Themes & Concepts in Archaeological Practice
This course introduces you to the major techniques, principal bodies of evidence,
research themes and concepts deployed in the discipline in order to develop a
critical understanding of how contemporary archaeologists think, draw and write
about archaeology. The module addresses the perceived divide between theory
and practice in archaeological fieldwork and cultural resource management. It
aims to produce a new kind of professional, who is theoretically aware whilst
grounded in the craft of archaeology. In so doing, the module will develop your
capacity for interdisciplinary and innovative research in the field, based on a
more critical and integrated study of landscape, architecture, and material culture.
Context, and an engagement with its material and historical conditions, is crucial
to this work-based training. London is key to the history of archaeology in Britain
and the syllabus explores that history from the effects of Second World War
bomb
damage
to
modern
developer-funded
archaeology.
Practice-based
teaching will focus on the archives of the Museum of London and the collections
held in The British Museum. The programme of study is linked directly to the
prehistoric past and will extend outwards from the city in order to compare and
contrast the detailed accounts of Thames Valley to East Anglian Fenland
archaeology. It is therefore well placed to examine differences in the kinds of
knowledge of prehistory produced in site-reports, the regional knowledge of
monographs, and the works of synthesis more popular in the academy. A crucial
subject is the value of archaeology in the world and the kinds of community that
participate in its practice.
Schedule of Classes:
History of Archaeology
Unravelling the Landscape
Tracing Architecture
Material Culture in Action
Archaeology and Context
Space and Time
Archives and Assemblages
Regional Knowledge
Scholarship and Synthesis
Value and Community
Key Resources:
The British Museum, Department of Prehistory and Europe
http://www.britishmuseum.org/the_museum/departments/prehistory_and_europe.a
spx
Cambridge Archaeological Unit
http://www-cau.arch.cam.ac.uk/
The London Archaeological Archive and Research Centre (LAARC)
http://www.museumoflondonarchaeology.org.uk/English/ArchiveResearch/
London before London Exhibition
http://www.museumoflondon.org.uk/archive/lbl/
London and Middlesex Archaeological Society
http://www.lamas.org.uk/
Oxford Archaeology
http://thehumanjourney.net/
Key Readings:
History of Archaeology
Diaz-Andreu, M. and Stig Sørensen, M.L. (eds.) (1998) Excavating Women: a History of
Women in European Archaeology. London: Routledge.
Daniel, G. and Chippindale, C. (eds.) (1989) The Pastmasters: Eleven Modern
Pioneers of Archaeology. London: Thames and Hudson.
Unravelling the Landscape
David, B. and Thomas, J. (eds.) (2008) Handbook of Landscape Archaeology
(World Archaeological Congress Research Handbooks). London: Left Coast Press.
Foster, S. and Smout, T.C. (1994) The History of Soils and Field Systems.
Edinburgh: Scottish Cultural Press.
Tracing Architecture
Forty, A. (2000) Words and Buildings. A Vocabulary of Modern Architecture.
London: Thames and Hudson.
Thomas, J. (1993) ‘The Politics of Vision and the Archaeologies of Landscape’ in B.
Bender (ed.), Landscape: Politics and Perspectives. Oxford: Berg, pp. 49-84.
Material Culture in Action
Brudenell, M. and A. Cooper. (2008) ‘Post-Middenism: Depositional Histories on
Later Bronze Age Settlements at Broom, Bedfordshire’, Oxford Journal of
Archaeology 27(1), pp. 15-36.
Hicks, D. and Beaudry, M.C. (eds.) (2010) The Oxford Handbook of Material
Culture Studies. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Archaeology and Context
Andrews, G., Barrett, J.C. and Lewis, J.S.C. (2000) ‘Interpretation not record: the
practice of archaeology’, Antiquity 74, pp. 525-30.
Lucas, G. (2000) Critical Approaches to Fieldwork: Contemporary and Historical
Archaeological Practice. London: Routledge.
Space and Time
Lucas, G. (2004) The Archaeology of Time. London: Routledge.
May, J. and Thrift, N. (eds.) (2001) Timespace: Geographies of Temporality (Critical
Geographies). London: Routledge.
Archives and Assemblages
Buchli, V.A. (ed.) (2002) The Material Culture Reader. Berg: Oxford.
Jones, A. (2002) Archaeological Theory and Scientific Practice. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press.
Regional Knowledge
Bradley, R. (2010) Solent Thames Research Framework Resource Assessment. The
Neolithic and Early Bronze Age. Oxford: Oxford Archaeology.
Brown, N. and Glazebrook, J. (2000) Research and Archaeology: a Framework for
the Eastern Counties 2. Research Agenda and Strategy. East Anglian Archaeology
Occasional Paper No.8.
Schofield, J. and Maloney, C. (eds.) (1998) Archaeology in the City of London,
1907-91 a Guide to Records of Excavations by the Museum of London . London:
Museum of London.
Scholarship and Synthesis
Bradley,
R.
(2007)
Prehistory of Britain and Ireland. Cambridge World
Archaeology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Pollard, J. (ed.) (2008) Prehistoric Britain. Studies in Global Archaeology. Oxford:
Blackwell.
Value and Community
Bauman, Z. (2000) Community: Seeking Safety in an Insecure World. Themes for
the 21st Century Series. Cambridge: Polity Press.
Layton, R.; Shennan, S. and Stone, P. (eds.) (2006) A Future for Archaeology: the
Past in the Present. London: University College London Press.