Contemporary Archaeology in Theory : A Reader

by Editor: Robert W. Preucel (Univ. of Pennsylvania); Editor: Ian Hodder (Univ. of Cambridge)

• ISBN13: 9780631195610
• ISBN10: 0631195610
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 1996-12-01
• Publisher: Wiley-Blackwell

Summary

This Reader presents an easily accessible collection of seminal articles in contemporary Anglo-American archaeological theory for use in introductory undergraduate classes as well as graduate level seminars. It focuses upon the period from 1980 to the present, emphasizing the far-reaching effects of recent internal and external critiques of processual archaeology. The central purpose of the reader is to assist students in thinking about the inter-relationships between theory and practice for different theoretical approaches. An extensive introductory chapter provides a clear account of the main lines of theoretical development within archaeology indicating current areas of debate and controversy. The book is then divided into seven sections each of which is prefaced by an introduction evaluating the nature of the selective contributions in the light of the history of the field. These sections are as follows: cultural ecology; political economy; evolutionary theory; symbolic and structuralist approaches; critical theory; engendering approaches; and archaeology and politics. The book contains 26 substantial readings divided equally between the sections and each prefaced by a headnote. The book concludes with recommendations for further reading and an index. It will be a vital resource for students and teachers of archaeology throughout the world.

Author Biography

Robert W. Preucel is Associate Professor of Anthropology and Associate Curator of North American Archaeology at the University of Pennsylvania. He has taught previously at Southern Illinois University and Harvard University and has been a Visiting Professor at the University of Cambridge. His publications include Seasonal Circulation and Dual Residence in the Pueblo Southwest (1990) and, as editor, Processual and Postprocessual Archaeologies (1991).

Ian Hodder is Reader at the Department of Archaeology, University of Cambridge. He has been a Visiting Professor at the Universities of Amsterdam, Sorbonne, Stanford Center for Advanced Studies in the Behavioural Sciences, Minnesota, SUNY (Binghamton) and the University of California, Berkeley. His publications include Symbols in Action (1982), The Present Past (1982), Reading the Past (1986), The Domestication of Europe (1990) and Theory and Practice in Archaeology (1992).

Table of Contents

List of Contributors	ix
Preface	xi
Acknowledgments	xiii
PART I PROLOGUE	1	(20)
Communicating Present Pasts	3	(18)
PART II ECOLOGICAL RELATIONS	21	(76)
Nature and Culture	23	(16)
Willow Smoke and Dogs' Tails: Hunter-Gatherer Settlement Systems and Archaeological Site Formation	39	(22)
Lewis R. Binford
Understanding Changing People/Plant Relationships in the Prehispanic Andes	61	(18)
Christine A. Hastorf
Sissel Johannessen
Ecological Interpretations of Palaeolithic Art	79	(18)
Steven J. Mithen
PART III POLITICAL ECONOMY	97	(106)
The Production of Value	99	(15)
Peer Polity Interaction and Socio-political Change	114	(29)
Colin Renfrew
The Ancient Economy, Transferable Technologies and the Bronze Age World-system: A View from the Northeastern Frontier of the Ancient Near East	143	(22)
Phillip L. Kohl
Specialization and the Production of Wealth: Hawaiian Chiefdoms and the Inka Empire	165	(24)
Timothy K. Earle
Beneath the Material Surface of Things: Commodities, Artifacts, and Slave Plantations	189	(14)
Charles E. Orser, Jr.
PART IV SOCIAL AND CULTURAL EVOLUTION	203	(94)
Process, Structure and History	205	(15)
Explaining the Upper Palaeolithic Revolution	220	(20)
Antonio Gilman
Braudel and North American Archaeology: An Example from the Northern Plains	240	(18)
Philip Duke
The Power of Prestige: Competitive Generosity and the Emergence of Rank Societies in Lowland Mesoamerica	258	(24)
John E. Clark
Michael Blake
Cultural Transmission and Cultural Change	282	(15)
Stephen Shennan
PART V MEANING AND PRACTICE	297	(116)
Material Symbols	299	(16)
The Symbolic Divisions of Pottery: Sex-related Attributes of English and Anglo-American Household Pots	315	(35)
Anne Yentsch
Cognitive Archaeology	350	(14)
Kent V. Flannery
Joyce Marcus
Style and the Design of a Perfume Jar from an Archaic Greek City State	364	(30)
Michael Shanks
The Living, the Dead and the Ancestors: Neolithic and Early Bronze Age Mortuary Practices	394	(19)
John C. Barrett
PART VI FEMINIST AND GENDER ARCHAEOLOGIES	413	(104)
Understanding Sex and Gender	415	(16)
The Interplay of Evidential Constraints and Political Interests: Recent Archaeological Research on Gender	431	(29)
Alison Wylie
Gender, Space, and Food in Prehistory	460	(25)
Christine A. Hastorf
What This Awl Means: Toward a Feminist Archaeology	485	(16)
Janet D. Spector
Dorothy Hughes Popenoe: Eve in an Archaeological Garden	501	(16)
Rosemary A. Joyce
PART VII THE PAST AS POWER	517	(82)
Representations and Antirepresentations	519	(12)
Public Presentations and Private Concerns: Archaeology in the Pages of National Geographic	531	(18)
Joan Gero
Dolores Root
The Past as Propaganda: Totalitarian Archaeology in Nazi Germany	549	(21)
Bettina Arnold
Archaeological Annapolis: A Guide to Seeing and Understanding Three Centuries of Change	570	(29)
Mark P. Leone
Parker B. Potter, Jr.
PART VIII RESPONSES OF ``THE OTHER''	599	(66)
Constructing Identities	601	(14)
Alternative Archaeologies: Nationalist, Colonialist, Imperialist	615	(17)
Bruce G. Trigger
History and Prehistory in Bolivia: What About the Indians?	632	(14)
Carlos Mamani Condori
Inuit Perceptions of the Past	646	(6)
Jack Anawak
Bone Courts: the Rights and Narrative Representation of Tribal Bones	652	(13)
Gerald Vizenor
PART IX DIALOGUE	665
Theoretical Archaeological Discourse	667