Journal of Social Archaeology recent issues

A phenomenology of landscape: A crisis in British landscape archaeology?

Barrett, J. C., Ko, I. — 2009-09-23

Recent criticism of the accuracy of the claimed observations on monument location by workers employing a ‘phenomenological’ approach to landscape archaeology in Britain has exposed failures in the way their particular approach has been employed to explain the choices made in the siting of certain Neolithic monuments. This article explains why such errors of record may have occurred and re-examines the ways in which the phenomenology of Martin Heidegger can offer a more positive contribution to our understanding of the historical context of the creation of these monuments.

Memories of a world crisis: The archaeology of a former Soviet nuclear missile site in Cuba

2009-09-23

Santa Cruz de los Pinos is a small town like most others in the Cuban countryside. But half a century ago it was the epicenter of the 1962 Missile Crisis. During that time it served as a Soviet base for middle-range nuclear missiles, and the US air reconnaissance photos of it were spread through media all around the world. The crisis was solved through negotiations without Cuban involvement, and as a result of this neglect the Missile Crisis has been an under-communicated part of history in Cuba. A Swedish—Cuban research project has now investigated what kinds of memories of the crisis remain today at the former missile base — in the ground as well as in people’s minds. Digging in the ground has proved to be an effective way to start a remembering process and to help disarm a politically loaded history and uncover stories other than those dominating ‘big history’.

Social identity, material culture, and the archaeology of religion: Quaker practices in context

Chenoweth, J. M. — 2009-09-23

This article considers how social identity groups come to be associated with certain material signs or traits. It is argued that this is a complex and continuing process, but not one which is untraceable or random, and so we can still use these signs to aid our understanding of social identity. Using the archaeological study of religious identity seen through Quakerism as a starting point, this article considers the nature of social identity and how it can be accessed archaeologically. Past Quaker archaeology is briefly outlined, and the apparently contradictory conclusions in this body of work are contextualized. While historians and Quakers themselves felt there to be a strong community, archaeologists have observed disparate material practices. A consideration of the social context of Quakerism and its ‘rules’ will help clarify these contradictions and also suggest a clearer understanding of how the material culture of a social group can allow us access to ephemeral social identities. Even through a changeable window of material traits, we can find coherence and unity in a social group by considering that material culture variability in a matrix of in- and out-group material and social relations, contextualizing what kind of difference each relation marks.

Ahead of its time?: The remarkable Early Classic Maya economy of Chunchucmil

Dahlin, B. H. — 2009-09-23

Classic Maya sites in the lowlands of the Yucatan Peninsula are generally known for their monumental art and architecture in central sacrosanct spaces, and their political economies are believed to have been highly centralized. The predominantly Early Classic site of Chunchucmil, however, does not fit this stereotype. Moreover, even though its urban population ranks among the largest and most densely packed in any Maya site, it inhabits one of the most depauperate agricultural landscapes. These idiosyncrasies have stimulated a great deal of archaeological research, all of which lead to the conclusion that Chunchucmil had a surprisingly commercialized economy. In addition to importing basic necessities, some of which were exchanged in a large central marketplace, its basic economy was built on servicing merchants along the most active Mesoamerican maritime trade route and funneling long distance trade items to sites in the interior of the peninsula. This article summarizes the data leading to the conclusion that Chunchucmil’s economic complexity rivaled that of the secondary states of the Postclassic Period and therefore was way ahead of its time. It also questions whether the kind of bottom-up approach applied here might reveal more complex economies at other Classic Maya sites than the more ardent advocates of the prevailing, monolithic ‘political economy’ paradigm have thus far been able to concede. In which case, it was perhaps only slightly ahead of its time.

Hadrian's Wall: Embodied archaeologies of the linear monument

Nesbitt, C., Tolia-Kelly, D. — 2009-09-23

The aim of this article is to consider the value of an embodied account of Hadrian’s Wall. This heritage site has often been understood in predominantly imperial and military terms. While this is a crucial aspect of the historical meanings of the monument, there has been little focus on factors such as changing social role, socialities produced through its presence, and perceptions of the Wall evident in historical accounts. Drawing on theoretical approaches in archaeology, geography and anthropology, this article investigates the potential for enriching archaeological knowledge through these approaches. We focus on accounts of some early visitors to the Wall to consider movement on, and encounter with, the Wall through an embodied account. This account seeks to enrich our archaeological history by being attentive to the power of the material landscape on the senses of being and feeling of those that encounter it. The experience of the Wall is made intelligible through a body-centred account.

Towards a social archaeology of the late medieval English peasantry: Power and resistance at Wharram Percy

Smith, S. V. — 2009-09-23

This article sets out to develop an approach to the archaeology of the late medieval peasantry that allows questions pertaining to the experience of power and resistance to be addressed by practitioners in this field. It is identified at the outset that the aims of the majority of late medieval rural archaeology studies are those to do with long-term issues of settlement development and determinations of the chronology and function of material culture types. This article puts an alternative interpretive emphasis on the material culture of the period and — focusing on the most comprehensively investigated medieval village in England — comes to conclusions about the experience and tempo of the deployment of social power in the village as well as the nature of resistant practices that occurred therein.

Death and everyday life: The Argaric societies from Southeast Iberia

Aranda, G., Monton-Subias, S., Sanchez-Romero, M., Alarcon, E. — 2009-05-15

This essay highlights the relationships between the realm of the symbolic world expressed in the funerary sphere and the realm of the maintenance activities of quotidian life, focusing on the Argaric culture of Southeast Iberia (c. 2250—1450 cal BC). The article begins by summarizing engendered mortuary archaeology in relation to maintenance activities and by briefly reviewing the funerary record of the Argaric societies. We then expand on the Argar culture, presenting in more depth two different types of archaeological evidence: grave goods deposited in tombs and paleoanthropological analyses conducted on Argaric skeletons. In the first case, we evaluate the relationship of grave goods to material culture integrated in practices related to the management of everyday domestic life, discussing the socio-symbolical significance that the exclusive association between awls and women may have had. In the second case, we report on those skeletal studies that allow us to infer information about sex differentiated tasks. To conclude, we bring these two different bodies of evidence into a focused dialogue in order to reach a better understanding about the relationship between the social perception and construction of Argaric women's identity and the practices that they may have carried out on a quotidian basis.

Diplomacy and desired pasts

Scham, S. — 2009-05-15

The following article addresses the question of how desired pasts function in cultural diplomatic relations, why they constitute a largely unacknowledged barrier in achieving cultural understanding and why they persist in both scholarly literature and in the popular imagination. Four desired pasts are considered in this context as represented by the institutions that sustain them. The Israeli desired past is represented primarily by the Israeli Government and, secondarily, by Jewish organizations in the United States. The Conservative Christian desired past is supported primarily by Christian fundamentalist organizations and, in part, by the American Schools of Oriental Research and the Biblical Archaeology Society. The Palestinian desired past is promoted by Palestinian rights organizations but, to some extent, is supported by Palestinian archaeologists and intellectuals. Finally, the `diplomatic' desired past is represented by appointed officials of the US Department of State. The analysis includes an examination of relevant materials issued by the organizations supporting each of these desired pasts including speeches, interviews, publications and websites.

Beyond chiefs and networks: Corporate strategies in Bronze Age Scandinavia

Skoglund, P. — 2009-05-15

This article discusses ship symbolism in Scandinavia during the Bronze Age, 1700—500 BC. It is argued that the ship symbol in south Scandinavia can be primarily related to a mythology guarded by individuals, while the ship symbol in the areas to the north had a more public character, being part of rituals involving many people. The argument is strengthened by a discussion of differences in the rock-carving practice in southern and northern Bohuslän and of ship settings in three different regions. It is argued that the identified differences in the use of the ship symbol are the result of different social strategies, namely a network strategy dominating in the south and a corporate strategy dominating in the areas to the north. By focusing on actions and local contexts, a view of the Bronze Age emerges that differs from recent studies, which instead have underlined the similarities between Scandinavia and central and south Europe in the Bronze Age.

Chaco reloaded: Discursive social memory on the post-Chacoan landscape

Van Dyke, R. M. — 2009-05-15

Archaeologists have recently begun to address the ways in which past peoples revived, referenced, utilized, and amended their own, more distant pasts for diverse social and political ends. Social memory refers to shared ideas about the past. Monumental architecture entails the discursive construction of memory. Memory can be grounded in direct connections to immediate ancestors, or it can involve tenuous links to remote antiquity. In the terrain between, ideas about the past are both replicated and distorted. The concepts of citation and translation help clarify these processes. In the Southwest USA, architects in diverse temporal and social contexts invoked the memory of the prominent ritual center Chaco Canyon. At the twelfth-century site of Aztec, builders cited Chacoan architecture to legitimate ritual and political organization. In the thirteenth century in the Four Corners region, builders translated Chacoan ideas into McElmo-style towers to stabilize and transform a world in chaos.

The Uber Archaeologist: Art, GIS and the male gaze revisited

Wickstead, H. — 2009-05-15

This article emerges from collaboration with visual artist Janet Hodgson on excavations around Stonehenge. Experiencing Hodgson at work led me to re-examine how archaeologists think about visuality, particularly in criticism of the male gaze. Ideas of the gaze have significantly influenced the directions taken in studies of landscape and Geographical Information Systems (GIS) over the last 15 years. In this article I expand on and develop theoretical debate surrounding the gaze, using Hodgson's practice to illustrate my argument. I argue for a renewed critique of the politics of vision and cartographic method that assimilates recent theoretical developments. I review accounts of the gaze, and discuss recent theories of knowledge as applied to mapping and GIS. I suggest that new theories have the potential to move the gaze critique towards further exploration of the contextual complexities of visualities. I use Hodgson's artistic projects at Stonehenge to illustrate this complexity.

The emergence of cultural heritage in Jordan: The itinerary of a colonial invention

Maffi, I. — 2009-01-23

Although at the end of the nineteenth century the Ottoman sultan began a policy aimed at building a national archaeological heritage, the Arab provinces of the Empire were excluded from this process. It was only after the First World War that the governments of the new colonial states of the area started to elaborate a coherent policy aiming at creating institutions for the protection of cultural heritage. Excavations were started and the first archaeological museums were created by European archaeologists. Yet, the enterprise was mainly a colonizer's affair and the very process of creating a cultural heritage was a way of imposing the European domination on the indigenous population. In this article, I analyse some aspects of the history of archaeological practice in Jordan and its political implications during and after the colonial period. This allows me to show how the emergence of cultural heritage has transformed archaeology into a political instrument at the disposal of the postcolonial state. In particular, I focus on biblical archaeology and Christian religious tourism, and their political meanings.

The role of the individual agent in Acheulean biface variability: A multi-factorial model

Machin, A. — 2009-01-23

The Lower Palaeolithic, epitomized by the Acheulean biface technology, is characterized by a degree of temporal and geographical stasis that is unparalleled in the lithic record. The reasons for this phenomenon have provoked considerable debate. However, whilst it is important to understand the overall stability of this techno complex, it is also important to address the considerable degree of variability evident at the level of individual locales. Why, for instance, do bifaces show a range of shapes and degrees of refinement? Why do some show high degrees of symmetry whilst others do not? Whilst it is widely acknowledged that such variability is the result of a number of factors, to date proposed theories tend to stress one factor as being of paramount importance. These have encompassed, amongst others, the influence of raw material, subsistence function, cognitive ability and the social context of manufacture upon biface form. This article, informed by recent empirical, experimental and theoretical work, attempts to move away from these largely single-factor models to present a multi-factorial model for biface variability. This model envisages that variability is caused by the differing motivations and constraints — ecological, physiological, biological, cognitive and social — which act upon the individual agent at any given point in time.

Entanglement and tinkering: Structural history in the archaeology of the Northern Tsimshian

Martindale, A. — 2009-01-23

The concept of `entanglement' in contact encounters emphasizes the power and agency of individuals, particularly Indigenous leaders, to confront colonial and capitalist hegemonic forces. Consequently, entanglement presents a necessary comparison of scale, a link between the situated actions of individuals and the broader patterns of history. While the former is theoretically complex, the latter is often contrasted as a static and stagnant essentialization. Naïvely invoked, long-term structured history simply replaces normative `culture' as a backdrop for individual agency with `identity', a modern-sounding recreation of a simplified model of history. That historical trends can cross generations is clear, but their source is likely to include the non-discursive aesthetics in the structure of agency-structure models. Rather than static, such capacities are inertial, changing only with the substantial consensus of many individuals. Northern Tsimshian post-contact archaeology has evidence of both strategic action and aesthetic shifts, presenting a model of structural history that includes evidence of entanglement at many scales, including in the most tenacious aspects of identity. These data suggest that there is a significant role for archaeology in unravelling the complex, and at times contradictory, historical frameworks found in contact scenarios.

The political agency of cityscapes: Spatializing governance in Ceausescu's Bucharest

O'Neill, B. — 2009-01-23

How does spatial organization contribute to the governance of a population? This article explores how the construction of monumental streetscapes turns city spaces into technologies of political control. It is the central claim that monumental spaces are not just static representations of particular ideologies; rather, the production of monumental spaces contributes to the project of autocratic governance. It is an argument rooted in the claim that governance and spatiality exist dialectically, structuring and reinforcing one another. The discussion is centered on the case of Nicolae Ceausescu and his construction of the Victory of Socialism Civic Center over historic Bucharest, Romania. Linking the construction of the Civic Center's space to Ceausescu's practice of governance demonstrates that the organization of space structures bureaucracy, people and thought.

The presence of the dead: Cemeteries, cremation and the staging of non-place

Sorensen, T. F. — 2009-01-23

In academic literature, death and the dead are often treated conceptually and with little regard for the aesthetic and tactile experience of the materiality of the corpse. In this way the agency of the dead body is ignored, and the reciprocity between the deceased and the bereaved remains obscured. In effect, the corpse assumes the role of a neutral object, which blurs the particular potency of the dead body's materiality. This article proposes an alternative to this inadequacy, and discusses the changes in cemetery culture in rural Denmark within the past 50 years, addressing identity, emotions and attitudes to the materiality of the dead body. It is argued that an immaterial and subjectified recollection of the dead has, in part, replaced the previous externalized and collective commemoration due to an altered recognition of the corpse's materiality. In this way the adoption of urn burials, unmarked communal graves and lawn cemetery sections may be seen as ways of creating paradoxical yet tangible non-places, where the forging of identities and meanings of dead individuals are relieved of their material presence and proximity.

Valuing the past: Perceptions of archaeological practice in Lydia and the Levant

Kersel, M. M., Luke, C., Roosevelt, C. H. — 2008-09-05

In both western Turkey and the Levant, archaeology has a long history, with the rise in interest and discovery beginning in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. While many have focused on the history of excavations in both of these areas, we approach historical analyses from a different perspective. Utilizing the voices of local actors, this article aims to understand the social reactions of local communities to the increasingly prominent role of people practicing archaeology — archaeologists, diplomats, explorers — through the lens of the antiquities trade over the last two centuries. Interlacing examples from Lydia and the Levant, we provide an overview of archaeological praxis and then offer the positions of the participants, gathered from archival and published materials as well as more recent interviews, conversations, and correspondences.

Identity and violent death: Contextualizing lethal gun violence within the African American community of Dallas, TX (1900--1907)

Davidson, J. M. — 2008-09-05

During the Freedman's Cemetery Project of the 1990s, evidence of lethal gun violence was recovered archaeologically from several early twentieth century burials. Although lying in unmarked graves, those who died violently still have the chance of being identified through the very bullets that robbed them of their lives. Forensic identification of the bullets and other archaeological criteria are compared to descriptions of gunshot victims in newspaper accounts and other archival records, and individual as well as group identity is examined in the process. These moments of violence also provide a unique window into exploring the extent and underlying causes of violence perpetrated within and against the African American community of Dallas, Texas, in the first decade of the twentieth century,

Metanarratives and the (re)invention of the Neolithic: A case study in rock-art from Birappa Rock Shelter and Hiregudda Hill, South-Central India

Robinson, D. W., Korisettar, R., Koshy, J. — 2008-09-05

Rock-art reflects cultural narratives and is influential as a medium in the invention of narratives. Images found in South-Central Indian rock-art are particularly useful in considering archaeological transitions. Rock-art here shows a chronology spanning the Mesolithic, Neolithic, Megalithic, Historic, and Modern times. Imagery reflects changing human/animal relationships, from `agile' hunted animals to cattle and its domestication, with rock-art an active medium in the creation of new metanarratives focused obsessively upon bulls. While bulls in the singular appear early, later compositional elements imply a growing concern with ideas of herds as interconnecting communities. Through time, panels were focal points for the addition of subsequent anthropomorphic imagery, further reinventing the Neolithic. A Historic period efflorescence of densely applied rock-art perhaps reflects an appropriation of a locality redolent with the past as new mythologies were invented in the ancestral association with the now millennia-old Neolithic rock-art.

Negotiating the archaeology of destiny: An exploration of interpretive possibilities through Tallensi Shrines

Insoll, T. — 2008-09-05

The concept of `destiny' is perhaps irrelevant to much of modern thinking in Western Europe and North America and hence fails to enter archaeological vocabulary. This is potentially an omission of consequence, for social psychology indicates that the belief that life is beyond the control of human agency can be a powerful one. Drawing upon ethnographic and archaeological data from the Tallensi of Northern Ghana, the potential resonance of `destiny' in archaeological interpretation is explored with reference to some examples of deposition from later British prehistory.

`Poor people in silk shirts': Dress and ethnogenesis in Spanish-colonial San Francisco

Voss, B. L. — 2008-09-05

At El Presidio de San Francisco, Spain's northernmost outpost in the Americas, military settlers refashioned their social identities by refusing the racializing sistema de castas and asserting a shared colonial identity as Californios. Dress was a central practice involved in this case of colonial ethnogenesis. Many studies of identity transformation in the Spanish Americas have treated dress as an individualistic medium for personal expression and social mobility. However, the artifacts and archives of El Presidio de San Francisco point instead towards the central role of colonial institutions in `fashioning' colonial subjects. While government-issue clothing functioned as a social leveler among the new Californios, dress also set firm constraints on the metamorphosis of social bodies. The findings of this study raise questions about the limits of ethnogenesis, both as a strategy used by historic subjects and as a theoretical model of identity transformation.