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9780745622699

Archaeological Theory Today

by
  • ISBN13:

    9780745622699

  • ISBN10:

    0745622690

  • Format: Paperback
  • Copyright: 2001-05-01
  • Publisher: Polity Pr
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List Price: $34.95

Summary

This volume provides an authoritative account of the current status of archaeological theory, as presented by some of its major exponents and innovators over the last decade. It summarizes recent developments and looks to the future, exploring some of the cutting-edge ideas at the forefront of the discipline. While few practitioners in theoretical archaeology would still argue for a unified disciplinary approach, few volumes have explored the full range of emerging perspectives. This volume, however, captures the diversity of contemporary archaeological theory. Some authors argue for an approach close to the natural sciences, others for an engagement with cultural debate about representation of the past. Some minimize the relevance of culture to societal change, while others see it as central; some focus on the contingent and the local, others on long-term evolution. The volume also reflects archaeology's new openness to external influences, as well as the desire to contribute to wider debates. The contributors examine ways in which archaeological evidence contributes to theories of evolutionary psychology, as well as to the social sciences in general, where theories of social relationships, agency, landscape and identity are informed by the long-term perspective of archaeology. Archaeological Theory Today will be essential reading for students and scholars in archaeology and in the social sciences more generally.

Author Biography

Ian Hodder is Professor of Anthropology in the Department of Cultural and Social Anthropology at Stanford University

Table of Contents

List of Figures and Tables
vii
List of Contributors
ix
Introduction: A Review of Contemporary Theoretical Debates in Archaeology
1(13)
Ian Hodder
Behavioral Archaeology: Toward a New Synthesis
14(51)
Vincent M. LaMotta
Michael B. Schiffer
Evolutionary Archaeology
65(33)
Robert D. Leonard
Archaeological Theory and Theories of Cognitive Evolution
98(24)
Steven Mithen
Symbol before Concept: Material Engagement and the Early Development of Society
122(19)
Colin Renfrew
Agency, the Duality of Structure, and the Problem of the Archaeological Record
141(24)
John C. Barrett
Archaeologies of Place and Landscape
165(22)
Julian Thomas
Archaeologies of Identity
187(27)
Lynn Meskell
American Material Culture in Mind, Thought, and Deed
214(27)
Anne Yentsch
Mary C. Beaudry
Postcolonial Archaeology: Issues of Culture, Identity, and Knowledge
241(21)
Chris Gosden
Archaeological Representation: The Visual Conventions for Constructing Knowledge about the Past
262(22)
Stephanie Moser
Culture/Archaeology: The Dispersion of a Discipline and its Objects
284(22)
Michael Shanks
Index 306

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