R. 1982. Science, social science and common sense: the agonizing dilemma of modern archaeology.
Journal of Anthropological Research 38:1-25.
Flannery, K.V. 1982. The golden Marshalltown: a parable for the archaeology of the 1980s. American
Anthropologist 84:265-78.
Gallay, A. 1989. Logicism: a French view of archaeological theory founded on a computational perspective.
Antiquity 63:27-39.
Gardin, J.C. 1980. Archaeological Constructs. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. (Chapter 1.)
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Gardin, J.-C. and Peebles, C.S. (eds.) 1992. Representations in Archaeology. Bloomington: Indiana U.P.
Gosden, C. 1999. Anthropology and Archaeology: a changing relationship. London: Routledge.
Hegmon, M. 2003. Setting theoretical egos aside: issues and theory in North American archaeology.
American Antiquity 68:213-43.
Hodder, I. 2001. Introduction: a review of contemporary theoretical debate in archaeology. In I. Hodder (ed.)
Archaeological Theory Today. Cambridge: Polity:1-13.
Hodder, I. 2012. Introduction: contemporary theoretical debate in archaeology. In I. Hodder (ed.)
Archaeological Theory Today (2nd edition). Cambridge: Polity:1-13.
Johnson, M. 2006. On the nature of theoretical archaeology and archaeological theory (with comments).
Archaeological Dialogues 13(2):117-82.
Johnson, M. 2010. Archaeological Theory: An Introduction. (2nd edition). Oxford: Blackwell. (Chapter 1:
Common sense is not enough.)
Johnson, M. 2011. On the nature of empiricism in archaeology. Journal of the Royal Anthropological
Institute 17:764-87.
Jones, A. 2002. Archaeological Theory and Scientific Practice. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Kuhn, T. 1972. The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. 2nd ed. London: University of Chicago Press.
Layton, R. 1997. An Introduction to Theory in Anthropology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Morris, I. 2004. Classical archaeology. In J. Bintliff (ed.), A Companion to Archaeology. Oxford:
Blackwell:253-71.
O’Brien, M.J., Lyman, R.L. and Schiffer, M.B. 2005. Archaeology as a Process: Processualism and its
progeny. Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press.
Orser Jr., C. 2004. The archaeologies of recent history: historical, post-medieval, and modern-world.
In J. Bintliff (ed.), A Companion to Archaeology. Oxford: Blackwell:272-90.
Praetzellis, A. 2000. Death by Theory: a tale of mystery and archaeological theory. Walnut Creek: AltaMira
Press.
Runciman, W.G. 1983. A Treatise on Social Theory. Volume I: The Methodology of Social Theory. (Chapter
1: Introduction: the nature of social theory.) Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Schiffer, M. B. 2000, Social theory in archaeology: building bridges, In M. Schiffer (ed.) Social Theory in
Archaeology. Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press:1-14.
Shanks, M. and C. Tilley 1987. Social Theory and Archaeology. Cambridge: Polity Press. (Chapter 1.)
Sherratt, A. 1993. The relativity of theory. In N. Yoffee and A. Sherratt (eds.), Archaeological theory:
who sets the agenda? Cambridge: Cambridge University Press:119-30.
Thomas, J. 1995. Where are we now? Archaeological theory in the 1990s. In P.J. Ucko (ed.) Archaeological
Theory: A World Perspective. London: Routledge:343-62.
Thomas, J. 2004. Archaeology and Modernity. London: Routledge.
Trigger, B. 2006. A History of Archaeological Thought. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Urban, P. and E. Schortman 2012. Archaeological theory in practice. Walnut Creek: Left Coast Press.
VanPool, T.L. and VanPool, C.S. (eds.) 2003. Essential Tensions in Archaeological Theory. Salt Lake City:
University of Utah Press.
Yoffee, N. and Sherratt A. (eds.) 1993. Archaeological Theory: who sets the agenda? Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press.
Discussion focus questions
What is theory? What represents theory in archaeology?
Is all archaeological theory borrowed from other disciplines? Is this a problem?
Are there any specifically archaeological theories? Should there be? Why?
What are the functions of archaeological theory: is it necessary? what does it do?
Can concepts have different degrees of theoretical content?
What is the role of archaeological theory in relation to archaeological practice?
What is archaeological interpretation and its relationship to archaeological theory?
Is interpretation different from explanation in writings on archaeological theory?
Do historical explanations differ in character from other types of explanation?
How has archaeological theory and interpretation supposedly changed over time?
Do new approaches to theory replace, or supplement earlier approaches?
Have there been any Kuhnian (T. Kuhn 1963 ‘The structure of scientific revolutions’) paradigm shifts in
archaeological theory? Does it matter?
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Seminar 2. 12/13 October: Culture history: objectives and assumptions.
Culture historical archaeology is often described (pejoratively) as atheoretical, descriptive and normative.
However, much of our enduring knowledge of past societies has been and still is generated within a culture
historical framework, and the majority of archaeological research conducted world-wide has basic culture
historical objectives. Therefore, archaeologists must develop a critical understanding of this approach: what
constitutes culture history, what are the goals and assumptions employed by practitioners, what theory is
embedded in culture history, and how are culture historical and subsequent archaeological frameworks
conceptually related?
Essential:
Trigger, B. G. 2006. A History of Archaeological Thought. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press.
(Chapter 6: Culture Historical archaeology.) [<Available as e-book through UCL Explore>; ISSUE
DESK IoA TRI 2; INST ARCH AG TRI]
Childe, V.G. 1935. Changing aims and methods in prehistory. Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society 1:115.
[<link to PDF through on-line reading list>; IOA PERS]
Hawkes, C. 1954. Archaeological theory and method: some suggestions from the Old World. American
Anthropologist 56:155-68. [<on-line journal>]
Webster, G. 2008. Culture history: a culture-historical approach. In R.A. Bentley, H.D.G. Maschner and C.
Chippindale (eds.) Handbook of Archaeological Theories. Walnut Creek: AltaMira Press:11-27. [INST
ARCH AG BEN (Reference only); available as an e-book through UCL Explore]
Recommended:
Andrén, A. 1998. Between Artifacts and Texts: historical archaeology in global perspective. New York:
Plenum Press.
Browman, D.L., and D.R. Givens. 1996. Stratigraphic excavation: the first New Archaeology. American
Anthropologist 98:80-95.
Chang, K.C. 1967. Rethinking Archaeology. New York: Random House.
Childe, V.G. 1958. The Dawn of European Civilization. London: Kegan Paul.
Childe, V.G. 1929. The Danube in Prehistory. Oxford: Clarendon Press. (Introduction).
Childe, V.G. 1956. Piecing Together the Past: The Interpretation of Archaeological Data. London:
Routledge and Kegan Paul. (Chapter 8: What happens in prehistory?)
Clark, G. 1963 (1953). Archaeological theories and interpretation: Old World. In, S. Tax (ed.)
Anthropology Today: Selections. Chicago: University of Chicago Press:104-21.
Daniel, G.E. (ed.). 1981. Towards a History of Archaeology. London: Thames and Hudson.
Daniel, G.E. 1950. A Hundred Years of Archaeology. London: Duckworth.
Diaz-Andreu, M. 2007. World History of Nineteenth-century Archaeology: nationalism, colonialism and the
past. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Diaz-Andreu, M. and T. Champion (eds) 1006. Nationalism and Archaeology in Europe. Boulder:
Westview Press.
Dunnell, R.C. 1986. Methodological issues in Americanist artifact classification. In M. Schiffer (ed.)
Advances in Archaeological Method and Theory, vol. 9. New York: Academic Press:149-207.
Ford, J.A. 1954. On the concept of types: the type concept revisited. American Anthropologist 56:42-53.
Gerrard, C. 2003. Medieval Archaeology: understanding traditions and contemporary approaches. London:
Routledge.
Gosden, C. 1999. Anthropology and Archaeology: a changing relationship. London: Routledge.
Haury, E. 1955. Archaeological theories and interpretation. Yearbook of Anthropology 1955:115-32.
Hides, S. 1996. The genealogy of material culture and cultural identity. In P. Graves-Brown, S. Jones and
C. Gamble (eds.) Cultural identity and archaeology: the construction of European communities. London:
Routledge:25-47.
Jeffreys, D. (ed.) 2003. Views of Ancient Egypt since Napoleon Bonaparte: imperialism, colonialism and
modern appropriations. London: UCL Press.
Jones, S. 1997. The Archaeology of Ethnicity. London: Routledge. (Chapter 2.)
Kroeber, A.L. 1931. The culture-area and age-area concepts of Clark Wissler. In S.A. Rice (ed.) Methods in
Social Science. Chicago: University of Chicago Press:248-65.
Lyman, R.L., and M.J. O'Brien. 2004. A history of normative theory in Americanist archaeology. Journal of
Archaeological Method and Theory 11:369-96.
Lyman, R.L., O’Brien, M.J. and Dunnell, R.C. 1997. The Rise and Fall of Culture History. New York:
Plenum Press.
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Lyman, R.L., M.J. O'Brien, and R.C. Dunnell. Editors. 1997. Americanist Culture History: Fundamentals of
Time, Space, and Form. New York: Plenum Press.
Lyman, R.L., S. Wolverton, and M.J. O'Brien. 1998. Seriation, superposition, and interdigitation: a history of
Americanist graphic depictions of culture change. American Antiquity 63:239.
Matthews, R. 2003. The Archaeology of Mesopotamia: theories and approaches. London: Routledge.
Meggers, B.J. 1955. The coming of age of American archaeology. In B. J. Meggers and C. Evans (eds.) New
Interpretations of Aboriginal American Culture History. Washington, D. C.: Anthropological Society of
Washington:116-29.
Murray, T. and Evans, C. (eds.) 2008. Histories of Archaeology: a reader in the history of archaeology.
Oxford: Oxford University Press.
O'Brien, M.J., and R.L. Lyman. 1999. Seriation, Stratigraphy, and Index Fossils: the Backbone of
Archaeological Dating. New York: Kluwer Academic/Plenum Publishers.
Philips, P., J.A. Ford, and J.B. Griffin. 1951. Archaeological Survey in the Lower Mississippi Valley, 19401947. Vol. 25. Papers of the Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology. Cambridge: Harvard
University. (P. 61-68, 219-36, 425-29).
Renfrew, C. 1990. Beyond diffusion. In C. Renfrew. Before Civilization: The Radiocarbon Revolution and
Prehistoric Europe. Harmondsworth: Penguin.
Rouse, I. 1939. Prehistory in Haiti. Vol. 21. Yale University Publications in Anthropology. New Haven:
Yale University Press.
Rouse, I.B. 1986. Migrations in Prehistory. New Haven: Yale University Press.
Schnapp, A. 1996. The Discovery of the Past: the origins of archaeology. London: British Museum Press.
Schnapp, A. 2002. Between antiquarians and archaeologists – continuities and ruptures. Antiquity 76:134-40.
Steward, J. and F. Setzler. 1938. Function and configuration in archaeology. American Antiquity 4:4-10.
Taylor, W.W. (1948 [1983]). A Study of Archaeology. Carbondale, Southern Illinois University at
Carbondale Center for Archaeological Investigations.
Thomas, J. 2004. Archaeology and Modernity. London: Routledge.
Trigger, B.G. (2006) A History of Archaeological Thought. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press:567-72.
[For a worldwide bibliography of culture historical writings and reviews of the framework, see this
section of Trigger’s bibliographic essay].
Trigger, B.G. 1980. Gordon Childe: Revolutions in Archaeology. London: Thames and Hudson.
Willey, G. R. and P. Phillips (1958). Method and Theory in American Archaeology. Chicago: University of
Chicago Press.
Willey, G. 1963 (1953). Archaeological theories and interpretation: New World. In, S. Tax (ed.)
Anthropology Today: Selections. Chicago: University of Chicago Press:170-94.
Discussion focus questions
What are the goals of culture historical archaeology?
What constitutes archaeological understanding in this framework?
What are the conceptual and explanatory differences in the culture historical archaeologies practiced in the
Americas and Europe?
What was the context of development of culture history in European archaeology?
Do differences in context account for differences in the nature of culture history in Europe and North
America? How about in other (including ex-colonial) regions of the world?
What are the explanatory processes employed by culture historians?
Compared to today, why was there so little explicit discussion of theory in the first 60 years of the 20th
century?
Why is culture history still the dominant framework for archaeology world-wide? Is this a problem?
What are the pros and cons of nationalist archaeologies, with their roots in traditional culture history?
Seminar 3. 19/20 October: The New Archaeology: a new optimism.
The beginning of the New Archaeology in the early 1960s has come to be regarded by many as the start of
the modern era in archaeology because of its strident break with Culture Historical archaeology and its selfconscious concern to integrate archaeology more effectively with anthropology and to develop appropriate
and effective theoretical and methodological frameworks for understanding the past through the
archaeological record. Since the late 1970s its approach has been severely criticised, though. Additionally, in
hindsight, many question the degree to which the New Archaeology was really all that new. The objective of
this seminar is to identify and evaluate the key concepts of the New Archaeology, and consider in what ways
they were new, whether they were helpful, and to what extent they are still relevant to archaeology today.
8
Essential:
Binford, L. 1962. Archaeology as Anthropology. American Antiquity 28:217-25. [<on-line journal>]
Reprinted in L. Binford An Archaeological Perspective. [ISSUE DESK IoA BIN 11; INST ARCH AH
BIN]
Binford, L. 1968. Archaeological perspectives. In S.R. Binford and L.R. Binford (eds.) New Perspectives in
Archaeology. Aldine:5-32. [<link to PDF through on-line reading list>; ISSUE DESK IoA BIN 2; INST
ARCH AH BIN] Reprinted in L. Binford An Archaeological Perspective. [ISSUE DESK IoA BIN 11;
INST ARCH AH BIN]
Clarke, D. 1973. Archaeology: the loss of innocence. Antiquity 47:6-18. [<on-line journal>] Reprinted in D.
Clarke Analytical Archaeologist:83-104. [ISSUE DESK IoA CLA 9]
Trigger, B.G. 1978. Current trends in American archaeology. In B. Trigger Time and Traditions. Edinburgh:
Edinburgh University Press:2-18. [<link to PDF through on-line reading list>; INST ARCH AH TRI]
Recommended:
Binford, L. 1968. Some comments on historical versus processual archaeology. Southwestern Journal of
Anthropology 24:267-75.
Binford, L.R. 1973. Interassemblage variability - the Mousterian and the 'functional' argument. In, C.
Renfrew, (ed.), The Explanation of Culture Change. Duckworth: 227-54.
Binford, L.R. 1989. The ‘New Archaeology’ then and now. In C.C. Lamberg-Karlovsky (ed),
Archaeological Thought in America. Cambridge University Press:50-62.
Caldwell, J.R. 1964. Interaction spheres in prehistory. In J.R. Caldwell and R.L. Hall (eds.) Hopewellian
Studies, vol. 12, Illinois State Museum Scientific Papers. Chicago: Illinois State Museum:135-43.
Clark, G. 1989. The economic approach to prehistory. In G. Clark Economic Prehistory: Papers on
Archaeology by Grahame Clark. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Deetz, J. 1965. The Dynamics of Stylistic Change in Arikara Ceramics. Illinois Studies in Anthropology,
Urbana.
Dunnell, R. Five decades of Americanist archaeology. In D. Meltzer, D. Fowler and J. Sabloff (eds.)
American Archaeology Past and Future. Washington: Smithsonian Institution Press:23-49.
Flannery, K.1967. Culture History v. Culture Process: A Debate in American Archaeology. Scientific
American 217(2):119-22.
Flannery, K. 1968. Archaeological systems theory and early Mesoamerica. In B. Meggers (ed.)
Anthropological Archaeology in the Americas. Washington DC: Anthropological Society of
Washington:67-87.
Ford, J.A. 1954. Comment on A.C. Spaulding's "Statistical Techniques for the Discovery of Artifact Types".
American Antiquity 19.
Ford, J.A. 1954. On the Concept of Types: The Type Concept Revisited. American Anthropologist 56:42-53.
Ford, J.A. 1954. Spaulding's Review of Ford. American Anthropologist 56:109-12.
Gibbon, G. 1989. Explanation in Archaeology. Oxford: Blackwell: 61-90.
Hill, J.N. 1970. Broken K Pueblo: Prehistoric Social Organization in the American Southwest.
Anthropological Papers 18. University of Arizona, Tucson.
Hole, F., K. Flannery and J. Neely 1969. Prehistory and Human Ecology of the Deh Luran Plain. Esp. first
and last chapters. (Memoirs of the Museum of Anthropology, No. 1). Ann Arbor: University of Michigan.
Kuhn, T. 1972. The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. 2nd ed. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.
Leone, M. 1972. Introduction. In M. Leone (ed.) Contemporary Archaeology. Southern Illinois University
Press. (Also chapters 12-33.)
Longacre, W.A. 1964. Archaeology as Anthropology: A Case Study. Science 144:1454.
Longacre, W.A. 1970. Archaeology as Anthropology: A Case Study. Anthropological Papers 17. University
of Arizona, Tucson.
Lyman, R.L. 2007. What is the 'process' in cultural process and in processual archaeology? Anthropological
Theory 7:217-250.
Lyman, R. L. 2007. Archaeology's quest for a seat at the high table of anthropology. Journal of
Anthropological Archaeology 26:133-49.
Lyman, R.L. and M.J. O'Brien 2004. A History of Normative Theory in Americanist Archaeology. Journal
of Archaeological Method and Theory 11:369-96.
Lyman, R.L., M.J. O’Brien and R.C. Dunnell 1997. The rise and fall of culture history. New York: Plenum
Press.
Meltzer, D.J.1979 Paradigms and the Nature of Change in American Archaeology. American Antiquity
44:644-57.
9
O'Brien, M.J., R.L. Lyman, and M.B. Schiffer. 2005. Archaeology as a process: processualism and its
progeny. Salt Lake City. University of Utah Press.
Plog, F. 1973. Laws, systems of laws, and the explanation of observed variation. In C. Renfrew (ed.) The
Explanation of Culture Change. London: Duckworth:649-61.
Preston, J. Forthcoming. Positivist and Post-positivist philosophy of science. In A. Gardner, M. Lake and U.
Sommer (eds.) The Oxford Handbook of Archaeological Theory. [Available on-line in advance of
publication.]
Redman, C. 1991. Distinguished Lecture in Archaeology: in defence of the seventies - the adolescence of
New Archaeology. American Anthropologist 93:295-307
Redman, C. 1999. The development of archaeological theory. In G. Barker (ed.) The Companion
Encyclopedia of Archaeology vol. 1. London: Routledge:48-80.
Renfrew, C. 1972. Culture systems and the multiplier effect. In C. Renfrew The Emergence of Civilisation.
London, Methuen:19-44.
Renfrew, C. 1973. Monuments, mobilization and social organization in Neolithic Wessex, in C. Renfrew
(ed.) The explanation of culture change: models in prehistory. London: Duckworth:539-58.
Renfrew, C. 1980. The great tradition versus the great divide: archaeology as anthropology? American
Journal of Archaeology 84:287-98.
Salmon, M. 1982. Philosophy and Archaeology. New York: Academic Press.
Snodgrass, A. M. 1985. The new archaeology and the classical archaeologist. American Journal of
Archaeology 89:31-37.
Spaulding, A.C. 1953a. Review of "Measurements of Some Prehistoric Design Developments in the
Southeastern States" by J. A. Ford. American Anthropologist 55:588-91.
Spaulding, A.C. 1953b. Statistical Techniques for the Discovery of Artifact Types. American Antiquity
18:305-13.
Spaulding, A.C. 1954. Reply (to Ford). American Anthropologist 56:112-14.
Taylor, W.W. 1948. A Study of Archaeology. American Anthropological Association (Chapter 6.)
Taylor, W.W. 1972. Old wine and new skins: a contemporary parable. In M.P. Leone (ed.) Contemporary
Archaeology: A guide to theory and contributions:28-33. Carbondale: Southern Illinois U.P.
Trigger, B. 2006. A History of Archaeological Thought. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. (Chapter
7: Early functional-processual archaeology.)
Trigger, B.G. 1970 Aims in prehistoric archaeology. Antiquity 44:26-37.
Trigger, B.G. 1978 Current trends in American archaeology. In B. Trigger, Time and Traditions. Edinburgh
University Press:2-18.
Watson, P.-J. 2008. Processualism and after. In R.A. Bentley, H.D.G. Maschner and C. Chippindale (eds.)
Handbook of Archaeological Theories. Walnut Creek: AltaMira Press:29-38. [INST ARCH AG BEN
(Reference Only)]
Watson, P.-J., LeBlanc, S. and Redman, C. 1984. Archaeological Explanation: the scientific method in
archaeology. New York: Columbia University Press. [INST ARCH AH WAT]
Watson, R.A. 1991. What the New Archaeology has accomplished. Current Anthropology 32:275-91.
Discussion focus questions
What is the normative approach, and what were Binford’s objections to it?
What is the proper framework for creating knowledge according to the New Archaeology?
What does it mean to suggest that archaeology should be anthropology?
What is the significance of a systemic perspective on culture for archaeology?
What defines the limits of archaeological inference?
What is the role of generalisation in archaeological interpretation?
What are models of human behaviour? Are they relevant to explaining the past?
Is archaeology a science? All archaeology? Does it matter whether it is or not?
Is ‘being a science’ more than the application of scientific techniques?
Must all explanations follow a deductive structure? What is the role of induction?
What were the theoretical, methodological, and substantive advances in the New Archaeology?
Did the New Archaeology constitute a ‘paradigm shift’ in archaeology?
Does the New Archaeology have any relevance for Egyptian, Classical, Medieval or other textaided/historical archaeological research traditions?
10
Seminar 4. 26/27 October: Processual Archaeology: pragmatism and retrenchment.
If the New Archaeology was characterised by a self-conscious concern with archaeological method and
theory, its subsequent development was marked by an equally self-aware concern with the nature of the
archaeological record and the problems this presents for the inferences which newly ambitious
archaeologists wished to make. The object of this seminar is to examine the different views about the nature
of the archaeological record and its significance which emerged from these debates.
Essential:
Schiffer, M. 1972 Archaeological context and systemic context. American Antiquity 37:156-65. [<on-line
journal>]
Clarke, D. 1973. Archaeology: the loss of innocence. Antiquity 47:6-18. (assigned for week 3, review pp. 1617.) [<on-line journal >] Reprinted in D. Clarke Analytical Archaeologist:83-104. ISSUE DESK IoA
CLA 9]
Binford, L.R. 1981. Behavioral Archaeology and the Pompeii Premise. Journal of Anthropological Research
37:195-208. [<on-line journal >]
Shott, M. 1998. Status and role of formation theory in contemporary archaeological practice. Journal of
Archaeological Research 6:299-329. [INST ARCH Pers; <on-line journal>]
Arnold, P. 2003. Back to basics: the middle-range program as pragmatic archaeology. In T.L. VanPool and
C.S. VanPool (eds.) Essential Tensions in Archaeological Method and Theory. Salt Lake City: University
of Utah Press:55-66. [INST ARCH AH VAN]
Recommended:
Binford, L. 1977. General Introduction. In L. Binford (ed.) For Theory Building in Archaeology: Essays on
Faunal Remains, Aquatic Resources, Spatial Analysis and Systemic Modelling. New York: Academic
Press:1-10.
Binford, L.R. 1981. Bones: Ancient Men and Modern Myths. New York: Academic Press. (Chapters 1, 2 &
7)
Binford, L.R. 1983. Working at Archaeology. New York: Academic Press. Chapters 7, 17-25.
Binford, L.R. and J. Sabloff. 1982. Paradigms, systematics and archaeology. Journal of Anthropological
Research 38:13-53.
Courbin, P. 1988 [1982]. What is Archaeology? An Essay on the Nature of Archaeological Research.
Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Dunnell R.C. 1982, Science, social science and common sense: the agonizing dilemma of modern
archaeology. Journal of Anthropological Research 38:1-25.
Gardin, J.C. 1980. Archaeological Constructs. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Gardin, J.C. 1989. The role of ‘local knowledge’ in archaeological interpretation. In S.J. Shennan (ed.)
Archaeological Approaches to Cultural Identity:110-22. London: Unwin Hyman.
Hayden, B. and Cannon, A. 1983. Where the garbage goes: refuse disposal in the Maya highlands. Journal of
Anthropological Archaeology 2:117-63.
Hodder, I. 1999 Towards a reflexive method. In I. Hodder. The Archaeological Process. An Introduction.
Oxford, Blackwell:80-104.
Joyce, R. and J. Pollard 2010. Archaeological assemblages and practices of deposition. In M. Beaudry and
D. Hicks (eds).The Oxford Handbook of Material Culture Studies. Oxford: OUP.
LaMotta, V. 2012. Behavioral Archaeology. In I. Hodder (ed.) Archaeological Theory Today. (2nd edition).
London: Polity:62-92. Lucas, G. 2001. Eventful contexts. In G. Lucas. Critical approaches to fieldwork.
London: Routledge:146-99.
Lucas, G. 2012. Understanding the archaeological record. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Neustupny, E. 1993 Archaeological Method. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
O’Brien, M.J., R.L. Lyman, and M.B. Schiffer 2005. Archaeology as a Process: Processualism and its
Progeny. Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press.
Patrik, L. 1985 Is there an archaeological record? In M. Schiffer (ed.) Advances in Archaeological Method
and Theory, Vol. 8. New York: Academic Press:27-62.
Raab, L. and A. Goodyear 1984. Middle-range theory in archaeology: a critical review of origins and
applications. American Antiquity 49: 255-9.
Schiffer, M. 1976. Behavioral Archeology. New York: Academic Press.
Schiffer, M. 1985. Is there a ‘Pompeii Premise’ in archaeology? Journal of Anthropological Research 41:1841.
Schiffer, M. 1987. Formation Processes of the Archaeological Record. Albuquerque: University of New
Mexico Press.
11
Schiffer, M. 1988. The structure of archaeological theory. American Antiquity 53:461-85.
Schiffer, M. 1995. Behavioral Archeology: First Principles. Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press.
Spriggs, M. 2008. Ethnographic parallels and the denial of history. World Archaeology 40:538-52.
Sullivan, A. 1978. Inference and evidence in archaeology: a discussion of the methodological problems. In
M. Schiffer (ed.), Advances in Archaeological Method and Theory. Vol. 1. Academic Press:183-222.
Trigger, B.G. 1995 Expanding Middle Range Theory. Antiquity 69:449-58.
Tschauner, H. 1996 Middle-Range Theory, Behavioral Archaeology and post-empiricist philosophy of
science in archaeology. Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory 3:1-30.
Wylie, A. 1985. The reaction against analogy. In M. Schiffer (ed.) Advances in Archaeological Method and
Theory, Vol. 8. New York: Academic Press:63-111.
Wylie, A. 1989. Matters of fact and matters of interest. In S.J. Shennan (ed.) Archaeological Approaches to
Cultural Identity. London: Unwin Hyman:94-109.
Wylie, A. 2000. Questions of evidence, legitimacy and the (dis)utility of science. American Antiquity
65:227-37.
Issue dedicated to assessing M. Schiffer’s contribution to Behavioural Archaeology: Journal of
Archaeological Method and Theory 18(4) 2011.
Discussion focus questions:
What was the central problem recognised after the first generation of the New Archaeology?
Why was this recognised only then?
In what ways does Binford’s concept of Middle Range Theory differ from Schiffer’s concept of the
Formation Processes of the archaeological record?
Is the purpose of archaeology to understand the archaeological record, or to use the archaeological record to
understand past human behaviour?
Is the understanding of formation processes simply archaeological method? If so, does that make it any less
important?
What are the implications of an understanding of formation processes, for the intuitive appeal of Hawkes’
Ladder of Archaeological Inference?
Is Binford correct that there can and must be logical independence between Middle Range and General
Theory?
Is Hodder correct, when he claims such independence is impossible?
Are all observations, and hence all data, 'theory laden'? If so, how does this affect the idea of objective
research?
Is it possible to establish uniformitarian principles of human behaviour? What would these look like?
Binford eventually decided that Middle Range Theory could only be constructed in the present, tested, and
applied to the past. Is this the case?
Why do archaeologists do their own ethnography (ethnoarchaeology); can't we rely on ethnography and
ethnographers?
What are the pros and cons of ethnoarchaeology for understanding material culture in its behavioural
context?
What are the pros and cons of experimental archaeology for building middle range understandings of
material culture?
Does the use of analogy restrict us to simply discovering the present in the past/imposing the present onto the
past?
What is the role of analogy in archaeological interpretation?
Wylie distinguishes between formal and relational analogies (as two ends of a scale). What is the difference,
and why is it significant?
What distinguishes explanation from analogy?
Seminar 5. 02/03 November: Post-processual Archaeology: critique and re-directed optimism.
Since the early 1980s, Post-processual approaches have gradually come to dominate theoretical discussions
in prehistoric archaeology, in Britain at least, and have had a significant but variable influence elsewhere.
The seminar will examine the fundamental criticisms which make it post processual and the extent to which
it can be considered as a unified approach, as well as the sustainability of its critical and more positive
claims. This and subsequent sessions will consider whether in practice, it lived up to its optimistic rhetoric –
a question worth asking of all ‘new’ perspectives.
Essential:
12
Johnson, M. 2010. Archaeological Theory: An Introduction. Oxford: Blackwell. Chapter 7. [<link to PDF
through on-line reading list>; ISSUE DESK IoA JOH 5; INST ARCH AH JOH]
Hodder, I. 1985. Post-processual archaeology. In M. Schiffer (ed.) Advances in Archaeological Method and
Theory, Vol. 8. New York: Academic Press:1-26. [INST ARCH Pers; <on-line journal>]
Shanks, M. and C. Tilley 1989. Archaeology into the 1990s (with comments). Norwegian Archaeological
Review 22:1-54. [INST ARCH Pers; <on-line journal>]
Patrik, L. 1985 Is there an archaeological record? In M. Schiffer (ed.) Advances in Archaeological Method
and Theory, Vol. 8. New York: Academic Press:27-62. [INST ARCH Pers; <on-line journal>]
Recommended:
Barrett, J. 1993. Fragments from Antiquity: an archaeology of social life in Britain, 2900-1200 BC. Oxford:
Blackwell.
Cowgill, G. 1993. Distinguished Lecture in Archaeology: Beyond criticizing New Archaeology. American
Anthropologist 95:551-73.
Earle, T.K. and Preucel, R.W. 1987. Processual Archaeology and the radical critique. Current Anthropology
28:501-38.
Hodder, I. 1982. Symbols in Action. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Hodder, I. 1982. Theoretical archaeology: a reactionary view. In I. Hodder (ed.) Symbolic and Structural
Archaeology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press:1-16.
Hodder, I. 1992 Theory and Practice in Archaeology. London: Routledge.
Hodder, I. and S. Hutson 2003. Reading the Past (3rd edition). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Leone, M. 1982. Some opinions about recovering mind. American Antiquity 47:742-60.
Leone, M. 1986. Symbolic, structural, and critical archaeology. In D. Meltzer, D. Fowler and J. Sabloff
(eds.) American Archaeology Past and Future. Washington: Smithsonian Institution Press:415-38.
Leone, M. 2010. Critical Historical Archaeology. Walnut Creek: Left Coast Press.
Leone, M. et al. 1987. Towards a critical archaeology. Current Anthropology 28:283-302.
Pinsky, V. and A. Wylie (eds.), 1989. Critical Traditions in Contemporary Archaeology. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press.
Renfrew, C. 1994. Towards a cognitive archaeology. In C. Renfrew and E.B.W. Zubrow (eds.) The Ancient
Mind: elements of a cognitive archaeology, 3-12. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Shanks, M. 2004. Archaeology and politics. In J. Bintliff (ed.), A Companion to Archaeology. Oxford:
Blackwell:490-508.
Shanks, M. 2008. Post-processual archaeology and after. In R.A. Bentley, H.D.G. Maschner and C.
Chippindale (eds.) Handbook of Archaeological Theories. Lanham: AltaMira Press:133-44.
Shanks, M. and Tilley, C. 1987. Re-constructing Archaeology. London: Routledge. (Chapters 5 and 6)
Shanks, M. and Tilley, C. 1987. Social Theory and Archaeology. Cambridge: Polity Press. (Pages 186-208:
Archaeology and the politics of theory.)
Thomas, J. 2000. Introduction. The polarities of Post-processual archaeology. In J. Thomas (ed.) Interpretive
Archaeology: A Reader. London: Leicester University Press:1-18.
Trigger, B. 1984. Archaeology at the crossroads: what's new? Annual Review of Anthropology 13:275-300.
Trigger, B. 1991. Distinguished Lecture in Archaeology: Constraint and freedom - a new synthesis for
archaeological explanation. American Anthropologist 93:551-69.
Trigger, B. 2006. A History of Archaeological Thought. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. (Chapter
8: Processualism and Postprocessualism.)
Trigger, B.G. 1991. Post-Processual developments in Anglo-America archaeology. Norwegian
Archaeological Review 24:65-76.
VanPool, C.S. & VanPool, T.L. 1999. The scientific nature of post-processualism. American Antiquity
64:33-53. (Comments and response: 66:361-66; 349-60; 367-75.)
Wylie, A. 1989. The interpretive dilemma. In V. Pinsky and A. Wylie (eds.) Critical Traditions in
Contemporary Archaeology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press:18-27.
Wylie, A. 1992. On 'heavily decomposing red herrings'. Scientific method in archaeology and the ladening
of evidence with theory. In L. Embree (ed.) Metaarchaeology. Dordrecht: Kluwer:269-88.
Wylie, A. 1994. Matters of fact and matters of interest. In S. Shennan (ed.) Archaeological
approaches to cultural identity. London: Routledge:94-109.
Wylie, A. 2000. Questions of evidence, legitimacy and the (dis)utility of science. American Antiquity
65:227-37.
Discussion questions
Can archaeology be an objective science?
13
If no objectivity is possible, how are interpretations assessed?
Why do Post-processual archaeologists place so much emphasis on context?
What does it mean to say material culture is 'active'?
Are archaeological data always 'theory-laden'? Is this a problem?
Is archaeology inevitably political? All archaeology, all the time?
Is it possible to be a ‘neutral scientist’?
Must archaeological research always be considered within its disciplinary historical context?
What would characterise Post-processual fieldwork or data collection? Is it any different from Processual
fieldwork?
Considering continuing developments within Processual archaeology, is the emergence of Post-processual
critiques surprising?
Was Post-processual archaeology really a significant departure, or the logical continuation of the disciplinary
critique initiated with the New Archaeology?
Does Post-processualism constitute a ‘paradigm shift’ away from Processualism?
Both the new Archaeology and post-processual archaeology claimed to make archaeology more
anthropological – were both claims correct?
Were the polemical debates about archaeology, or simply posturing and personal career development?
As with Processual archaeology before it, did Post-processual archaeology succeed in becoming
‘archaeology as usual’?
Seminar 6. 16/17 November: Marxism: social change, power and ideology.
The relationship between Marxist thought and archaeology/anthropology is long-standing. Marx and Engels
were influenced by contemporary social evolutionary thought in the 19th century, while in the 20th century
various schools of Marxism impacted upon the study of other cultures. The materialist and evolutionary
focus of many Marxist perspectives resonated with the ecological materialism of much Processual theorising,
though was rarely explicitly acknowledged, given the cold war context. While Neo-Marxism contributed to
the Post-processual interest in ideology and power in the past, this development also had roots in earlier
processual studies of long-term change. Marxist thought has also been profoundly influential in non-Western
archaeologies, particularly in the Soviet Union, Eastern Europe and China, but also in Japan and Latin
America. In this session we will explore a range of aspects of this rich and controversial tradition, including
its recent manifestation in the relationship between agency and structure.
Essential:
Trigger, B. 1993. Marxism in contemporary western archaeology. Archaeological Method and Theory 5:
159-200. [<link to PDF through on-line reading list>; INST ARCH Pers; <on-line journal>]
Leone, M. et al. 1987. Towards a critical archaeology. Current Anthropology 28:283-302. [<on-line
journal>]
McGuire, R. 2008. Marxism. In R.A. Bentley, H. Maschner and C. Chippindale (eds.) Handbook of
Archaeological Theories. Walnut Creek: AltaMira Press:73-93. [INST ARCH AG BEN (Reference
Only); e-book available through UCL Explore]
Gardner, A. 2008. Agency. In R.A. Bentley, H. Maschner and C. Chippindale (eds.) Handbook of
Archaeological Theories. Lanham: AltaMira Press:95-108. [<link to PDF through on-line reading list>;
INST ARCH AG BEN (Reference Only); e-book available through UCL Explore>]
Recommended:
Barrett, J.C. 2001. Agency, the duality of structure, and the problem of the archaeological record. In I.
Hodder (ed.) Archaeological Theory Today. Cambridge: Polity Press:141-64.
Barrett, J. 2012. Agency: a revisionist account. In I. Hodder (ed.) Archaeological Theory Today. (2nd
edition). London: Polity:146-66.
Bayman, J. 2002. Hohokam Craft Economies and the Materialization of Power Journal of Archaeological
Method and Theory 9:69-95.
Brumfiel, E.M. 2000. On the archaeology of choice: agency studies as a research strategem. In M.-A. Dobres
and J. E. Robb (eds.) Agency in Archaeology. London: Routledge:249-55.
Cobb, C. (1996). Specialization, Exchange, and Power in Small-Scale Societies and Chiefdoms. Research in
Economic Anthropology 17:251–94.
De Marrais, E., L.J. Castillo and T. Earle 1996. Ideology, materialisation and power strategies. Current
Anthropology 37:15-31.
14
Dornan, J.L. 2002. Agency and archaeology: past, present, and future directions. Journal of Archaeological
Method and Theory 9:303-29.
Fewster, K. Forthcoming. On practice. In A. Gardner, M. Lake and U. Sommer (eds) The Oxford Handbook
of Archaeological Theory. [Available on-line in advance of publication.]
Friedman, J. 1974. Marxism, structuralism and vulgar materialism. Man 9:444-69.
Godelier, M 1977. Perspectives in Marxist anthropology. Cambridge: C.U.P.
Gosden, C. 1994. Social Being and Time. Oxford: Blackwell.
Harris, D.R. (ed.) 1994. The Archaeology of V. Gordon Childe: contemporary perspectives. London: UCL
Press.
Harris, M. 2001. Cultural materialism. The struggle for a science of culture. Walnut Creek: Rowman and
Littlefield.
Price, B. 1982. Cultural materialism: a theoretical review. American Antiquity 47:709-41.
Hodder, I. and Hutson, S. 2003. Reading the Past. 3rd Edition. Cambridge: C.U.P. (Ch. 4).
Johnson, M. 1996. An Archaeology of Capitalism. Oxford: Blackwell.
Layton, R. 1997. An Introduction to Theory in Anthropology. Cambridge: C.U.P. (Ch. 5).
Leone, M. 1984. Interpreting ideology in historical archaeology: using the rules of perspective in the William
Paca Garden in Annapolis, Maryland. In D. Miller and C. Tilley (eds.) Ideology, Power and Prehistory,
25-35. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Leone, M. 2005. The Archaeology of Liberty in an American Capital: excavations in Annapolis. Berkeley:
University of California Press.
Leone, M. 2010. Critical Historical Archaeology. Walnut Creek: Left Coast Press.
Leone, M and Preucel, R. 1992. Archaeology in a democratic society. In, L. Wandsnider (ed.) Quandaries
and Quests. Visions of Archaeology’s Future. Carbondale: Southern Illinois University:115-35.
Leone, M. and Potter, P.B. (eds.) 1999. Historical Archaeologies of Capitalism. New York: Kluwer/Plenum.
McGuire, R. 1993. Archaeology and Marxism. Archaeological Method and Theory 5:101-57.
McGuire, R. 2002. A Marxist Archaeology. Ney York: Percheron Press.
McGuire, R. 2008. Archaeology as Political Action. Berkeley: University of California Press.
McGuire, R., and R. Bernbeck 2011. Ideology. In T. Insoll (ed) The Oxford Handbook of the Archaeology of
Ritual and Religion. Oxford: OUP.
McGuire, R. and Navarette, R. 2005. Between motorcycles and rifles: Anglo-American and Latin American
radical archaeologies. In Funari, P.P., Zarankin, A. and Stovel, E. (eds.) Global Archaeological Theory.
New York: Kluwer Press:309-36.
Miller, D., Rowlands, M. and Tilley, C. (eds.) 1989. Domination and Resistance. London: Unwin Hyman.
Miller, D. and C. Tilley 1984. Ideology, power and prehistory: an introduction. In D. Miller and C. Tilley
(eds.) Ideology, Power and Prehistory. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press:1-15.
Miller, D. and C. Tilley (eds.) 1984. Ideology, Power and Prehistory. Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press.
Mizoguchi, K. 2006. Archaeology, Society and Identity in Modern Japan. Cambridge: C.U.P.
Patterson, T. 2003. Marx’s Ghost: conversations with archaeologists. Oxford: Berg.
Patterson, T. 2004. Social archaeology and Marxist social thought. In L. Meskell and R. Preucel (eds.) A
Companion to Social Archaeology. Malden: Blackwell:66-81.
Patterson, T. and C. Orser (eds.) 2004. Foundations of Social Archaeology. Selected writings of V. Gordon
Childe. Oxford: Berg.
Pinsky, V. and A. Wylie (eds.) 1989. Critical Traditions in Contemporary Archaeology. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press.
Shanks, M. and Tilley, C. 1987. Social Theory and Archaeology. Cambridge: Polity. (Ch. 3, 6).
Shanks, M. and Tilley, C. 1992. Re-Constructing Archaeology: Theory and Practice. (2nd Edition.) London:
Routledge. (Ch. 5, 6).
Shnirelman, V.A. 1995. From internationalism to nationalism: forgotten pages of Soviet archaeology in the
1930s and 1940s. In P.L. Kohl and C. Fawcett (eds.) Nationalism, Politics and the Practice of
Archaeology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press:120-38
Spriggs, M. (ed.) 1984. Marxist Perspectives in Archaeology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Tong, E. 1995. Thirty years of Chinese archaeology (1949-1979). In P.L. Kohl and C. Fawcett (eds.)
Nationalism, Politics and the Practice of Archaeology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press:177-97.
Discussion Focus Questions
Why has Marxism proved an attractive source of theory for archaeologists?
Why were Marxist perspectives not integrated into the materialist and evolutionary models of the New
Archaeology?
15
Would they have provided relevant theoretical underpinning?
What are the differences between classical Marxism and neo-Marxism?
Is Marxism only applicable to class-based societies?
What is the scientific status of Marxism?
What is ideology, and what is its role in social stability and change?
Why is material culture important to support ideologies?
How can we get at ideologies through the archaeological record?
What generates social structures?
What is the role of individual agents in change within society?
Does everyone have agency?
What does ‘structuration’ mean?
What is agency?
What is structure?
Is the focus on agency merely a reflection of our own preoccupations with individualism in modern society?
Why is so much of the focus on agents, but less attention given to structure?
Often, claims of agency seem simply to document that ‘someone did something’? Is this enough?
We only rarely see individuals in the archaeological record. Can we do an agent-oriented archaeology,
without direct access to the agents? Does it require the recognition of specific individuals in the past?
Does an agent-oriented archaeology reduce to a ‘great-man’ view of history?
Seminar 7. 23/24 November: Structuralism, Post-structuralism and meaning.
A central strand of theoretical debate within Post-processual archaeology has been the quest for meaning in
the past. One of the strongest influences on a range of scholars seeking ways of understanding meaning has
been the structuralist tradition. Originally a theory of language, structuralism was applied to culture by
anthropologists and then imported to archaeology, by which time post-structuralism was already flourishing
in the disciplines of linguistics, literary and cultural studies. These ideas made their way into archaeology
too, followed by the further developments of social theories influenced by a mixture of structuralism and
Marxism, such as Giddens’ structuration theory. Post-processual archaeologists have drawn eclectically upon
this tradition and in this session we will explore how successful this strategy has been.
Essential:
Hodder, I. 1982. Theoretical archaeology: a reactionary view. In I. Hodder (ed.) Symbolic and Structural
Archaeology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press:1-16. [<link to PDF through on-line reading list>;
ISSUE DESK IoA HOD 12; INST ARCH AH HOD] (Reprinted in I. Hodder. 1992. Theory and Practice
in Archaeology.)
Hodder, I. and Hutson, S. 2003. Ch. 3 ‘Structuralist, post-structuralist and semiotic archaeologies’. Reading
the Past. (3rd Edition.) Cambridge: Cambridge University Press:45-74. [ISSUE DESK IOA HOD 6; INST
ARCH AH HOD; e-book available through UCL Explore]
Preucel, R. Forthcoming. Structuralism and its archaeological legacy. In A. Gardner, M. Lake and U.
Sommer (eds.) The Oxford Handbook of Archaeological Theory. Oxford: OUP. [Available through UCL
Explore
as
an
e-book
in
advance
of
publication;
search
on
‘Preucel’
at
<http://www.oxfordhandbooks.com.libproxy.ucl.ac.uk/browse?t0=ORR:AHU00020>.
Robb, J. 1998. The archaeology of symbols. Annual Review of Anthropology 27:329-46. [<on-line
journal>]
Recommended:
Bapty, I. and Yates, T. (eds.) 1990. Archaeology After Structuralism. London: Routledge.
Barrett, J. 1993. Fragments from Antiquity: an archaeology of social life in Britain, 2900-1200 BC. Oxford:
Blackwell.
Barrett, J.C. 2001. Agency, the duality of structure, and the problem of the archaeological record. In I.
Hodder (ed.) Archaeological Theory Today. Cambridge: Polity Press:141-64.
Bell, J. 1994. Interpretation and testability in theories about prehistoric thinking. In C. Renfrew and E.
Zubrow (eds.), The ancient mind. Elements of cognitive archaeology. Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press:15-21.
Bourdieu, P. 1977. Outline of a Theory of Practice. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press:72-95
Buchli, V. 1995. Interpreting material culture: the trouble with text. In I. Hodder et al. (eds.), Interpreting
archaeology. Finding meaning in the past. London: Routledge:181-93. (Reprinted in J. Thomas (ed.)
2000. Interpretive Archaeology. London: Leicester University Press:363-76.)
16
Cornell, P. 2000. Post-structuralism and ‘archaeology’: Michel Foucault and Jacques Derrida (with comment
by Cornelius Holtorf). In Holtorf, C. and Karlsson, H. (eds.) Philosophy and Archaeological Practice.
Göteborg: Bricoleur Press:173-84.
Dobres, M.-A. 2000. Technology and Social Agency. Oxford: Blackwell.
Friedman, J 1974. Marxism, structuralism and vulgar materialism. Man 9:444-69.
Gardin, J.-C. and Peebles, C.S. (eds.) 1992. Representations in Archaeology. Bloomington: Indiana U.P.
Gardner, A. 2008. Agency. In R.A. Bentley, H.D.G. Maschner and C. Chippindale (eds.), Handbook of
Archaeological Theories. Lanham: AltaMira Press:95-108.
Giddens, A. 1979. Central Problems in Social Theory. Basingstoke: MacMillan.
Gosden, C. 1994. Social Being and Time. Oxford: Blackwell.
Hodder, I. 1982. Symbols in Action. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Hodder, I. (ed.) 1982. Symbolic and Structural Archaeology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Hodder, I. 1987. The Archaeology of Contextual Meanings. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Hodder, I. (ed.) 1989. The Meanings of Things. London: Unwin Hyman.
Hodder, I. 1990. The Domestication of Europe. Oxford: Blackwell.
Hodder, I. 1992. Material practice, symbolism and ideology. In I. Hodder Theory and Practice in
Archaeology. London: Routledge:201-12.
Hodder, I. et al. (eds.) 1995. Interpreting Archaeology. London: Routledge.
Hodder, I. and Hutson, S. 2003. Reading the Past. (3rd Edition.) Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Johnsen, H. & Olsen, B. 1992. Hermeneutics and archaeology: on the philosophy of contextual archaeology.
American Antiquity 57:419-36.
Knappett, C. 2005. Thinking through material culture: an interdisciplinary perspective. Philadelphia:
University of Pennsylvania Press.
Knappett, C. 2012. Materiality. In I. Hodder (ed.) Archaeological Theory Today. (2nd edition). London:
Polity:188-207.
Knappett, C. and L. Malafouris (eds.) 2008.
Material agency: towards a non-anthropocentric
approach. New York: Springer.
Layton, R. 1997. An Introduction to Theory in Anthropology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. (Ch.
3, 7.)
Layton, R. 2006. Structuralism and semiotics. In Tilley, C. et al. (eds.) Handbook of Material Culture.
London: SAGE:29-42.
Lévi-Strauss, C. 1963. Structural Anthropology. New York: Basic Books.
Malafouris, L. and C. Renfrew (eds.) 2010. The cognitive life of things. Cambridge: the McDonald Institute.
Miller, D. 1994. Artefacts and the meaning of things. In T. Ingold (ed.) Companion Encyclopedia of
Anthropology. London: Routledge:396-419.
Moore, H 1986. Space, text and gender: an anthropological study of the Marakwet of Kenya. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press.
Moreland, J. 1997. The Middle Ages, theory and post-modernism. Acta Archaeologica 68:163-82.
Moreland, J. 2001. Archaeology and Text. London: Duckworth.
Olsen, B. 2003. Material culture after text: re-membering things. Norwegian Archaeological Review
36:87-104.
Olsen, B. 2006. Scenes from a troubled engagement. Post-structuralism and material culture studies.
In C. Tilley, et al. (eds.). Handbook of Material Culture. New York: Sage:85-103.
Olsen, B. 2010. In Defence of Things: archaeology and ontology of objects. Lanham: Rowman and
Littlefield.
Olsen, B. 2012. Symmetrical archaeology. In I. Hodder (ed.) Archaeological Theory Today. (2nd edition).
London: Polity:208-228.
Olsen, B., M. Shanks, T. Webmore and C. Witmore 2012. Archaeology. The discipline of things. Berkeley:
University of California Press.
Preucel, R. and Bauer, A. 2001. Archaeological pragmatics. Norwegian Archaeological Review
34:85-96.
Preucel, R. 2006. Archaeological Semiotics. Oxford: Blackwell.
Robb, J.E. (ed.) 1999. Material Symbols: culture and economy in prehistory. Carbondale: Southern Illinois
University.
Shanks, M. 1992. Experiencing the Past: on the character of archaeology. London: Routledge.
Shanks, M. and Tilley, C. 1987. Social Theory and Archaeology. Cambridge: Polity. (Ch. 4).
Shanks, M. and Tilley, C. 1992. Re-Constructing Archaeology: Theory and Practice. 2nd Edition. London:
Routledge. (Ch. 6.)
17
Thomas, J. and Tilley, C. 1993. The axe and the torso: symbolic structures in the Neolithic of Brittany. In C.
Tilley (ed.) Interpretative Archaeology. Oxford: Berg:225-324.
Tilley, C. 1989. Interpreting material culture. In I. Hodder (ed.) The Meanings of Things. London: Unwin
Hyman:185-94.
Tilley, C. 1991. Material Culture and Text: the art of ambiguity. London: Routledge.
Tilley, C. (ed.) 1990. Reading Material Culture. Oxford: Blackwell.
Tilley, C. (ed.) 1993. Interpretative Archaeology. Oxford: Berg
Tilley, C. 1999. Metaphor and Material Culture. Oxford: Blackwell.
Trigger, B. 2006. A History of Archaeological Thought. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. (Ch. 9.)
Discussion Focus Questions
Is material culture always meaningful?
Are all archaeologically detectable patterns meaningful?
What is ‘structured deposition’, and does its identification tell us anything?
Is the meaning of artefacts in the past, identical with the meaning we can construct in the present? How
would we know?
If everyone in the past was an individual with their own experiences, constructing their own understanding
of the world around them, whose meanings are we trying to understand? Can we distinguish different
individual’s meanings?
How applicable are structuralist and semiotic approaches to material culture?
What is meant by ‘structures’ in the structuralist tradition, and how are individuals accommodated within
them?
How do structures change?
How do discussions of agency in archaeology relate to the structuralist and Marxist traditions?
What are the differences between structuralism and post-structuralism?
Is it possible to study meanings without generalisation?
Is it possible to generalise about meanings?
What is hermeneutics, and how do we employ it to recognise meanings in the past?
In what ways is material culture like a text?
In what ways is material culture not like a text?
Has the 'text' analogy been useful in archaeology?
Seminar 8. 30 Nov./01 Dec.: Social evolution and complexity.
The idea of ‘social evolution’ and Neoevolutionary typologies of socio-political complexity (e.g., band, tribe,
chiefdom, state) have been the dominant framework for the archaeological study of social change from the
work of Childe onwards and remain implicit even in many case-studies which attempt to escape from this
framework. Is this framework simply an empirical generalisation, or does it carry explanatory value, and if
so, how? This week’s readings consider some of the anthropological and archaeological concepts used to
define and explain changes in cultural complexity and outline some of the criticisms. Given the historical
perspective of archaeology, is an evolutionary perspective surprising, and are there any alternatives?
Essential:
Dunnell, R. C. 1988. The concept of progress in cultural evolution. In M. H. Nitecki (ed.) Evolutionary
Progress. Chicago: University of Chicago Press:169-94. [IoA ISSUE DESK TC3756; INST ARCH BB
1 NIT]
Earle, T. 1994. Political domination and social evolution. In T. Ingold (ed.) Companion Encyclopedia of
Anthropology. London: Routledge:940-61. [<link to PDF through on-line reading list>; INST ARCH BD
ING]
Carballo, D., P. Roscoe and G. Feinman. 2014. Cooperation and collective action in the cultural evolution of
complex societies. Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory 21:98-133. <on-line journal>
Robb, J. and T. Pauketat 2013. From monuments to millennia: theorizing scale and change in human history.
In J. Robb and T. Pauketat (eds) Big Histories, Human Lives. Tackling problems of scale in archaeology.
Santa Fe: School of Advanced Research Press:3-34. [<available on Aacdemia.edu; INST ARCH AH
ROB]
Recommended:
Bintliff, J. (ed.) 1991. The Annales School and Archaeology. London: Leicester University Press.
18
Blanton, R. and L. Fargher 2009. Collective action in the formation of pre-modern states. New York:
Springer.
Blanton, R., G. Feinman, S. Kowaleswski and P. Peregrine. 1996. A dual-processual theory for the
evolution of Mesoamerican civilization. Current Archaeology 37:1-14.
Carballo, D. (ed.) Cooperation and Collective Action: archaeological perspectives. Boulder: University
Press of Colorado.
Carneiro, R. 2003. Evolutionism in cultural anthropology. A critical history. Boulder: Westview Press.
Chapman, R. 2003. Archaeologies of Complexity. London: Routledge.
Childe, V.G. 1951. Social Evolution. London: Watts and Co.
Diehl, M.W. (ed) 2000. Hierarchies in Action. Cui Bono? Carbondale, Illinois: Center for Archaeological
Investigations, University of Southern Illinois.
Drennan, R.D., and C.E. Peterson. 2006. Patterned variation in prehistoric chiefdoms. Proceedings of the
National Academy of Sciences USA 103:3960-3967.
Dunbar, R.I.M. 2007. Evolution and the social sciences. History of the Human Sciences 20(2):29-50.
Dunnell, R.C. 1978. Natural selection, scale, and cultural evolution: some preliminary considerations. In
M.J. O'Brien (ed.) Evolutionary Archaeology: theory and application. Salt Lake City: University of Utah
Press:24-29.
Dunnell, R.C., and R.J. Wenke. 1980. Cultural and scientific evolution: some comments on "The decline and
rise of Mesopotamian civilization". American Antiquity 45:605.
Earle, T. (ed.) 1991. Chiefdoms: Power, Economy and Ideology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Earle, T. 1997. How Chiefs Come to Power. Stanford: Stanford University Press. Chapters 1 and 2 (pp. 166).
Feinman, G. and J. Marcus (eds.) 1998. Archaic States. Santa Fe: SAR Press.
Flannery, K. V. 1972. The cultural evolution of civilizations. Annual Review of Ecology and Systematics
3:399-426.
Flannery, K. 1999. Process and agency in early state formation. Cambridge Archaeological Journal 9:3-21.
Flannery, K. and J. Marcus 2012. The Creation of Inequality. How our prehistoric ancestors set the stage
for monarchy, slavery and empire. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
Fried, M. 1967. The Evolution of Political Society. New York: Random House.
Friedman, J. and M. Rowlands 1977. Notes towards an epigenetic model of the evolution of ‘civilisation’. In
J. Friedman and M. Rowlands (eds.) The Evolution of Social Systems. London: Duckworth:201-76.
Gilman, A. 1995. Prehistoric European chiefdoms: rethinking ‘Germanic’ societies. In D. Price and G.
Feinman (eds.) Foundations of Social Inequality. New York: Plenum Press: 235-51.
Gummerman, G. J. and M. Gell-Mann (eds.) 1994. Understanding Complexity in the Prehistoric Southwest.
Addison-Wesley, Reading, Massachusetts.
Haas, J. 1982. The Evolution of the Prehistoric State. New York: Columbia University Press.
Haas, J. (ed.) 2001. From Leaders to Rulers. New York: Kluwer/Plenum.
Hedeager, L. 1992. Iron Age Societies: from Tribe to State in Northern Europe - 500 BC to AD 700. Oxford:
Blackwell.
Jeffares, B and K. Sterelny Forthcoming. Darwinisn and its influences. In A. Gardner, M. Lake and U.
Sommer (eds.) The Oxford Handbook of Archaeological Theory. [Available on-line in advance of
publication.]
Johnson, M. 2004. Archaeology and social theory. In J. Bintliff (ed.), A Companion to Archaeology.
Oxford: Blackwell:92-109.
Johnson, A.W. and T. Earle 2000. The Evolution of Human Societies. Stanford: Stanford University Press.
Kirch, P. 1984. The Evolution of the Polynesian Chiefdoms. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Kirch, P.V. 1990. The evolution of sociopolitical complexity in prehistoric Hawai`i: an assessment of the
archaeological evidence. Journal of World Prehistory 3:311-345.
Knapp, B. 1992. Archaeology, Annales, and Ethnohistory. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Mann, M. 1986. The Sources of Social Power. Vol. 1. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. (Chapter 1.)
Marcus J. 2008. The archaeological evidence for social evolution. Annual Review of Anthropology 37:25166.
McGuire, R. 1983. Breaking down cultural complexity: inequality and heterogeneity. In, M. Schiffer (ed.)
Advances in Archaeological Method and Theory 6:91-142.
McIntosh, S.K. (ed.) 1999. Beyond Chiefdoms: pathways to complexity in Africa. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press. (Chapter 1.)
Pauketat, T.R. 2001. Practice and history in archaeology: an emerging paradigm. Anthropological Theory
1:73-98.
Pauketat, T. 2007. Chiefdoms and other archaeological delusions. Lanham: AltaMira.
19
Peebles, C. and S. Kus 1977. Some archaeological correlates of ranked societies. American Antiquity 42:42148.
Pluciennik, M. 2004. Social Evolution. London: Duckworth.
Pollock, S. 1999. Ancient Mesopotamia. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Renfrew, C. 1984. Social evolution, societal change and generalization. In C. Renfrew (ed.) Approaches to
Social Archaeology. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press:225-57.
Renfrew, C. and Bahn, P. 1991. Archaeology: Theories, Methods and Practice. London: Thames and
Hudson. (Pages 153-94: How were societies organised? Social archaeology)
Richerson, P.J. and R. Boyd 2001. Institutional evolution in the Holocene: the rise of complex societies. In
W.G. Runciman (ed), The Origin of Social Institutions, pp. 197-234. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Rosenberg, M. 1994. Pattern, process, and hierarchy in the evolution of culture. Journal of Anthropological
Archaeology 13:307-40.
Sanderson, S.K. 1990. Social Evolutionism: a Critical History. Oxford: Blackwell. (Chapter 7.
Sanderson, S.K. 2001. The Evolution of Human Sociality: A Darwinian Conflict Perspective. Lanham:
Rowman and Littlefield.
Service, E. 1962. Primitive Social Organisation. New York: Random House.
Service, E. 1975. Origins of the State and Civilization. New York: Norton.
Shanks, M. and Tilley, C. 1987. Social Theory and Archaeology. Cambridge: Polity Press. (Chapter 6: Social
evolution and societal change.)
Shennan, S.J. 1993. After social evolution: a new archaeological agenda? In N. Yoffee and A. Sherratt (eds.),
Archaeological Theory: Who Sets the Agenda? pp. 53-59. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Shennan, S.J. 1999. The development of rank societies. In G. Barker (ed), Companion Encyclopaedia of
Archaeology Vol. 2. London: Routledge:870-907.
Shennan, S. 2002. Genes, Memes, and Human History. London: Thames and Hudson. (Pages 35-65: Culture
as an evolutionary system).
Shennan, S. 2011. An evolutionary perspective on the goals of archaeology. In E. Cochrane and A. Gardner
(eds.) Evolutionary and Interpretive Archaeologies. A dialogue. Walnut Creek: Left Coast Press:325-44.
Smith, A. 2011. Archaeologies of sovereignty. Annual Review of Anthropology 40:415-32.
Smith, M. 2012. The Comparative Archaeology of Complex Societies. Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press.
Stein, G. 1998. Heterogeneity, power and political economy: some current research issues in the archaeology
of Old World complex societies. Journal of Archaeological Research 6:1-43.
Stoddart, S. 1999. Urbanisation and state formation. In G. Barker (ed.), Companion Encyclopaedia of
Archaeology, Vol 2. London: Routledge:908-49.
Trigger, B.G. 1998. Sociocultural Evolution. Oxford: Blackwell.
Wenke, R.J. 1981. Explaining the evolution of cultural complexity. In M. B. Schiffer (ed.) Advances in
Archaeological Method and Theory, vol. 4. New York: Academic Press:79-127.
Wenke, R.J. 1997. Anthropology, Egyptology, and the concept of cultural change. In J. Lustig (ed.)
Anthropology and Egyptology. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press:117-36.
Wright, H. 1978. Toward an explanation of the origin of the state. In R. Cohen and E. Service (eds.) Origins
of the State: the Anthropology of Political Evolution. Philadelphia: Institute for the Study of Human
Issues:49-68.
Yoffee, N. 1979. The decline and rise of Mesopotamian civilization: an ethnoarchaeological perspective on
the evolution of social complexity. American Antiquity 44:5.
Yoffee, N. 1993. Too many chiefs? (or, safe texts for the '90s). In N. Yoffee and A. Sherratt (eds.),
Archaeological Theory: Who Sets the Agenda? pp. 60-78. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Yoffee, N. 1995. Political economy in early Mesopotamian states. Annual Review of Anthropology. 24:281.
Yoffee, N. 2005. Myths of the Archaic State: evolution of the earliest cities, states and civilizations.
Cambridge: C.U.P.
Discussion focus questions
What is social, political, or cultural complexity? What are archaeologists trying to capture with these
concepts? How do they differ?
‘Cultural complexity’ is often considered a patronising judgement on past (and present) societies? Does it
need to be? Is there any value in the concept?
What does complexity mean?
Are there discrete stages in human social evolution?
Are there distinct types/configurations of human societies? What alternatives are there to conceptualise and
organise our understanding of the variety of human societies?
20
All societies are unique, at any specific point in time; why is it necessary to group, classify and organise
them?
What are the differences between uni-linear and multi-linear perspectives on social evolution?
Why did Service and Sahlins's neo-evolutionary classification of societies have such resonance for New
Archaeologists?
Is there any value in such a classificatory approach?
If we don’t use them, or similar classificatory concepts, what concepts would be more appropriate?
Why did this approach find it so difficult to explain social change?
This perspective had close connections with the systemic view of culture, but this in itself made the
explanation of change difficult - why?
Are there any generalisations which can be made about patterns of complexity in the archaeological record?
About the patterns of development of different social formations?
What relationship, if any, is there between the neoevolutionary scheme, and the Marx framework for social
and political evolution?
What alternative concepts may be more productive than the neoevolutionary framework?
In what ways has the notion of progress been an implicit or explicit component of research on social
evolution? Should it?
What might be pertinent observations to make of the archaeological record if we are to explain changes in
social, political, or cultural complexity?
Seminar 9. 07/08 December: The diversification of Interpretative Archaeologies.
Since the early 1980s, Post-processual theoretical approaches in Britain have come to dominate theoretical
debate in prehistoric archaeology, and they have had a significant influence elsewhere. Post-processual
archaeology encompasses a diversity of ideas and approaches that are now more often grouped under the
term ‘interpretative archaeologies’. This diversity includes approaches derived from Marxism, hermeneutics,
structuralism, post-structuralism, phenomenology, gender theory, post-colonial theory and post-modernism.
At the core of an interpretive archaeology stance is the view that any understanding of a human society must
be sought in the society itself, thereby requiring a contextual perspective. Interpretative archaeology is
characterised by consideration of issues such as social power, gender construction, ritual action, personal
identity, meaning, agency, and the roles of ideology and cosmology in human understandings and
constructions of their worlds. Interpretative archaeologies recognise the valid coexistence of multiple/plural
interpretative perspectives.
Essential:
Johnson, M. 2010. Archaeological Theory: An Introduction. Oxford: Blackwell. Chapter 7. [<link to PDF
through on-line reading list>; ISSUE DESK IoA JOH 5; INST ARCH AH JOH] (Already read for
earlier session.)
Renfrew, C. 1994. Towards a cognitive archaeology. In C. Renfrew and E.B.W. Zubrow (eds.) The Ancient
Mind: elements of a cognitive archaeology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press:3-12.
Preucel, R. 1995. The Postprocessual condition. Journal of Archaeological Research 3:147-75.
Hodder, I. 1991. Interpretative archaeology and its role. American Antiquity 56:7-18. [INST ARCH Pers;
<on-line journal>]
Fahlander, F. Forthcoming. Postmodern archaeologies. In A. Gardner, M. Lake and U. Sommer (eds.) The
Oxford Handbook of Archaeological Theory. Oxford: OUP. [Available through UCL Explore as an ebook
in
advance
of
publication;
search
on
‘Fahlander’
at
<http://www.oxfordhandbooks.com.libproxy.ucl.ac.uk/browse?t0=ORR:AHU00020>.
Recommended:
Andrews, G., Barrett, J.C. and Lewis, J.S.C. 2000. Interpretation not record: the practice of archaeology.
Antiquity 74:525-30.
Barrett, J. 1993. Fragments from Antiquity: an archaeology of social life in Britain, 2900-1200 BC. Oxford:
Blackwell.
Barrett, J.C. 2001. Agency, the duality of structure, and the problem of the archaeological record. In I.
Hodder (ed.) Archaeological Theory Today. Cambridge: Polity Press:141-64.
Barrett, J. 2012. Agency: a revisionist account. In I. Hodder (ed.) Archaeological Theory Today. (2nd
edition). London: Polity:146-66.
Barrett, J. and I. Ko. 2009. A phenomenology of landscape. A crisis in British landscape archaeology?
Journal of Social Archaeology 9:275-94.
Bender, B., Hamilton, S. and Tilley, C., 2007. Stone Worlds: Narrative and Reflexivity in Landscape
21
Archaeology. Walnut Creek: Left Coast Press. (Chapters 1 and 3.)
Brück, J. 2005. Experiencing the past? The development of a phenomenological archaeology in British
prehistory. Archaeological Dialogues 12(1):45-72.
Brumfiel, E. 1992. Distinguished lecture in archaeology: breaking and entering the ecosystem –
gender, class and faction steal the show. American Anthropologist 94:551-67.
Chadwick, A. 2003. Post-processualism, professionalization and archaeological methodologies. Towards
reflective and radical practice. Archaeological Dialogues 10:97-117.
Cole, T. 2013. The place of things in contemporary history. In P. Graves-Brown and R. Harrison (eds) The
Oxford Handbook of the Archaeology of the Contemporary World. Oxford: OUP.
Crossland, Z. Forthcoming. Materiality and embodiment. In A. Gardner, M. Lake and U. Sommer (eds) The
Oxford Handbook of Archaeological Theory. [Available on-line in advance of publication.]
Dawson, T. 1998. Homosexuality, queer theory and archaeology. In J. Thomas (ed.) Interpretive
Archaeology. A reader. London: Leicester University Press:283-89.
Dietler, M. 2010. Consumption. In M. Beaudry and D. Hicks (eds) The Oxford Handbook of Material
Culture Studies. Oxford: OUP.
Dobres, M.-A. and Robb, J.E. 2000. Agency in archaeology: paradigm or platitude? In M.-A. Dobres and J.
E. Robb (eds.) Agency in Archaeology. London: Routledge:3-17.
Dobres, M.A. and J.E. Robb (eds.) 2000. Agency in Archaeology. London: Routledge.
Flannery, K. 1999. Process and agency in early state formation. Cambridge Archaeological Journal 9:3-21.
Fowler, C. 2000. The individual, the subject, and archaeological interpretation. Reading Luce Irigaray
and Judith Butler. In C. Holtorf and H. Karlsson (eds.), Philosophy and archaeological practice.
Perspectives for the 21st century. Goteborg: Bricoleur Press:107-33.
Fowler, C. 2004. The Archaeology of Personhood: an anthropological approach. London: Routledge.
Fowler, C. 2010. From identity and material culture to personhood and materiality. In, D. Hicks and
M. Beaudry (eds.). The Oxford Handbook of Material Culture Studies. Oxford: Oxford University
Press:352-85.
Fowler, C. 2011. Personhood and the body. In T. Insoll (ed.) The Oxford Handbook of the Archaeology of
Ritual and Religion. Oxford: OUP.
Fowles, S. 2010. The Southwest school of landscape archaeology. Annual Review of Anthropology
39:453-68.
Gardner, A. 2007. An Archaeology of Identity: soldiers and society in late Roman Britain. Walnut Creek,
CA: Left Coast Press.
Gardner, A. 2011. Action and structure in interpretive archaeologies. In E. Cochrane and A. Gardner (eds.)
Evolutionary and Interpretive Archaeologies. A dialogue. Walnut Creek: Left Coast Press:63-82.
Geller, P. 2009. Identity and difference: complicating gender in archaeology. Annual Review of
Anthropology 38:65-81.
Gillespie, S., R. Joyce and D. Nichols 2003. Is archaeology anthropology? Archaeological Papers of the
American Anthropological Association 13.1:3-13.
Hamilakis, Y. 2011. What is the archaeology of the senses? In T. Insoll (ed.) The Oxford Handbook of the
Archaeology of Ritual and Religion. Oxford: OUP.
Hamilakis, Y. 2013. Archaeology and the Senses: human experience, memory and effect. Cambridge: CUP.
Hamilakis, Y., M. Pluciennik and S. Tarlow (eds.) Thinking through the body: archaeologies of corporeality.
London: Kluwer.
Hodder, I. 1992. Theory and Practice in Archaeology. Routledge:83-91, 92-121, 145-80.
Hodder, I. 2001. Introduction: a review of contemporary theoretical debate in archaeology. In I. Hodder (ed.)
Archaeological Theory Today. Cambridge: Polity:1-13.
Hodder, I. 2004. The 'social' in archaeological theory: an historical and contemporary perspective. In L.
Meskell and R. Preucel (eds.), A companion to Social Archaeology. London: Blackwell:23-42.
Hodder, I. 2012. Introduction: contemporary theoretical debate in archaeology. In I. Hodder (ed.)
Archaeological Theory Today (2nd edition). Cambridge: Polity:1-13.
Hodder, I. and S. Hutson 2003. Reading the Past (3rd edition). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Hodder, I., et al. (eds.) 1995. Interpreting Archaeology. Finding meaning in the past. London: Routledge.
Hodder, I., Karlsson, H. and Olsen, B. 2008. 40 years of theoretical engagement: a conversation with Ian
Hodder. Norwegian Archaeological Review 41:26-42. .
Johnsen, H. & Olsen, B. 1992. Hermeneutics and archaeology: on the philosophy of contextual archaeology.
American Antiquity 57:419-36.
Johnson, M. 1989. Conceptions of agency in archaeological interpretation. Journal of Anthropological
Archaeology 8:189-211.
Johnson, M. 2002. Behind the Castle Gate: from Medieval to Renaissance. London: Routledge.
22
Johnson, M. 2004. Archaeology and social theory. In J. Bintliff (ed.), A Companion to Archaeology.
Oxford: Blackwell:92-109.
Johnson, M. 2006. On the nature of theoretical archaeology and archaeological theory. Archaeological
Dialogues 13:117-32.
Johnson, M. 2012. Phenomenological approaches in landscape studies. Annual Review of Anthropology
41:269-84.
Jones, A. and N. Boivin 2010. The malice of inanimate objects: material agency. In M. Beaudry and D.
Hicks (eds.).The Oxford Handbook of Material Culture Studies. Oxford: OUP.
Jones, S. 1996. Discourses of identity in the interpretation of the past. In, P. Graves-Brown, S. Jones and C.
Gamble (eds.), Cultural Identity and Archaeology: the construction of European communities. London:
Routledge:1-24.
Joyce, R. 2004. Embodied subjectivity: gender, femininity, masculinity, sexuality. In L. Meskell and R.
Preucel (eds.), A Companion to Social Archaeology. London: Blackwell:82-95.
Joyce, R. 2005. Archaeology of the body. Annual Review of Anthropology 34:139-58.
Knappett, C. 2012. Materiality. In I. Hodder (ed.) Archaeological Theory Today. (2nd edition). London:
Polity:188-207.
Kohl, P.L. 1993. Limits to a post-processual archaeology (or, the dangers of a new scholasticism). In N.
Yoffee and A. Sherratt (eds.) 1993. Archaeological Theory: who sets the agenda? Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press:13-19.
Leone, M. 2010. Critical Historical Archaeology. Walnut Creek: Left Coast Press.
Meskell, L. 2001. Archaeologies of identity. In I. Hodder (ed.), Archaeological Theory Today.
Cambridge: Polity:187-213.
Meskell, L. 2002. The intersections of identity and politics in archaeology. Annual Review of
Anthropology 31:279-301.
Nichols, S., R. Joyce and S. Gillespie 2003. Archaeology is anthropology. Archaeological Papers of the
American Anthropological Association 13.1:155-69.
Olsen, B. 2010. In Defence of Things: archaeology and ontology of objects. Lanham: Rowman and
Littlefield.
Olsen, B., M. Shanks, T. Webmore and C. Witmore 2012. Archaeology. The discipline of things. Berkeley:
University of California Press.
Pinsky, V. and A. Wylie (eds.) 1989. Critical Traditions in Contemporary Archaeology. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press.
Preston, J. Forthcoming. Positivist and Post-positivist philosophy of science. In A. Gardner, M. Lake and U.
Sommer (eds.) The Oxford Handbook of Archaeological Theory. [Available on-line in advance of
publication.]
Preucel, R. 1991. The philosophy of archaeology. In R.W. Preucel (ed.) Processual and Post-processual
archaeologies: multiple ways of knowing the past. Carbondale: Southern Illinois U.P.:17-29.
Renfrew, C. et al. 1993. What is Cognitive Archaeology? Cambridge Archaeological Journal 3:247-70.
Shanks, M. 2008. Post-processual archaeology and after. In R.A. Bentley, H.D.G. Maschner and C.
Chippindale (eds.) Handbook of Archaeological Theories. Lanham: AltaMira Press:133-44.
Shanks, M. and C. Tilley 1987. Re-constructing Archaeology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
(Chapter 6.)
Shanks, M. and C. Tilley 1987. Social Theory and Archaeology. Cambridge: Polity Press. (Chapter 7.)
Shanks, M. and C. Tilley 1989. Archaeology into the 1990s (with comments). Norwegian Archaeological
Review 22:1-54.
Shanks, M. and Hodder, I. 1994. Processual, postprocessual and interpretive archaeologies. In I. Hodder et
al. (eds.) Interpreting Archaeology. Finding meaning in the past. London: Routledge:3-29.
Shennan, S. 1994. Introduction: archaeological approaches to cultural identity. In S. Shennan (ed.),
Archaeological approaches to cultural identity. London: Routledge:1-32.
Smith, S. Forthcoming. Identity. In A. Gardner, M. Lake and U. Sommer (eds) The Oxford Handbook of
Archaeological Theory. [Available on-line in advance of publication.]
Stahl, A. 2010 Material histories. In M. Beaudry and D. Hicks (eds.).The Oxford Handbook of Material
Culture Studies. Oxford: OUP.
Thomas, J. 1995. Where are we now? Archaeological theory in the 1990s. In P.J. Ucko (ed.) Archaeological
Theory: A World Perspective. London: Routledge:343-62.
Thomas, J. 2000. Introduction. The polarities of Post-processual archaeology. In J. Thomas (ed.) Interpretive
Archaeology: A Reader. London: Leicester University Press:1-18
Tilley, C. 1989. Archaeology as socio-political action in the present. In V. Pinsky and A. Wylie (eds.)
Critical Traditions in Contemporary Archaeology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press:104-16.
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Tilley, C. (ed.), 1990. Reading Material Culture. London: Routledge.
Tilley, C. 1993. Interpretation and a politics of the past. In C. Tilley (ed.) Interpretative Archaeology.
Oxford: Berg:1-27.
Tilley (ed.) 1993. Interpretative Archaeology. Oxford: Berg.
Trigger, B. 1989. Hyperrealism, responsibility, and the social sciences. Canadian Review of Sociology and
Anthropology 26:776-97. In B. Trigger. 2003. Artefacts & Ideas. Essays in Archaeology. London:
Transaction:113-31.
Trigger, B. 1991. Post-Processual developments in Anglo-America archaeology. Norwegian Archaeological
Review 24:65-76.
Trigger, B. 1998. Archaeology and epistemology: dialoguing across the Darwinian chasm. American
Journal of Archaeology 102:1-34.
Trigger, B. 2006. A History of Archaeological Thought. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. (Chapters
9 and 10.)
VanPool, T.L. and VanPool, C.S. 2003. Agency and evolution: the role of intended and unintended
consequences of action. In T.L. VanPool and C.S. VanPool (eds.) Essential Tensions in Archaeological
Method and Theory. Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press:89-113.
Voss, B. 2008. Sexuality studies in archaeology. Annual Review of Anthropology 37:317-36.
Williamson, R. and M. Bisson (eds.). 2006. The Archaeology of Bruce Trigger. Theoretical Empiricism.
London: McGill-Queen’s University Press.
Wylie, A. 1989. The interpretive dilemma. In V. Pinsky and A. Wylie (eds.) Critical Traditions in
Contemporary Archaeology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press:18-27.
Discussion questions
Why do interpretive archaeologists place so much emphasis on context?
Is archaeology inevitably political?
Are interpretive archaeologies more concerned with theories than method?
Are interpretive archaeologies truly pluralist, or do they simply agree to differ?
Are particular approaches to theory more relevant or effective to address some questions, and can one pick
and choose?
Many of the concerns of interpretive archaeologies align closely with concerns of western society today, in
terms of the individual, individual action, identities, sexuality and bodily experience. Are these merely
topical pre-occupations, or are they universal? Are they the principal questions archaeology should be
addressing? Are we able to address them effectively through archaeological evidence?
Do all individuals have agency?
Do things have agency?
What do the phenomenological bodily experiences of the modern analyst, tell us about the experiences and
understandings of individuals in the past?
Do only emic perspectives have explanatory value?
Can we recognise or discuss an individual’s experience in the past? Whose experience?
Can we evaluate alternative interpretations of the past?
Do archaeologists engage effectively with alternative, non-academic interpreters of the past?
Does anything distinguish our interpretations from theirs?
In a relativist, post-modern climate, is it possible to reject any interpretation as invalid, or inappropriate (e.g.
racist)? How?
How do we reconcile alternative/opposed viewpoints/interpretations, in a real (as opposed to academic)
context, where individuals’ understanding of their past and traditions really matter to them?
Seminar 10. 14/15 December: Archaeological theory today: diversity, pluralism or chaos?
In 1972, Mark Leone, reflecting on the first decade of the New Archaeology, rather prematurely claimed that
‘the rhetorical scene has gone quiet’. Over forty years later, there are no longer the polarised slinging
matches that characterised most of the 70s through 90s, at least in some quarters. This is certainly not the
consequence of any one position ‘winning’ the theory wars, or any agreement on a unified perspective. Does
this represent an increasing maturity in discussion and debate, incompatible divergence, chaos or apathy? Is
this a good thing or not? In this session we will discuss the current ‘state of play’ in archaeological theory
including what archaeological theorists are currently doing and why, possible explanations for the historical
development of archaeological theory we have thus far tracked, and consider where the field may head next.
Essential Reading:
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Hegmon, M. 2003. Setting theoretical egos aside: issues and theory in North American archaeology.
American Antiquity 68:213-244. [INST ARCH Pers; <on-line journal>]
Hodder, I. 2012. Introduction: A review of contemporary theoretical debates in archaeology. In I. Hodder
(ed.) Archaeological Theory Today (2nd edition). Cambridge: Polity:1-13. [INST ARCH HOD; Issue
Desk IOA HOD 18]
Jones, A. 2009. Into the future. In C. Gosden, B. Cunliffe and R. Joyce (eds.). The Oxford Handbook of
Archaeology. Oxford: OUP. [Available as e-book, through UCL Explore; AH CUN (reference)]
Kintigh, K. et al. 2014. Grand challenges for archaeology. American Antiquity 79:5-14. [INST ARCH
Pers; <on-line journal>]
Recommended Reading:
Bintliff, J. and M. Pearce (eds.) 2011. The Death of Archaeological Theory? Oxford: Oxbow Books.
Chakrabarti, D. 2012. Archaeology and politics in the third world, with special reference to India. In R.
Skeates, C. McDavid and J. Carman (eds.) The Oxford Handbook of Public Archaeology. Oxford: OUP.
Conkey, M. 2007. Questioning theory: is there a gender of theory in archaeology? Journal of Archaeological
Method and Theory 14:285-310.
Gero, J. 2007. Honoring ambiguity/problematizing certitude. Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory
14:311.
Giblin, J. 2013. Politics, ideology and indigenous perspectives. In P. Mitchell and P. Lane (eds.) The Oxford
Handbook of African Archaeology. Oxford: OUP.
Gillespie, S., R. Joyce and D. Nichols 2003. Is archaeology anthropology? Archaeological Papers of the
American Anthropological Association 13.1:3-13.
Harding, A. 2009. A conversation with Colin Renfrew (Professor Lord Renfrew of Kaimsthorn). European
Journal of Archaeology 11:143-70.
Hawley, J. Forthcoming. Post-colonial theory. In A. Gardner, M. Lake and U. Sommer (eds.) The Oxford
Handbook of Archaeological Theory. [Available on-line in advance of publication.]
Hegmon, M. 2005. No more theory wars: a response to Moss. American Antiquity 70:588-90.
Hingley, R. Forthcoming. Colonial and post-colonial archaeologies. In A. Gardner, M. Lake and U. Sommer
(eds.) The Oxford Handbook of Archaeological Theory. [Available on-line in advance of publication.]
Hodder, I. 2012. Entangled. An archaeology of the relationships between humans and things. London:
Wiley-Blackwell.
Hodder, I., Karlsson, H. and Olsen, B. 2008. 40 years of theoretical engagement: a conversation with Ian
Hodder. Norwegian Archaeological Review 41:26-42.
Insoll, T.A. 2007. Archaeology: the Conceptual Challenge. Duckworth Publishers.
Johnson, M.H. (with comments) 2006. On the nature of theoretical archaeology and archaeological theory.
Archaeological Dialogues 13:117-182.
Kristiansen, K. 2004. Genes versus agents: a discussion of the widening theoretical gap in archaeology.
Archaeological Dialogues 11:77-99.
LaMotta, V. 2012. Behavioral Archaeology. In I. Hodder (ed.) Archaeological Theory Today. (2nd edition).
London: Polity:62-92.
Lucas, G. 2012. Understanding the archaeological record. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Lyman, R. L. 2007. Archaeology's quest for a seat at the high table of anthropology. Journal of
Anthropological Archaeology 26:133-49.
Martinon-Torres, M. and D. Killick Forthcoming. Archaeological theories and archaeological sciences. In A.
Gardner, M. Lake and U. Sommer (eds.) The Oxford Handbook of Archaeological Theory. [Available online in advance of publication.]
Meskell, L. and Preucel, R. (eds.) A Companion to Social Archaeology. Malden: Blackwell.
Morris, I. 2004. Classical archaeology. In J. Bintliff (ed.), A Companion to Archaeology. Oxford:
Blackwell:253-71.
Moss, M. L. 2005. Rifts in the theoretical landscape of archaeology in the United States: A comment on
Hegmon and Watkins. American Antiquity 70:581-87.
Murray, T. 2011. Archaeologists and indigenous people: a maturing relationship? Annual Review of
Anthropology 40:363-78.
Nichols, S., R. Joyce and S. Gillespie 2003. Archaeology is anthropology. Archaeological Papers of the
American Anthropological Association 13.1:155-69.
O’Brien, M.J., Lyman, R.L. and Schiffer, M.B. 2005. Archaeology as a Process: Processualism and its
progeny. Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press.
Olsen, B. 2010. In defence of things. Archaeology and the ontology of objects. New York: Altamira Press.
25
Olsen, B. 2012. Symmetrical archaeology. In I. Hodder (ed.) Archaeological Theory Today. (2nd edition).
London: Polity:208-228.
Olsen, B., M. Shanks, T. Webmore and C. Witmore 2012. Archaeology. The discipline of things. Berkeley:
University of California Press.
Orser Jr., C. 2004. The archaeologies of recent history: historical, post-medieval, and modern-world.
In J. Bintliff (ed.), A Companion to Archaeology. Oxford: Blackwell:272-90.
Orser Jr, C. 2010. Twenty-first century historical archaeology. Journal of Archaeological Research
18:111-50.
Orser Jr, C. Forthcoming. Modern-world archaeology. In A. Gardner, M. Lake and U. Sommer (eds) The
Oxford Handbook of Archaeological Theory. [Available on-line in advance of publication.]
Preston, J. Forthcoming. Positivist and Post-positivist philosophy of science. In A. Gardner, M. Lake and U.
Sommer (eds.) The Oxford Handbook of Archaeological Theory. [Available on-line in advance of
publication.]
Preucel, R. and S. Mrozowski (eds.) 2010. Introduction. In R. Preucel and S. Mrozowski (eds.),
Contemporary Archaeology in Theory. The New Pragmatism. London: Wiley-Blackwell:3-49.
Schiffer, M. B. (ed.) 2000. Social Theory in Archaeology. Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press.
Seymour, D. and M. Schiffer Forthcoming. Emerging from theoretical anarchy to anthropological
archaeology. In A. Gardner, M. Lake and U. Sommer (eds.) The Oxford Handbook of Archaeological
Theory. [Available on-line in advance of publication.]
Shanks, M. 2004. Archaeology and politics. In J. Bintliff (ed.), A Companion to Archaeology. Oxford:
Blackwell:490-508.
Shanks, M. 2008. Post-processual archaeology and after. In R.A. Bentley, H.D.G. Maschner and C.
Chippindale (eds.) Handbook of Archaeological Theories. Lanham: AltaMira Press:133-44.
Sherratt, A. 1993. The relativity of theory. In N. Yoffee and A. Sherratt (eds.), Archaeological theory:
who sets the agenda? Cambridge: Cambridge University Press:119-30.
Hunt, T., Lipo, C. and Sterling, S. 2001. Posing questions for a scientific archaeology. In S. Sterling, T.
Hunt, C. Lipo (eds.) Posing questions for a scientific archaeology. Bergin and Garvey:1-21.
Thomas, J. 2004. Archaeology and Modernity. London: Routledge.
Thomas, J., Witmore, C., Glorstad, H., Kjorup, S. and Jensen, O. 2006. Comments of Julian Thomas
(2004): Archaeology and modernity. Norwegian Archaeological Review 39:49-69.
Trigger, B. 1998. Archaeology and epistemology: dialoguing across the Darwinian chasm. American
Journal of Archaeology 102:1-34.
Trigger, B. 2006. A History of Archaeological Thought. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. (Chapter
9: Pragmatic synthesis; Chapter 10: The relevance of archaeology.)
VanPool, T. L., and C. S. VanPool (eds.) 2003. Essential Tensions in Archaeological Method and Theory.
Salt Lake City: University of Utah.
Watkins, J. 2012. Public archaeology and indigenous archaeology: intersections and divergences from a
native American perspective. In R. Skeates, C. McDavid and J. Carman (eds.) The Oxford Handbook of
Public Archaeology. Oxford: OUP.
Wylie, A. 1992. On 'heavily decomposing red herrings'. Scientific method in archaeology and the ladening
of evidence with theory. In L. Embree (ed.) Metaarchaeology. Dordrecht: Kluwer:269-88.
Wylie, A. 1994. Matters of fact and matters of interest. In S. Shennan (ed.) Archaeological
approaches to cultural identity. London: Routledge:94-109.
Wylie, A. 1995. Alternative histories. Epistemic disunity and political integrity. In P. Schmidt and T.
Patterson (eds.), Making Alternative Histories. The practice of archaeology and history in nonwestern settings. Santa Fe: School of American Research:255-72.
Wylie, A. 2000. Questions of evidence, legitimacy and the (dis)utility of science. American Antiquity
65:227-37.
Wylie, A. 2002. Thinking from things. Essays in the philosophy of archaeology. London: University o
California Press.
Wylie, A. 2008. The integrity of narratives: deliberative practice, pluralism and multivocality. In J.
Habu, C. Fawcett and J. Matsunaga (eds.), Evaluating Multiple Narratives: beyond nationalist,
colonialist, imperialist archaeologies. London: Springer:201-12.
Yoffee, N. and A. Sherratt 1993. Introduction: the sources of archaeological theory. In N. Yoffee and
A. Sherratt (eds.), Archaeological theory: who sets the agenda? Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press:1-10.
Discussion Focus Questions
Can any discipline claim any understanding in a post-modern climate, or is there only critique?
26
Is the differentiation of sciences and humanities an apt one in archaeology (or in other disciplines)?
Is there strength in diversity?
Are specific approaches to archaeological interpretation more or less appropriate to different questions?
How do we reconcile, juggle or balance plural perspectives on the past?
How does one advocate interpretations of the past which others, who claim a direct relationship to that past,
have objections to?
Are all approaches to the past equally valid? If not, who decides which are and which are not? On what
basis?
Do archaeologists have any exceptional authority to interpret the past? If not, why do we bother?
4. ONLINE RESOURCES
Further important information relating to all courses at the Institute of Archaeology is to be found on the
Institute website and in your degree handbook. It is your responsibility to read and if relevant act on it.
Most of the essential readings for each session are available via the Institute’s online reading list service as
downloadable PDFs or on-line html pages, where permitted by copyright. For this course the link is:
<http://readinglists.ucl.ac.uk/lists/35ABE61B-D6D9-0A79-ADF4-E729B45A7D47.html>), some of the
readings on that list used last year have been replaced by new readings, for which links are noted in the
reading lists above, or will be made available.
The on-line Moodle site for this course (accessed as ARCLG193) will eventually have the course handbook,
a link to the on-line reading list, and any PPTs used in seminars.
Intercollegiate students should contact the Academic Administrator (Judy Medrington
<j.medrington@ucl.ac.uk>; room 411a) to be registered for a college IS username and password to be able to
access on-line resources.
5. ADDITIONAL INFORMATION
Libraries and Other Resources
In addition to the Library of the Institute of Archaeology (5th floor), other libraries in UCL with holdings of
particular relevance to this course are the Main Library (Wilkins Building) and the Science Library (D.M.S.
Watson building) on the central UCL site. The University of London Senate House Library
<http://www.ull.ac.uk/> also has holdings which may be relevant to this course.
Information for intercollegiate and interdepartmental students
Students enrolled in Departments outside the Institute should collect hard copy of the Institute’s coursework
guidelines from the office of the Academic Administrator (Judy Medrington) 411a.
Tutor
The Course Co-ordinator is Todd Whitelaw (room 207; 020 7679 7534; t.whitelaw@ucl.ac.uk; e-mail for
appointment). He prefers to be contacted by e-mail, NOT by telephone except in emergencies (he is in and
out of his office, and e-mail provides a written reminder). Please use normal e-mail, not via Moodle, for
communication with the Course Co-ordinator.
27
APPENDIX: POLICIES AND PROCEDURES 2015-16 (PLEASE READ CAREFULLY)
This appendix provides a short précis of policies and procedures relating to courses. It is not a substitute for the full
documentation, with which all students should become familiar. For full information on Institute policies and
procedures, see the following website: http://wiki.ucl.ac.uk/display/archadmin.
For UCL policies and procedures, see the Academic Regulations and the UCL Academic Manual:
http://www.ucl.ac.uk/srs/academic-regulations; http://www.ucl.ac.uk/academic-manual/.
GENERAL MATTERS
ATTENDANCE: A minimum attendance of 70% is required. A register will be taken at each class. If you are unable
to attend a class, please notify the lecturer by email.
DYSLEXIA: If you have dyslexia or any other disability, please discuss with your lecturers whether there is any way in
which they can help you. Students with dyslexia should indicate it on each coursework cover sheet.
COURSEWORK
SUBMISSION PROCEDURES: You must submit a hard copy of coursework to the Co-ordinator's pigeon-hole via
the Red Essay Box at Reception by the stated deadlines. Coursework must be stapled to a completed coversheet
(available from the IoA website, the rack outside Room 411A, or the Library). You should put your Candidate
Number (a 5 digit alphanumeric code, found on Portico; please note that this number changes each year) and Course
Code on all coursework. It is also essential that you put your Candidate Number at the start of the title line on
Turnitin, followed by a short identifier for the coursework (example: YBPR6 _G193_Assessment_1).
LATE SUBMISSION: Late submission is penalized in accordance with UCL regulations, unless permission for late
submission has been granted. The penalties are as follows: i) A penalty of 5 percentage marks should be applied to
coursework submitted the calendar day after the deadline (calendar day 1); ii) A penalty of 15 percentage marks should
be applied to coursework submitted on calendar day 2 after the deadline through to calendar day 7; iii) A mark of zero
should be recorded for coursework submitted on calendar day 8 after the deadline through to the end of the second week
of third term. Nevertheless, the assessment will be considered to be complete provided the coursework contains material
than can be assessed; iv) Coursework submitted after the end of the second week of third term will not be marked and
the assessment will be incomplete.
GRANTING OF EXTENSIONS: New UCL-wide regulations with regard to the granting of extensions for
coursework have been introduced with effect from the 2015-16 session. Full details will be circulated to all students
and will be made available on the IoA intranet. Note that Course Coordinators are no longer permitted to grant
extensions. All requests for extensions must be submitted on a new UCL form, together with supporting documentation,
via Judy Medrington’s office and will then be referred on for consideration. Please be aware that the grounds that are
now acceptable are limited. Those with long-term difficulties should contact UCL Student Disability Services to make
special arrangements.
TURNITIN: Date-stamping is via Turnitin, so in addition to submitting hard copy, you must also submit your work
to Turnitin by midnight on the deadline day. If you have questions or problems with Turnitin, contact ioaturnitin@ucl.ac.uk.
RETURN OF COURSEWORK AND RESUBMISSION: You should receive your marked coursework within four
calendar weeks of the submission deadline. If you do not receive your work within this period, or a written explanation
for the delay, notify the Academic Administrator. When your marked essay is returned to you, return it to the Course
Co-ordinator within two weeks. You must retain a copy of all coursework submitted.
WORD LENGTH: Essay word-lengths are normally expressed in terms of a recommended range. Not included in the
word count are the bibliography, appendices, tables, graphs, captions to figures, tables, graphs. You must indicate word
length (minus exclusions) on the cover sheet. Exceeding the maximum word-length expressed for the essay will be
penalized in accordance with UCL penalties for over-length work.
CITING OF SOURCES and AVOIDING PLAGIARISM: Coursework must be expressed in your own words, citing
the exact source (author, date and page number; website address if applicable) of any ideas, information, diagrams,
etc., that are taken from the work of others. This applies to all media (books, articles, websites, images, figures, etc.).
Any direct quotations from the work of others must be indicated as such by being placed between quotation
marks, and the original source indicated. Plagiarism is a very serious examination irregularity, which can carry heavy
penalties. It is your responsibility to abide by requirements for presentation, referencing and avoidance of plagiarism.
Make sure you understand definitions of plagiarism and the procedures and penalties as detailed in UCL regulations:
http://www.ucl.ac.uk/current-students/guidelines/plagiarism
RESOURCES
MOODLE: Please ensure you are signed up to the course on Moodle. For help with Moodle, please contact Nicola
Cockerton, Room 411a (nicola.cockerton@ucl.ac.uk).
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