1/15 - what is archaeology?

Question 1

Anthropology

Answer 1

The study of all aspects of humankind - biological, cultural, and linguistic; extant and extinct - employing a holistic, comparative approach and the concept of culture. (study of humans)

Question 2

Archaeology

Answer 2

The study of the past through the systemic recovery and analysis of material remains.

Question 3

Artifact

Answer 3

Any moveable object that as been used, modified, or manufactured by humans; artifacts include stone, bone, and metal tools; beads and other ornaments; pottery; artwork; religious and sacred items.

Question 4

Material Culture

Answer 4

The study of the past things people create and attach meaning to. IS FOREVER!

Question 5

Antiquarians

Answer 5

Originally, someone who studied antiques largely for the sake of the objects themselves, not to understand the people or culture that produced them.

Question 6

Giovanni Belzoni

Answer 6

One of the earliest antiquarians. Previous circus performer. Great pillager, stealing things from Egypt.

Question 7

Culture History

Answer 7

The kind of archaeology practiced mainly in the early to mid-twentieth century; it explains differences or changes over time in artifact frequencies by positing the diffusion of ideas between neighboring cultures or the migration of a people who had different mental templates for artifact styles.

Question 8

Gertrude Caton Thompson

Answer 8

Reconstructed the Great Zimbabwe - started trying to answer questions about the past.

Question 9

Processualism

Answer 9

Explains social, economic, and cultural changes as primarily the result of adaptation to material conditions.

Question 10

Lewis Binford

Answer 10

Archaeology is more than ‘stamp collecting’. Big trends, culture as adaptation, scientific, ethically neutral, Processualism creator?!

Question 11

Agency

Answer 11

Human capacity to act independently and make choices.

Question 12

Post-Processualism

Answer 12

Focuses on human approaches and rejects scientific objectivity. archaeology is inherently political and is more concerned with interpreting the past than with testing hypotheses.

Question 13

Ian Hodder

Answer 13

contributed to both ethnoarchaeology and post-processualism.

Question 14

Thomas Jefferson

Answer 14

wanted tp understand earthen mounds! helped show that the scientific method is repeatable, self-correcting, and a shared rule system.

Question 15

Theory

Answer 15

An explanation for observed, empirical phenomena. It seeks to explain the relationships between variables; it is an answer to a ‘why’ question

Question 16

Paradigm

Answer 16

Overarching framework for understanding a research problem; ways of seeing the world.