A World History of Nineteenth-Century Archaeology: Nationalism, Colonialism, and the Past (Oxford Studies in the History of Archaeology)

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An Alternative Account of the History

of Archaeology in the Nineteenth Century

THE MULTIVOCALITY OF ARCHAEOLOGY AS A CHALLENGE

TO WRITING THE HISTORY OF THE DISCIPLINE

Historians of science (whether philosophers, epistemologists, historians of
science, or sociologists of science) have been stubbornly reluctant to deal with
archaeology in favour of other disciplines such as geology and medicine. 1
Most histories of archaeology have, therefore, been written by archaeologists
and this book is no exception. Being trained in the subtleties of stratigraphy
and typology does not, however, provide archaeologists with the necessary
tools to confront the history of their own discipline. Many of the histories of
archaeology so far written revolve around a narrow, almost positivistic,
understanding of what the writing of one’s own disciplinary history repre-
sents. This volume attempts to overcome these limitations. Questions ad-
dressed have been inspired by a wide range of authors working in the areas of
history, sociology, literary studies, anthropology, and the history of science. It
uses the case of nineteenth-century world archaeology to explore the potential
of new directions in the study of nationalism for our understanding of the
history of archaeology. Key concepts and questions from which this study has
drawn include the changing nature of national history as seen by historians
(Bergeret al. 1999b; Hobsbawm 1990) and by scholars working in the
areas of literature and political studies (Anderson 1991); transformations
within nationalism (Smith 1995); new theoretical perspectives developed
within colonial and post-colonial studies (Asad 1973; Said 1978); the rela-
tionship between knowledge and power (Foucault 1972 (2002); 1980b); and

1 Among historians of science there are a few exceptions: Michael Hammond, Henrika
Kuklick, Marc-Antoine Kaeser, and Wiktor Stoczkowski. They were originally trained as archae-
ologists but took doctorates in the history of science. Historians have also been reluctant to deal
with the history of archaeology, but their number is larger, among others Noe ̈l Coye, Nathalie
Richard (both also originally trained as archaeologists), Raf de Bont, Martijn EickhoV, Philippa
Levine, Gonzalo Pasamar, Ignacio Peiro ́, Suzanne Marchand, and Rosemary Sweet.