Histories of the Archaeological Discipline: Issues to Consider

One could argue that archaeology is a discipline obsessed with its own history. It is as if the discipline, through studying the material remains of past human populations, feels that this is an obvious part of its mission. Indeed, textbooks, handbooks, regional syntheses, books on theory, and more will greet you with an archaeological history on the given topic within the first few pages. Any general history of archaeology will tell you a version of how it was born, how it developed, and how it changed as new techniques or new theories or perspectives arose. In fact, archaeology and archaeologists cannot be disentangled from social and economic contexts or political orientations and institutions (see Harmansah & Shepherd 2012: 52). When one of these contexts changes so does the discipline by virtue of its reaction to these situations.