Interpretative archaeology.

Interpretative archaeology. It is sometimes said that post-processual theory is nothing if itis not critique, and many archaeologists would accept that in some areasthe post-processual critique of New and other kinds of archaeology hasbeen most effective. The post-processual agenda implied by this critiqueis a more complex matter, a longer-term, more experimental project - aquestion of choosing different subject-matter, taking particularideological or political stances, and establishing a fresh relationshipbetween archaeological material and what is written about it. The recentpublication of Interpretative archaeology and A phenomenology phenomenology,modern school of philosophy founded by Edmund Husserl. Its influence extended throughout Europe and was particularly important to the early development of existentialism. oflandscape [hereinafter IA and PL] allows us a chance to see how theseapproaches work out in practice. An important theme for post-processualism is the interpretation of`meaning' in past material culture, which focusses much moreattention on art, architecture and style than has been customary in mostareas of recent archaeological endeavour. However, there is a certaintension and confusion between getting at meanings 'out there',in the sense of `drawing conclusions' about the mental world ofpeople of the past, and developing an interpretative discussionadmirable for its philosophical and rhetorical agility but necessarily,unashamedly un��a��shamed?adj.Feeling or showing no remorse, shame, or embarrassment:una��sham , deliberately inconclusive. How far can the new approachesbreak the log-jam presented by the material? How far do theoreticiansdesire to have `found out' something new about the past, as well asfeeling good about the kind of things they write? Post-processualist approaches to the interpretation of`meaning' seem to fall along a continuum. At one end is thecognitive/structuralist approach, in the tradition of Leroi-Gourhan, orHodder at Catal Huyuk, represented in IA by the Thomas & Tilleypiece `The axe and the torso', which claims that the symbolicmeaning of prehistoric `art' can be read more or less directlyafter an analysis of pattern and position. In the middle are scholarssuch as Bradley (in his work on north British North British is an adjective used as an alternative to "Scottish" which emphasises Britishness -- see North Britain. It may refer to: North British Railway North British Locomotive Company North British Distillery petroglyphs, e.g. Bradley1994), or Kirk and Richards in IA, who also work with pattern andposition, but at a deeper and less precise level, more from theperspective of Giddens and Bourdieu, seeking recursive See recursion. recursive - recursion relationshipsbetween design in landscapes, buildings or monuments, and power andritual in the world of the social. At the other end of the continuum arethose who are interested in the constructed world as sensuouslyexperienced by the human body, but wish to go beyond the immediacy ofdesign to consider more profound spatial and temporal rhythms (e.g.Gosden 1994). According to according toprep.1. As stated or indicated by; on the authority of: according to historians.2. In keeping with: according to instructions.3. its editor, IA is intended to address the`failure' of post-processual archaeology to provide many clearlyworked-out examples tackling archaeological data. The same could be saidof much of PL, which is about experience and understanding of`landscape', with special reference to the British Neolithic. Ofthe two books, Phenomenology hangs together better than Interpretativearchaeology, and not simply because it has a single author and a unitarytheme. In PL's two introductory essays, Tilley expounds a theory oflandscape perception for that long period of relatively fluid and mobilehunting/gathering and early farming which apparently preceded the onsetof territory, territorial sub-division and more stable settlementpatterns. This is a very clear, eloquent advocacy of the terrain madefamiliar to some extent by Barrett's Fragments from Antiquity andIngold's The appropriation of nature, not to mention recenttreatments of aboriginal Australian concepts of landscape. Then the `places, paths and monuments' approach is applied tothe megalithic meg��a��lith?n.A very large stone used in various prehistoric architectures or monumental styles, notably in western Europe during the second millennium b.c. tombs of southeast and southwest Wales. The BlackMountains Black Mountains:see Appalachian Mountains; Mitchell, Mount. megaliths are shown to form a clear pattern, in terms of theirspacing behaviour as well as the landscape features to which theyrespond - rivers and prominent hills. Tilley's more selectivetreatment of the Pembrokeshire tombs emphasizes close relationships withrock outcrops and outstanding hill-tops, which - perhaps inevitably -are regarded as liminal liminal/lim��i��nal/ (lim��i-n'l) barely perceptible; pertaining to a threshold. lim��i��naladj.Relating to a threshold.liminalbarely perceptible; pertaining to a threshold. features. The outcrops are also sources of stonefor the tombs, however, and it might have been instructive to haveconsidered the landscape correlates - and stone sources - of thosePembrokeshire tombs which are in other kinds of location. Some of thesearguments cut both ways. Should one be cautious about postulating sacredmountains Sacred mountains are mountains sacred to certain religion. Almost all religions have some sacred mountains - either holy themselves (like Mount Olympus in Greek mythology) or related to famous events (like Mount Sinai in Judaism and descendant religions). in areas like southwest Wales where isolated hills, and thePreseli range itself, are so dominant on the skyline? Or does thetopography make such postulates almost inevitable? Neither thehypothesis-testing approach implied by the first question nor thedeterminism implied by the second will appeal to post-processualists.Yet it is fascinating to note that, of Tilley's two sacredNeolithic mountains, Carn Ingli was the `hill of angels',definitely a liminal place for the Irish saint Brynach. And on thewestern edge of the Black Mountains, Mynydd Troed - for Tilley the hillon which a group of long barrows was focussed, looking like a giant`natural' long barrow A long barrow is a prehistoric monument dating to the early Neolithic period. They are rectangular or trapezoidal earth mounds traditionally interpreted as collective tombs. itself - gave its name to Garth Matrun, the`hillspur of the Great Mother', the old name of the 5th-centurykingdom based on the zone around Llangors Lake (Thomas 1994: 57 145-6). Of the 10 essays in IA, two are essentially `approaches'papers and three are not concerned with the interpretation ofarchaeological data - conspicuously so in the case of the story told inchapter 9, in which a fictitious Welsh schoolboy, Richard Jones, sendsoff for a lot of British university archaeology prospectuses and ends upshredding them all in disgust. I was delighted that such a snooty littlehorror would not trouble the admissions tutors further. The recruitingliterature of British archaeology departments may well be good for alaugh, but - for whatever reason - university-based archaeology in thesecond part of the 20th century has been an undoubted success. What isneeded here is hardly the epatation of people whose claim to bebourgeois is debatable. Some university departments of archaeology haveactually done what they should do, providing the conditions in whichunconventional scholars can get on with their work and even eventuallyget `head-hunted'. Let us see some more incisive critiques of themanagerial doctrines which are damaging our subject and thearchaeological community in UK universities, and the uncritical andsometimes unethical way in which some of our colleagues are going alongwith them. The data-oriented papers in IA deal with art and architecture inthe Neolithic and Bronze Age Bronze Age,period in the development of technology when metals were first used regularly in the manufacture of tools and weapons. Pure copper and bronze, an alloy of copper and tin, were used indiscriminately at first; this early period is sometimes called the of northwest Europe, and it is here thatthe reader may have problems. Post-processualists clearly enjoy degreesof freedom in interpreting art and architecture which will notautomatically commend their work to readers who are hoping for a`result' in terms of our understanding of how it was in the past.It is not always clear how far the writers are claiming that they havemade progress, in these terms, and how far they are simply saying `thisis a new approach which you might like to think about'. This is aclassic problem for thinking archaeologists, but it is important, in theshuttle between hubris HubrisAn arrogance due to excessive pride and an insolence toward others. A classic character flaw of a trader or investor. and humility, to be clear about how the argumentintersects with the data. Assertion, though unavoidable at times. is nota substitute for argument; a sceptic might conclude that, in some ofthese writings, argument by assertion is too unproblematic, whileargument by one assertion after another is apparently called `rhizomicdiscourse' (IA: 20). When the interpretation of a megalithicstructure and the `art' on its walls seems straightforward, thesuggestion is that the `reading' is `controlled'. Thus, forinstance, `the provision of a passage may suggest that the monument wasto be primarily approached, encountered and interpreted from a singleprescribed direction' (IA: 213). But architectural complexity alsoimplies an attempt to ensure that the `correct' reading is made(IA: 92). At the same time, it is also claimed to contain the potentialfor multiple readings. In `the axe and the torso', the Thomas & Tilley account ofthe Breton megaliths, it is asserted that some of the carvings on Bretonmegaliths - and indeed the plan of Barnenez - represent the humanrib-cage, and that since we have 12 ribs, the argument is supported whenthe rib-like elements among the carvings number about 12. But Barnenezstarted out as a cairn cairn,pile of stones, usually conical in shape, raised as a landmark or a memorial. In prehistoric times it was usually erected over a burial. A barrow is sometimes called a cairn. containing five chambers, with a distinctivecentral one; and other cairns contain varying numbers of passage-graves.Did they also represent bits of rib-cages? This blurring of the argumentoccurs frequently. Figure 6.18 sets drawings of `dagger' carvingsbeside drawings of the human sternum sternum:see rib. from medical text-books, and thecaption invites us to deny the difference. But the difference is veryclear! A circle with a dot inside is a breast, apparently, even whenthere are four on one side of the `body' and three on another (LesPierres Plates). And when a relatively simple interpretation eventuallybecomes hard to sustain in its original form, they play the Catal HuyukDefence (IA: 268):`the ambiguity is intentional ... depending upon context andassociation, any or all of these significations might be intended ...particular meanings would have been drawn out ... through discourse, inan interpretive ritual practice.... The way in which all of the figuresin the Gavrinis art run into one another is like an allegory forlanguage itself, in which signifiers "run on" into each other,and nothing can be finally pinned down.'This was doubtless true in the Breton Neolithic; but, conveniently,and unnervingly for the reader, it is also a licence for the authors tosay anything they wish. This kind of approach did not carry much conviction when O.G.S.Crawford tried it in The eye goddess (1958); for this reviewer, it doesnot do so here. If only a set of more independent arguments could bemade to converge on the same conclusions! Clearly, the richest contextsfor interpreting the meaning of material culture in this ratherimmediate sense occur in ethnography, ethnohistory eth��no��his��to��ry?n.The study of especially native or non-Western peoples from a combined historical and anthropological viewpoint, using written documents, oral literature, material culture, and ethnographic data. and documentedhistory - which is ironic considering the prominence of prehistorians indeveloping the approach. For prehistorians, on the other hand, themiddle part of the continuum sketched above looks more promising - andthe other end at least very interesting. These volumes inevitably raise the question: in the post-modernworld, how are we to judge what, if anything, constitutes`progress' in historical inquiry, and in what sense - if any - dowe need such a concept? Despite persistent rumours of the death ofpositivism positivism(pŏ`zĭtĭvĭzəm), philosophical doctrine that denies any validity to speculation or metaphysics. Sometimes associated with empiricism, positivism maintains that metaphysical questions are unanswerable and that the only and of politically neutral archaeologies, most archaeologistswill instinctively prefer to see the rhetoric of philosophy directedtowards increasing our knowledge of the past - rather than seeingarchaeological data used to support a philosophical stance already opento judgement in its own terms. If post-processual studies turn out to beevasive or cavalier in their approach to archaeological data, we areleft wondering just how much has been `established' about the past.The upshot is that, deservedly or not, the philosophical stance itselfmay appear to have been discredited among archaeologists who do not havetime or inclination to go back to the original debates. Sometime in thefuture, the very theorists who first sensitized us to the ideologicalpenetration of our discipline may find their writings cited as evenbetter examples of the same phenomenon. To ask for academic rigour rig��our?n. Chiefly BritishVariant of rigor.rigouror US rigorNoun1. isdoubtless deemed a repressive demand, especially if it is done fromwithin the `patriarchal gerontocracy' (IA: 407) of university-basedarchaeology. And to be fair, many prehistorians, faced with such arequest, would not feel altogether comfortable; most have abandoned theminimalist scepticism which used to pass for source-criticism, and whichcertainly was repressive. But then again, can we allow those who writeabout the past to place themselves effectively above criticism, usingrhetoric to perform an Indian rope-trick? Post-processualists should also reflect upon their mantra-likerepetition of words coined by writers from other disciplines to meettheir particular needs. In terms of the engagement between theory anddata, Richard Bradley's Altering the earth (1993) covers a gooddeal of the same ground as the two volumes under review here, butmanages to convey its meaning without the transferred technology of theself, recursive self-interpretational self-constitution, and so on. For all theorists, the tension between writing as if they havediscovered something about the past and trying to demonstrate how thearchaeological record supports their theoretical stance cannot be wishedaway, but there is a strong case for more humility and more clarity inthis area. We need to be ready to discuss alternatives, to pick up theironies in our own work, and to acknowledge the cussedness cuss��ed?adj. Informal1. Perverse; stubborn.2. Cursed.cussed��ly adv. of data whichsimply will not bear the weight of our theoretical ambitions. Is it toomuch to hope that, while more old-fashioned archaeologists develop ataste for critique, post-processualists will become more interested insource-criticism? ReferencesBradley, R. 1993. Altering the earth: the origins of monuments inBritain and continental Europe. Edinburgh: Society of Antiquaries ofScotland The Society of Antiquaries of Scotland is the senior antiquarian body in Scotland, with its headquarters, collections, archive, and lecture theatre in the Royal Museum, Chambers Street, Edinburgh. The Society plays an important role in the cultural life and heritage of Scotland. . 1994. Symbols and signposts - understanding the pre-historicpetroglyphs of the British Isles, in C. Renfrew & E. Zubrow (ed.),The ancient mind: elements of cognitive archaeology: 95-106. Cambridge:Cambridge University Press Cambridge University Press (known colloquially as CUP) is a publisher given a Royal Charter by Henry VIII in 1534, and one of the two privileged presses (the other being Oxford University Press). . Crawford, O.G.S. 1958. The eye goddess.London: Phoenix House. Gosden, C. 1994. Social being and time. Oxford:Blackwell. Thomas, C. 1994. And shall these mute stones speak? Cardiff:University of Wales Affiliated institutionsCardiff University Cardiff was once a full member of the University but has now left (though it retains some ties). When Cardiff left, it merged with the University of Wales College of Medicine (which was also a former member). Press.