Journal of Social Archaeology

This article discusses the structuring of domination in everyday life, studied through private housing material culture, over a period of several centuries. Our case study deals with the processes of use of space and the changes in middle-class households in Buenos Aires since the late eighteenth century, highlighting both world and Latin American contexts. We show how morphological and spatial changes in households are related both to the wider world capitalist context and to local conditions, shaping people’s lives. We focus on the controlling features of housing, affecting not only the middle classes, but potentially the whole spectrum of social classes. Capitalism tends to individualize space, create private environments, restrict movement and control movement in general, and houses as material artifacts reflect these tendencies. We conclude that the study of Buenos Aires housing enables us to note that there has been a growing tendency to restrict circulation within the house, enforcing a controlling, bourgeois way of life.

How does ‘material memory’ work? Should monumental sites be considered as places of social memory par excellence or perhaps citational practices? With these questions in mind the concepts of citation, trace and repetition are singled out as elements of ‘material memory’. This article addresses evidence from the prehistoric site of Lepenski Vir in south-east Europe, and suggests that the concept of ‘deep time’ constituted the main structuring trope of the sequence. Over the long term, people adhered to physical traces of ‘deep time’, through re-figuring, dis placement and circulation of material fragments, which maintained a collective (material) memory. The significance of apotropaism is suggested as a constitutive part of cultural practices and understood as a ‘technology of protection’ with ontological and epistemological relevance, such that it empowers individual agents to cope with various vicissitudes of life by an effective mobilization of ‘deep time’ residues. Examples of narrative sequences at Lepenski Vir are explored, which relate to specific individuals and life cycles of houses.

In February of 2001, Afghanistan’s de facto Taliban government publicly announced its intention to systematically destroy every statue within its borders. Immediately, numerous nations, organizations and individuals rallied to avert the impending destruction. Despite these efforts, countless objects were obliterated, including the two colossal Buddhas of Bamiyan carved nearly two millennia ago. This article explores this disturbing, yet fascinating, episode with a particular view towards the discourses that emerged on the Internet just preceding and following the Afghan purge. Setting aside the theological and moral questions that arise from these events, the author aims to elucidate the intersection of ancient artifacts and modern politics, local action and global reaction, and the material and immaterial clashes that shaped the worldwide debate. Oriented around Marcus’ notions of global-local, simultaneity and complex connections, this study views the Internet as a metaphor for Marcus’ theory, as well as an object for ethnographic inquiry to examine the politics of the past in the present.

In this article, we provide an example of what we consider to be a productive archaeological collaboration between a State Agency and a Native American tribe that we believe has both theoretical and methodological implications. Our work implements and extends Hodder’s reflexive method (1999) through the use of inclusivity, reciprocity and mutual respect. We describe how coupling our mutual regard for knowledge of the past with our respect for the spiritual significance of the Kashaya landscape necessarily led to the breaking down of boundaries between the scientific, the sacred and the personal. A 1997 excavation provides a case study of our collaborative process. We conclude by suggesting that the space between the usual oppositions of secular and sacred, science and religion, explanation and understanding, holds promise for Native Americans and archaeologists to participate with each other in non-dichotomous and mutually beneficial ways.