FRENCH 151A Study Guide - Ian Hodder, American Antiquity, Ethnoarchaeology
Document Summary
This course is an introduction to the field of archaeology: its goals, challenges, methods, and theoretical frameworks. Archaeology is the study of past human societies through the rigorous analysis of material items used in people"s everyday lives. Through a diverse suite of field and laboratory methods, archaeologists can examine these physical traces on a variety of scales to construct interpretations about the lives of people who lived in the ancient and recent past. This course will explore how exactly archaeologists recover archaeological information and turn those data into interpretations about the past. Lecture topics will include the goals of archaeology, the formation of the archaeological record, archaeological field methods, and the analysis of archaeological remains. Another important theme of the course will be the ability of archaeology to counter traditional historical narratives that exclude or misrepresent minorities, lower status individuals, and persecuted groups.
