Chapter 4 The Rise of Modern Archaeology

Typologies

categorizing material data based on specific attributes like form or style

Hyper-Diffusionism

a model assumed that some far-flung cultural traits indicative “icivilaizations” had originated from a single source

Behavioral Archaeology

a science of material culture, specifically focused on human-artifact relationships

Selectionist Archaeology

a theoretical framework that explains culture change as a result of evolutionary processes similar to those outlined by natural selection; also known as evolutionary archaeology and Darwinian archaeology

Cultural Historical Archaeology

assigning ethnicity to archaeological cultures through the use of material culture

Processualism

(also known as the New Archaeology) is a theoretical framework that takes functionalist systemic frameworks and applies them across time to valuate how and why systems change

Lewis Binford

an important founder of processual archaeology

Michael Schiffer

an important founder of behavioral archaeology and formation processes

Queer Theory

a theoretical framework that examines how interpretations of the past are shaped by heteronormative assumptions of those who practice archaeology

Colin Renfrew

an important founder of cognitive archaeology

Middle Range Theory

Lewis Binford’s version of formation processes which establishes the material expressions of human behavior in the ethnographic record to help ethnoarchaeology and experimental archaeology

Julian Steward

a cultural anthropologist whose work interests in settlement patterns and the ways that human behavior is impacted by the environment had an impact on the development of processualism

Postprocessualism

sometimes defined as a series of interpretive frameworks in archaeology that challenged processualist epistemologies such as feminist archaeology, Marxist archaeology, and structuralism, or as a specific body of theory that emphasizes the use of subjective interpretations;; also known as interpretive archaeology

Evolutionary Ecology

uses natural selection theory to study adaptation and biological design in an ecological setting

Franz Boas

an influential anthropologist who established four-field anthropology in the United States

Phenomenology

a theoretical framework that for archaeologists concerns the study of human experiences in the past

Ian Hodder

an important founder of postprocessual archaeology

Feminist Archaeology

a theortical framework that first focused on gender bias in the practice of American Archaeology and interpretation of archaeological and then moved beyond analyses of females/males in the past and has inspired work in many aspects of human diversity including studied of childhood, the body and queer theory

Cultural Ecology

the study of how humans societies adapt to, survive in, and shape their physical and social environments

Cultural Evolutionary Theory

the study of how human beliefs, behaviors, languages, and technologies change over time through social transmission rather than genetic inheritance

Contemporary Processualism

scientific method, data quantification, and empirical testing

Practice Theory

explains society and culture through the lens of human action, routines, and everyday practices rather than rigid structural determinism or isolated individual choices

Cultural Particularism

an anthropologist theory stating that each culture has a unique history and must be understood through its own specific context rather than by universal laws or evolutionary ranks