The Arch-theory discussion group has just come out of (?) a lengthy
bout of discourse on the "schisms" in archaeology, and now here's
HISTARCH with academics lining up on one side of the room and CRM'ers
on the other, historical and prehistoricals battling it out. You'd
think we weren't all trained in the processes of "ethnicity," power
relations, politics, history, and social organization!
There IS a substantial difference in doing archaeology on sites with
considerable documentation versus those without. These is also a big
difference between sites with and without pottery, with and without
cave art, with and without ornate cast bronze drums, with and without
pyramids, etc. The historic/prehistoric rift is a New World one, and
it has very much to do with the histories of the fields. The
CRM-academic split is more universal (the Brits and Aussies are
apparently battling that one, too). As long as *some* university-based
researchers don't do CRM, they'll never understand the "real world"
problems most archaeologists face. And as long as *some* corporate and
agency-based archaeologists refrain from publishing in (I'm tempted
to say *reading*) professional journals, attending scholarly
conferences, etc., they won't have the foggiest notion why they're
excavating, and their work won't be helping to further the
interpretation of the past.
If we were to take a poll, however, I'll wager we'd find that a very
large percentage of archaeologists have worked on prehistoric and
historic sites (perhaps with differing levels of comptetence), and
they both dig for dollars *and* teach, interpret, or publish in the
realm of academe.
Dan Mouer
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