My first archaeological theory glossary
As part of my research I’ve gone back to basics with archaeological theory and am reading summaries of the whole shebang. The thing I’ve always struggled with is the sheer weight of jargon that accompanies theory. This glossary is an evolving, dynamic list of the topics, subjects, and key words that I’ve re-encountered recently produced here for my own diabolical needs. As ever, it’s primarily for my own uses but if it serves to help out anyone else, hooray. All definitions are my own.
Agency – the ability to act and produce an effect in the world, intentional or not.
Anthopocentric – focussing on the place and role of humans in research.
Biography (object) – the sequence of events or processes which have occurred to a single object throughout its physical existence and the way(s) in which it may have been used.
Cognitive archaeology – Archaeological approach focussing on how people thought, viewed through organisations and ideologies.
Cultural history – 19th and 20th Century approach associating specific people in places as ‘cultures’ and considering their interactions and development.
Dialectics – two different perspectives/points of view in discussion or effecting change on each other.
Dualisms – Pervasive idea dividing a specific perspective between two distinct choices, e.g. male/female, old/young, left/right, rich/poor, living/dead etc.
Emic – from the viewpoint of a contemporary group.
Essentialism – The idea that a phenomenon is true of across difference in time and culture.
Etic – from outside the viewpoint of a contemporary group discussing that group.
Materiality – The physical, material quality of things and the reactions and relationships that humans (or other agents) have to these.
Marxist theory – archaeology from the perspective of Marxism.
New Archaeology – The ‘paradigm shift’ following Cultural Archaeology incorporating the development of scientific approaches in the 1980s and their focus on applying hard-sciences into archaeology. Emphasis on systems, structures, and effects.
Personhood – the subjective qualities making up a person
Phenomenology – theory surrounding the necessity of ‘Being-in-the-world’. Considers people, places, landscapes, objects etc. ass context specific and difficult to address solely through their scientific measurement.
Posthumanism – Critique of Anthropocentric approaches that opens inquiry to non-human life (animals, insects plants) as well as inorganic substances (landscapes, water, time etc.)
Post-processusal archaeology – The ‘paradigm shift’ following ‘new archaeology’ focussing on the dynamic role of objects and individuals within archaeology rather than processes by which things happened.
Potentialities – The ability for something to change or an inherent quality allowing for development
Practice (theory) – agents and structures working on each in other in the real world, effecting change.
Queer theory – destructuralist sociological approach questioning past assumptions of heternormativity.
Romanisation – the theory surrounding the adoption and/or interpretation of Roman ‘culture’ by peoples/societies/groups which came into contact with it.
Semiotics – the relationship between signs and meanings
Structuration – theory surrounding the relationship between structures which affect, influence or limit the behaviour of an agent, whether physical, behavioural, cultural etc.
For more extensive or complete glossaries see the following texts:
Hodder, Ian; Hutson, Scott (2003). Reading the Past: Current Approaches to Interpretation in Archaeology (third edition). New York: Cambridge University Press.
Harris, O. J. T. and Cippola, C. 2017. Archaeological Theory in the New Millennium: Introducing Current Perspectives. Routledge.
Or, for free, the Wikipedia page Archaeological Theory ) is a good start alongside all the pages flagged/categorised as such.
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