Processual archaeology, also known as New Archaeology, which came to dominate the field in the 1960s presented a critique of past archaeological work, that it, fundamentally, was non-scientific. The debates and arguments that exist within the field of archaeology often seem to be limiting, as Trigger remarks, or result in slowing down the field's development. But, there also often seems to be circularity to the discourses. (Trigger, 1996) As a result, a processual analysis that Gordon Childe`s work, to give a potent example, is non-scientific, can be debated. This paper will intend, by drawing on primary and secondary sources, to show Childe`s accomplishments as scientific and forward-looking, though he is an archaeologist from a time when much archaeological work was biased and limited in its focus in ways that post-processual archaeology dissects. (Trigger, 1996)
[...] (Trigger, 1996) Childe wrote that he was interested in the possibilities of “archaeology's revelations disclose no abstract evolution but the intersection of multiple concrete groups and the blending of contributions from far-sundered regions.” (Trigger: His later theories combined social and materialist elements, taken from Engels and others, such as Engels contention that “separation of handicrafts from agriculture is a marker of major social as well as technological and economic transition.” (Trigger: Describing what was found at dig sites and combining this with ways of analyzing the meaning of what is found increasingly becomes the area that archaeologists like Childe devote their energies to. [...]
[...] (Trigger, 1996) Another concern is the way that totalitarian and fascist regimes could use archaeology as a way to promote mythological visions of their own cultural- national superiority, such as the myth of the Aryan superiority found in Nazism. (Trigger, 1996) But when one studies Childe's development, it can be seen even early in his career, he was largely opposed to the racist strains found in the work of the linguist Gustaf Kossinna. (Trigger, Childe's relevance to the 1990s: pg 11) Kossinna was focused on finding the original “homeland of the Indo- European speaking peoples.” (Trigger: 11) Childe, to balance the scales, was not immune to the idea that European civilization was superior to non- European (or Oriental) societies. [...]
[...] (Trigger, If Childe were Alive Today: 11) Childe's speculations, his use of charts to try to map out the cultural and material and technological aspects of prehistoric groups, is an excellent example of scientific method. It provokes discussion and provides a way to compare evidence, to concur or to deny through further resources and researches that might come later. (Childe, Proofs of Diffusion, Chapter XII) Trigger's thought that archaeology has to develop as it does, through denial of the past work and slow arduous struggle to reach the same places that Childe was arriving at earlier, is also a useful and interesting point to consider. [...]
[...] He is a critical Marxist, as discussed above, because of his disillusionment with and denouncing of the aims to which Marxist thought was put by the field of archaeology under Stalin, making it an ideological rather than a scientific discipline. Proof of this is found in his letter from Dec in which Childe critiques the Soviet Archaeological project. In this letter he expresses his dismay to what the Soviet archaeologists are doing with the contextual evidence of prehistorical culture gathered from field work excavation and examination of data. [...]
[...] He writes, excavation technique Soviet archaeology falls far below the standards recognized in Britain, Czechoslovakia or even Germany, it is the duty of an excavator to publish clear and large plans and sections showing every detail he can observe for the benefit of his colleagues at home and abroad. It has often happened that another investigator can discover significant features thus presented though they were not understood by the excavator (Childe: 1956, 95) In this, Childe reveals his scientific orientation, and how it proves that he is not an ideologue but rather a man with theories and ideas; open to refiguring and questioning his own and other assumptions in the light of new research and new understandings. [...]
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