Greetings all,
It strikes me that wringing our hands over the fact that the same white
bodied, vitreous earthenware plate (or glass coke bottle) can mean
different things to different people is a bit misguided. I also
think that this thread is a symptom of an old problem. Those archies
studying cognitive or semiotic issues, such as the material expression of
ethnicity, would not attempt to explain the meaning of an assemblage of
artifacts without additional data indicating who the stuff belonged to.
When undergoing this type of humanistic narration of their interpretation,
they need to rely on detailed culture-historical contexts and when
possible, records of an individualistic nature. For example, many will
remember the Archaeologists as Storytellers session at the recent SHAs.
The lab coat science types will try to reconstruct patterns of ethnic
expression that can be examined against unknown data, or assemblages in
the absence of culture-historical contexts or site-specific records. Some
great work has been done on the faunal remains from ethnic sites in the
West, for example. But even these patterns must be built from sites that
are knowns- we understand something of the ethnic, gender, class, etc.
status of the individual or persons of the site. Take Millers CC index as
another example. Detailed reconstruction of expectations from documentary
sources, followed by tests of said reconstructed expectations on known
archaeological materials, can lead us to a very useful tool for examining
and understanding patterns we see in the artifacts.
As most of us know, these patterns (whether created or revealed), are not
simple formulaic tools that we can churn data through to produce
boiler-plate explanations of gender, class, or ethnicity. There are may
examples of this, but my current favorite is Alison Brooks' new
dissertation that demonstrates how assemblages of artifacts from initial
settlements in Western boom towns do not reflect socio-economic position
or ethnic identity, but rather anticipated length of occupation. In
short, Brooks argues that if someone was expecting to move in, stake some
rich claims, sell them to a mining company, and move on to the next boom,
they set up very humble dug-out or tent structures and carried very meager
material trappings. Those who planned to set up shop and stay built a
more permanent material world. A formulaic analysis would result in a
whole poor-prospector class of settlers. This would not be an accurate
image of the mixture of lower, middle, and upper class individuals that
participated in this pattern of settlement.
So we are left with a similar exclamation once issued by that poorly
conceived talking Barbie doll, "reconstructing ethnicity is hard!" One
could substitute :understanding expressions of class," or "identifying the
material expression of a child's thoughts," or "realizing the ideology of
gender" for ethnicity in that thought. This does not mean that we can
not, or should not, do studies that attempt to surmount these problems.
I think that we could get over our collective psychosis if we would accept
that historical archaeology entails the use of primary, secondary, and
tertiary historical documents, folklore, oral history, ethnography, etc.
as an integral part of every analysis. We use the historical and social
sciences as much as the natural and geological sciences in our studies.
Even if these ideas are simply part of the intellectual background to our
work, every study we do is immersed in the documentary and ethnographic
record from which we derive our expectations and assumptions.
I believe that we should embrace this. It is this interplay that gives
our field its power and beauty. The fact that we can all see the value in
the work of Miller and his friends building the CC index and the
ever-growing Deetzian cognitive crew and their works (like Yentsch's
Chesapeake Family and their Slaves, or Ferguson's Uncommon Ground). Yet
we all also know that a site with a bead from one test pit in a phase one
survey should not make a report scream "African-Americanism!!!" In
addition, we all understand that one can not just crank though some
formula for pipe stem bores and decide the mean date for a site. We all
understand, I hope, that the best archaeology uses both these techniques
in a critical 'matrix' that will keep us from abusing either type of
technique.
When you get down to the nitty-gritty, it does not matter if
we are trying to use 'stuff' to get to ideas of gender, class, age,
ethnicity, or anything else- the basic problems are the same. We must
accept that we are in a unique position to examine, illustrate, and
explain the world. We must get over our fear of miss-interpretation that
pushes us to imagine an archaeology that is a true science. We must also
let go of the reactionary idea that hypothesis testing is a worthless
pursuit in archaeology. I am not a believer in a grand synthesis of
theory, but I do believe that we can demand _good and proper_ use of each
type of analysis. That I can stand and exist at the center of this
methodological and theoretical paradox is what makes this field so sexy
and exciting for me.
My two cents,
Tim Scarlett
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PhD student
teaching assistant
Department of Anthropology
University of Nevada, Reno
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"Don't complain to my professors, I don't tell them what I am going to do"
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