Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-v9fdk Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-05T14:05:04.348Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Method in Archaeology: Middle-Range Theory as Hermeneutics

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2017

Peter Kosso*
Affiliation:
Department of Philosophy, Northern Arizona University, Flagstaff, AZ 86011

Abstract

Disagreements about methodology in archaeology are often located in terms of the middle-range-theory approach of Lewis Binford and the hermeneutic, contextual archaeology of Ian Hodder. These positions are usually presented in opposition to each other, but here they are shown to present very much the same methodological picture of archaeology. This specific analysis is more generally informative of the methodological relation between the natural and social sciences.

Résumé

Résumé

Desacuerdos acerca de metodología en arqueología son frecuentemente planteados en términos del enfoque de teoría de rango medio de Lewis Binfordy la perspectiva hermenéutica y contextual de Ian Hodder. Estas posiciones son presentadas normalmente en oposición, pero en el presente artículo se demuestra que ambas ofrecen una imagen metodológica similar de la arqueología. Este análisis resulta más informativo en términos generates acerca de la relación metodológica entre las ciencias naturales y las ciencias sociales.

Type
Articles
Copyright
Copyright © The Society for American Archaeology 1991

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

References Cited

Binford, L. 1977 General Introduction. In For Theory Building in Archaeology, edited by Binford, L., pp. 110. Academic Press, New York.Google Scholar
Binford, L. 1982a Objectivity-Explanation-Archaeology 1981. In Theory and Explanation in Archaeology, edited by Renfrew, C., Rowlands, M, and Seagraves, B., pp. 125138. Academic Press, New York.Google Scholar
Binford, L. 1982b Meaning, Inference and the Material Record. In Ranking, Resource and Exchange, edited by Renfrew, C. and Shennan, S., pp. 160163. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.Google Scholar
Binford, L. 1989 Review of Reading the Past, by Ian, Hodder. American Antiquity 53 : 875876.Google Scholar
Bintliff, J., and Snodgrass, A. 1988 Off-Site Pottery Distributions : A Regional and Interregional Perspective. Current Anthropology 29 : 506513.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cherry, J., Davis, J., and Mantzourani, E. 1991 Landscape Archaeology As Long-Term History : Northern Keos in the Cycladic Islands. UCLA Press, Los Angeles, in press.Google Scholar
Hodder, I. 1985 Postprocessualist Archaeology. In Advances in Archaeological Method and Theory, vol. 8, edited by Schiffer, M. B., pp. 126. Academic Press, New York.Google Scholar
Hodder, I. 1986 Reading the Past. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.Google Scholar
Hodder, I. 1991 Interpretive Archaeology and its Role. American Antiquity 56 : 718.Google Scholar
Patrik, L. 1985 Is There an Archaeological Record? In Advances in Archaeological Method and Theory, vol. 8, edited by Schiffer, M. B., pp. 2762. Academic Press, New York.Google Scholar
Schaffer, K. 1980 Theory Structure in the Biochemical Sciences. The Journal of Medicine and Philosophy 5 : 5795.Google Scholar
Schiffer, M. B. 1988 The Structure of Archaeological Theory. American Antiquity 53 : 461485.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shanks, M., and Tilley, C. 1987 Re-constructing Archaeology. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.Google Scholar
Shapere, D. 1982 The Concept of Observation in Science and Philosophy. Philosophy of Science 49 : 485525.Google Scholar
Wilkinson, T. 1982 The Definition of Ancient Manured Zones by Means of Extensive Sherd-Sampling Techniques. Journal of Field Archaeology 9 : 323333.Google Scholar
Wylie, M. A. 1982 Epistemological Issues Raised by a Structuralist Archaeology. In Symbolic and Structural Archaeology, edited by Hodder, I., pp. 3946. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.Google Scholar