Theme:
4. Persisting with Change: Theory and Archaeological Scrutiny
Session format:
Regular session
Title:
Telling the Stories of Others? Ethics, Epistemology, and Practices in Archaeological Discourses
Content:
Reflecting on an appropriate use of analogy and ethnography is at the core of research practice for many archaeologists: we are fundamentally ‘telling the stories of others’, i.e. telling stories about Others - in their stead. Embedded in our stories are decisions to tell one in many possible ways of being human.This is always theoretically and politically situated and needs to be considered.
Ethical, epistemological, and practical implications of telling the stories of Others can be deployed around four questions:
Who: who speaks? In whose name? Who is talked about? Which stories are ours to tell? Which voices are present in archaeological texts? Is it possible to represent without misrepresenting? Is storytelling a way of voicing the not-yet-heard?
What: what link(s) are there between descriptions, narratives, stories, representations, and interpretations? Can one describe without interpreting? What do we choose to say about our fragmentary data? What is the effect of time and taphonomy on our interpretations?
Why: is anyone unsettled by the idea that archaeologists are storytellers? Why/why not? Is there a distinction between archaeological discourse and (other types of) storytelling? With the constructed separation between the scientific/objective/real/neutral world and that of imaginaries, stories and narratives, are we telling stories that would be (in)comprehensible to past populations?
How: How should we implement anthropological/ethnographic knowledge? To what extent can storytelling as knowledge transmission become a part of our research practice? Is there a difference between analogy from ethnographic/anthropological sources and appropriation of indigenous knowledge in our attempts to create sense from our data?
For this session, although research on hunter-gatherers is our point of departure, we welcome papers reflecting on how to represent all past people in ways that support ethical and respectful practices, and diverse narratives.
Keywords:
Storytelling, Analogy, Epistemology, Ethics, Practices, Situated knowledge production
Session associated with MERC:
no
Session associated with CIfA:
no
Session associated with SAfA:
no
Session associated with CAA:
no
Session associated with DGUF:
no
Session associated with other:
PaM - HEAR
Main organiser:
Martin Moucheron (Ireland) 1
Co-organisers:
Astrid Nyland (Norway) 2
Affiliations:
1. University College Dublin
2. Museum of Archaeology - University of Stavanger
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