Agency in Archaeology

Agency in Archaeology is the first critical volume to scrutinise the concept of agency and to examine in-depth its potential to inform our understanding of the past. Theories of agency recognise that human beings make choices, hold intentions and take action. This offers archaeologists scope to move beyond looking at broad structural or environmental change and instead to consider the individual and the group Agency in Archaeology brings together nineteen internationally renowned scholars who have very different, and often conflicting, stances on the meaning and use of agency theory to archaeology. The volume is composed of five theoretically-based discussions and nine case studies, drawing on regions from North America and Mesoamerica to Western and central Europe, and ranging in subject from the late Pleistocene hunter-gatherers to the restructuring of gender relations in the north-eastern US.

History

Dobres, Marcia-Anne

Robb, John

Ancient Civilizations

Routledge

Fifty Key Contemporary Archaeologists (Routledge Key Guides)

Politics & Social Sciences

Archaeology

With firm roots in antiquarianism, archaeology began as the study and collection of things. Even today objects take center stage in many areas of archaeological inquiry. But the past few decades have seen a proliferation of the ways anthropological archaeologists analyze raw materials, tools, techniques, finished products, and discarded objects.  Material Meanings examines current approaches to material culture in the archaeological record from three perspectives: ethnoarchaeology and technological traditions; materials science; and theoretical approaches to materiality. The focus of this book is not on artifacts themselves but on the social context in which things are produced and in which they are given meaning; the technical choices of an artifact producer within a larger technical system; and their interpretation by modern researchers.  The chapters represent a broad range of theoretical perspectives, methods, and data sets. Several chapters consider methodological issues in reconstructing technical systems. Most contributions, however, apply this understanding to larger questions of social identity and ethnicity, emphasizing historical context or models of cultural process.

Material Meanings: Critical Approaches to the Interpretation of Mat (Foundations of Archaeological Inquiry)

Arnold, Dean E.

Bishop, Ronald L.

Glascock, Michael D.

Chilton, Elizabeth S.

Arnold, Philip J., III

Conkey, Margaret W.

Costin, Cathy Lynne

Neff, Hector A.

Stark, Miriam T.

Wobst, H. Martin

Social Sciences

University of Utah Press

Publisher: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1999. First Edition.

The Social Dynamics of Technology: Practice, Politics, and World Views

Christopher R. Hoffman

Smithsonian Institution Press

Technology and Social Agency: Outlining a Practice Framework for Archaeology

<p>The book presents a new conceptual framework and a set of research principles with which to study and interpret technology from a phenomenological perspective.</p>

Wiley/Blackwell

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