tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2357316514436369105.post2988659578484594103..comments2024-03-11T15:40:37.015+00:00Comments on Theoretical Structural Archaeology: 31. Primitive RitualsGeoff Carterhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01111820035762957610noreply@blogger.comBlogger8125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2357316514436369105.post-5979440836575838402010-04-24T22:38:43.545+01:002010-04-24T22:38:43.545+01:00I like the approach; teaching children, and people...I like the approach; teaching children, and people, how to think is vital. Archaeology, like many disciplines is a way of thinking about the evidence.<br /><br />Modern people experience more radical change in culture. Things usually changed more slowly in the past, certainly the agricultural routines of the common folk were inherently fairly fixed. However, most 'culture' leaves archaeological remains.Geoff Carterhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01111820035762957610noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2357316514436369105.post-54047328093989979302010-04-24T18:39:32.130+01:002010-04-24T18:39:32.130+01:00You are exactly right- if we understand an item...You are exactly right- if we understand an item's use, then we don't call it a ritual artifact. I've come to a point where, when I encounter the word "ritual" I mentally substitute "We don't know what this was used for" in its place. <br /><br />Something funny happened to me last year. I was in a store with my son, who is 14. They had one of those long conveyor belts in the back, the sort we used to use when I was a kid for returning cartons of glass soft drink bottles. It wasn't in use, rather, it was piled up with display items- but it caught his eye and he asked me what it was. I thought a moment, then asked him to try to figure it out. He speculated for a bit- I forget what he came up with, but he was way wrong. When I explained the whole bottle return system, he was surprised. In his lifetime, returnable bottles don't exist here, he had no frame of reference for a system that was, quite recently, completely ubiquitous. Alex has never seen a 16 ounce glass coke bottle. So he had no conception of a world where they go back to the store for a cash refund. A single system that was once a large part of our grocery economy has disappeared, leaving little trace; what was normal and perfectly sensible, with the right frame of reference, was unimaginable without it.<br /><br />It got me thinking about what sort of social and economic systems might have vanished over the course of human experience. The remnants of such might be hard to identify, without modern corollaries to examine.Ornithophobehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08522714232659584430noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2357316514436369105.post-61116440633008479862010-04-24T11:18:10.889+01:002010-04-24T11:18:10.889+01:00Thank you for taking so much time to read my artic...Thank you for taking so much time to read my articles. I am so pleased they hit the spot for you. <br /><br />I am not picking holes in existing ideas for the fun of it. The narrative is actually going somewhere very exciting [- as soon as I can finish the next set of drawings of the building at Woodhenge].<br /><br />When you understand something, you do not need the word 'ritual'; it is unnecessary to describe a Christian church or chalice as 'ritual', because we can offer more specific definitions and descriptions.Geoff Carterhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01111820035762957610noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2357316514436369105.post-55388210389389216982010-04-24T09:51:05.674+01:002010-04-24T09:51:05.674+01:00I'd love to say something brilliant and witty ...I'd love to say something brilliant and witty here- but I've just read through the first 31 entries and it's now 4:45 am. So I'm going to leave it at this: Thank you. You've answered a lot of the questions that pop into my head as I'm making my way through my textbooks (I'm an anthropology student) and you've validated a certain uncomfortable suspicion that's been growing in my mind. (I've begun to wince at the words "ritual use," in the last couple of years.) <br /><br />Anyway- I'll be back tomorrow to finish my reading, and I've added you to the blogs I follow. Great site, wonderfully well written and clearly explained.Ornithophobehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08522714232659584430noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2357316514436369105.post-48048451100126896072009-08-19T02:22:52.063+01:002009-08-19T02:22:52.063+01:00Thanks Martha,
While I may be frustrated with the ...Thanks Martha,<br />While I may be frustrated with the system, I would not be here without some very fine academics, and what concerned me most about my recent experience of university was the effect of that an attitude of indifference and disinterest had on their students. <br />Most of the postgraduate students, particularly overseas students, who were more directly aware how much they were paying, were unhappy, particularly about the lack of time spent with staff in some sort of face to face teaching situations.<br />Teaching the next generation is a responsible and important job, and should be a privilege, and when the staff becomes disenchanted and cynical about their subjects/ institutions it does not bode well for their students. <br /><br />The sexual politics of roundhouse is far too complex a topic for a structural archaeologist, what you want is a ‘structuralist’ archaeologist – better able to conceive of a building in terms of a male-female dialectic.Geoff Carterhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01111820035762957610noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2357316514436369105.post-54720629517613578352009-08-18T21:00:25.618+01:002009-08-18T21:00:25.618+01:00I'll add my Bravo! to the above.
I, like...I'll add my Bravo! to the above. <br /> <br />I, like you, have been frustrated by "academia." I love research and was forced out into the cold, hard world to earn a living, so I have a lot of empathy with where you are coming from. <br /><br />It's always our assumptions or our metaphors, that get in the way of discoveries. I love the story Dennis Stanford told about how archaeologists in America quit digging when they find Clovis stuff, because they've been taught there's nothing older than that here. And how long did it take to figure out that more shoreline and potential living space was exposed during the glacial periods?<br /><br />So hang in there!<br /><br />It seems to me the circle is the more natural form for any building until split or sawn planks came into common use. Corners have no real purpose, even in our homes today. They are usually wasted space. So a rectangular or square building seems more likely to call for ritual as an explanation. <br /><br />In our town we have one circular house from the early 1900s that apparently led to a problem that might be overlooked. It was the home in which the dean of girls at our high school grew up. I've heard it said that the reason she never married was that it's hard to corner a man in a round house.<br /><br />MarthaMartha Murphyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02539396507098000692noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2357316514436369105.post-64403423371348987552009-07-08T09:10:25.135+01:002009-07-08T09:10:25.135+01:00Thanks Vincent, and thank you for reading it.
It&...Thanks Vincent, and thank you for reading it. <br />It's strange for a dyslexic - writing things down gets you in trouble in education, so I still find writing very stressful, and why it takes weeks to do a post. (and it's still full of errors!)Geoff Carterhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01111820035762957610noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2357316514436369105.post-707530802558348052009-07-08T08:34:17.968+01:002009-07-08T08:34:17.968+01:00[APPLAUSE] Bravo! If only I could write like you ...[APPLAUSE] Bravo! If only I could write like you Geoff, that's a work of art.Vincenthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17237329970776216248noreply@blogger.com