Engages with contemporary debates in archaeology ? Uses sources
from history and anthropology as well as archaeology ? Offers a new
perspective on the characterisation of islands
內容簡介:
Archaeologists have traditionally considered islands as distinct
physical and social entities. In this book, Paul Rainbird discusses
the historical construction of this characterization and questions
the basis for such an understanding of island archaeology. Through
a series of case studies of prehistoric archaeology in the
Mediterranean, Pacific, Baltic, and Atlantic seas and oceans, he
argues for a decentering of the land in favor of an emphasis on the
archaeology of the sea and, ultimately, a new perspective on the
making of maritime communities. The archaeology of islands is thus
unshackled from approaches that highlight boundedness and
isolation, and replaced with a new set of principles - that
boundaries are fuzzy, islanders are distinctive in their
expectation of contacts with people from over the seas, and that
island life can tell us much about maritime communities. Debating
islands, thus, brings to the fore issues of identity and community
and a concern with Western construction of other peoples.
目錄:
1. ''A consciousness of the earth and ocean'': the creation of
islands
2. Seas of islands: anthropology, biogeography, archaeology and
postcolonialism
3. An archaeology of the sea
4. The Mediterranean: Malta
5. Oceania: Pohnpei and the eastern Carolines
6. The Baltic: Gotland
7. Atlantic Archipelago: the western seaways of Europe
8. Conclusion - islands and histories of the sea