|
Postcolonialism and Archaeological Practice:
Precedents, Problems and “Post-Postcolonialism”
We invite paper abstracts to be submitted to the ASA09 conference panel
Postcolonialism and Archaeological Practice: Precedents, Problems and
“Post-Postcolonialism”. The 2009 Annual Conference of the
Association of Social Anthropologists (ASA09) will take place at the University of Bristol (England),
6-9 April 2009.
This session proposes an examination of the interaction between postcolonialism
and archaeological practice. Since the 1960s, postcolonial sensitivities have
wrought dramatic change on the theories and methods of archaeology. Reacting to
contemporary political changes, and borrowing from social anthropology,
archaeologists have approached material records in new ways and have adjusted
old assumptions, most intensively in contexts of colonization. Agency,
multi-directional exchange, and the silence of colonized populations in
historical records are just some of the issues raised by twentieth-century
responses to ideas of empire and power long refracted through the biased lens
of modern colonialism.
The institutionalization of postcolonial approaches within archaeological
scholarship is now starting to beg new questions. Is postcolonialism actually
as ubiquitous as it seems, or has it met certain points of resistance? Does
postcolonialism have a stranglehold on archaeology, keeping us from new
approaches? Do postcolonial sensitivities risk reductionism, limiting
scholarship to description?
We invite papers
that address these and other questions about the relationship
between archaeology and postcolonialism. In particular, we encourage papers
that look critically at bodies of material evidence and the ways in which
postcolonial theory has been used to interpret them. We also seek papers that
promote new, 'post-postcolonial' ways of looking at the evidence, either
through critique of established methods or application of theories developed in
other fields. A combination of material- and theory-based contributions will, we
hope, establish a multifaceted examination of the influence of postcolonialism
on the field of archaeology and a look at what is to come
(www.nomadit.co.uk/asa/asa09/panels.php5?PanelID=530).
Paper abstracts should include a short version of 300 characters and a longer
version of 250 words. For further guidelines, and for instructions for
submitting abstracts via the conference website, please see www.theasa.org/conferences/asa09/papers.htm.
Regards,
Emily Modrall • emodrall(a)sas.upenn.edu
Lela Urquhart • lelau(a)stanford.edu
(panel co-conveners)
|