Chapter 3
The Structure of Archaeological
Inquiry
Outline
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Levels of Theory
Paradigms
Paradigms in Archaeology
Is Postmodernism All That New?
Archaeology Today
The Structure of Archaeological Inquiry
Conclusion: Processualist or
Postprocessualist?
Theory
• An explanation for observed, empirical
phenomena.
• It is empirical and seeks to explain the
relationships between variables; it is an
answer to a “why” question.
Paradigm
• The overarching framework, often
unstated, for understanding a research
problem.
• It is a researcher’s “culture.”
Rockshelter
• A common type of archaeological site,
consisting of a rock overhang that is
deep enough to provide shelter but not
deep enough to be called a cave.
– ecofact
Plant or animal remains found in an
archaeological site.
Feature
• The nonportable evidence of
technology.
• Examples: fire hearths, architectural
elements, artifact clusters, garbage pits,
soil stains.
Gatecliff Shelter
• A prehistoric rockshelter in Nevada where
people camped over a 7000 year period.
• Buried in Gatecliff Shelter were:
– Artifacts: bone awls, baskets, grinding
stones, woven sagebrush bark mats, shells
and turquoise used as ornaments.
– Ecofacts: bighorn sheep bones, charcoal,
piñon nut hulls, and pollen.
– Features: pits, hearths, rodent burrows
Data at Gatecliff Shelter
• No data was found at Gatecliff shelter.
• Archaeologists do not excavate data,
they excavate objects.
• Data are observations made on those
objects.
Theories
• low-level theories - observations and
interpretations from hands-on field and lab
work.
• middle-level theory - hypothesis that links
archaeological observations with human
behavior or natural processes that produced
them.
• high-level theory - theory that seeks to
answer large “why” questions.
Experimental Archaeology
• Experiments to determine the archaeological
correlates of ancient behavior.
– ethnoarchaeology - The study of
contemporary peoples to determine how
human behavior is translated into the
archaeological record.
– taphonomy - The study of how organisms
become part of the fossil record.
Paradigms in Archaeology
• Processual paradigm
– Explains social, economic, and cultural
change as the result of adaptation to
material conditions.
• Postprocessual paradigm
– Focuses on humanistic approaches and
rejects scientific objectivity; more
concerned with interpreting the past than
testing hypotheses.
Cultural Materialism
• Views environmental, technological, and
economic factors as the most powerful and
pervasive determinants of human behavior.
• By exclusively embracing a scientific
framework to examine the effects of material
factors on human societies, cultural
materialists reject humanist, ideational
approaches and advocate the adaptive view
of culture.
Cultural Materialists
• Use three fundamental concepts in their
approach:
– Infrastructure
– Structure
– Superstructure
Infrastructure
• Food, shelter, reproduction, and health
• Mediates a culture’s interactions with the
natural and social environment through:
– Mode of production - technology,
practices, and social relations used in
basic subsistence production
– Mode of reproduction - technology,
practices, and social relations used to
expand, limit, and maintain population.
Structure
• Made up of interpersonal relationships that
emerge as behavior.
• Domestic economy - organization of
reproduction and production, exchange, and
consumption within domestic settings.
• Political economy - organization of
reproduction, production, exchange, and
consumption within and between bands,
villages, chiefdoms, states, and empires.
Superstructure
• Refers to a society’s values, aesthetics,
rules, beliefs, religions, and symbols,
which can be behaviorally manifested
as art,music, dance, literature,
advertising, religious rituals, sports,
games, hobbies, and even science.
Principle of Infrastructural
Determinism
1. Human society strives to meet the
needs most important to the survival
and well-being of human individuals
(sex, sleep, nutrition, and shelter).
2. The infrastructure determines the rest
of the sociocultural system.
How the Cultural Materialist Views
Causality
Contrasts: Processual and
Postprocessual Archaeology
Processual
Archaeology
Emphasizes evolutionary
generalizations, and
regularities, downplays the
importance of the
individual.
Views culture from a
systemic perspective and
defines culture as
adaptation.
Postprocessual
Archaeology
Rejects the search for
universal laws
and regularities.
Rejects the systemic view
of culture.
Contrasts: Processual and
Postprocessual Archaeology
Processual
Archaeology
Postprocessual
Archaeology
Explanation is explicitly
scientific and objective.
Rejects scientific methods
and objectivity.
Argues that all archaeology
Attempts to remain
is unavoidably political.
ethically neutral; claims to
be explicitly nonpolitical.
Enlightenment
• A shift in Western philosophy that advocated
absolute truth, science, rational planning of
ideal social orders, and standardization of
knowledge.
– Science and technology would free people
from the oppression myth, religion, and
superstition.
– Control of nature through technology would
permit the development of moral and
spiritual virtues.
Postmodernism
• Argues that there really is no truth and
no coherence except that all
understanding and meaning is
“historically situated.”
• Our understanding of the world is not
really truth, but rather only a product of
the time in which we live.
A Model of Archaeological
Inquiry
Quick Quiz
1. A _____ is the overarching framework
for understanding a research problem.
Answer: paradigm
• A paradigm is the overarching
framework for understanding a research
problem.
2. Low-level theories seek to answer large
“why” questions.
A. True
B. False
Answer: B. False
• Low-level theories are observations and
interpretations from hands-on field and lab
work, high-level theories seek to answer
large “why” questions.
3. This paradigm explains social,
economic, and cultural change as the
result of adaptation to material
conditions.
A. Processual paradigm
B. Postprocessual paradigm
C. Cultural materialism
D. Postmodernism
E. None of the above.
Answer: A
•
The processual paradigm explains
social, economic, and cultural change
as the result of adaptation to material
conditions.
4. Cultural materialism
A. Argues that there is no truth and that all
meaning is “historically situated.”
B. Views environmental, technological, and
economic factors as the most powerful
determinants of human behavior.
C. Believes science and technology will
free people from oppression.
D. None of the above.
Answer: B
• Cultural materialism views environmental,
technological, and economic factors as
the most powerful determinants of human
behavior.