Reading the Past

This is a completely revised edition of Ian Hodder's controversial textbook first published in 1986. The mainstream archaeology of the seventies, 'processual archaeology', modelled itself on the natural sciences. It has been challenged in recent years by a 'post-processual' archaeology which draws upon the wider perspectives of history and social anthropology, insisting that account must be taken of the context and meaning of behaviour, and that the ideological uses of archaeology be recognised by practitioners. Ian Hodder, a leading figure in the new movement, argues that in explaining the behaviour of past societies a concern with meaning must be joined to the study of ecological constraints and economic and social processes. This leads him to discuss systems theory and structuralist and Marxist approaches in archaeology.