Archaeological Review from Cambridge The Archaeological Review from Cambridge (ARC) is a biannual journal of archaeology. It is run on a non-profit, voluntary basis by postgraduate research students at the University of Cambridge.
Archaeological Review from Cambridge Volume 30.2
November 2015
Although primarily rooted in archaeological theory and practice, the ARC increasingly invites a range of perspectives with the aim of establishing a strong, interdisciplinary journal which will be of interest in a range of fields.
Archaeological Review from Cambridge Department of Archaeology and Anthropology University of Cambridge Downing Street, Cambridge, CB2 3DZ United Kingdom http://www.societies.cam.ac.uk/arc Volume 30.2
Archaeology: Myths Within and Without
Theme editors
Benjamin Hinson and Barbora Janulikova
Cover Design
Adam Hinson. Image reproduced courtesy ofFotolia
ARCHAEOLOGY: MYTHS WITHIN AND WITHOUT
( #85134083, "Direction sign with blank spaces for text") Published in November 2015. Copyright remains with the authors. Opinions expressed in contributions do not necessarily reflect those of the editors or the ARC.
ISSN: 0261-4332 Typeset in Arno Pro by Barbora Janulikova and Ben Hinson All images are the authors' own, except where otherwise stated Printed by Victoire Press
ARC Committee, November 2015 General Editors Mat Dalton, Ana Tavares and Georgie Peters Treasurer Lynette Talbot Secretary Ana Tavares Book Reviews Benjamin Hinson Subscriptions Barbora Janulfkova Back Issue Sales Ian Ostericher Publicity and Events Meghan Strong IT and Web Management Ian Ostericher
Edited by Benjamin Hinson and Barbora Janulikova
Contents Archaeology: Myths Within and Without. Introduction
1
BENJAMIN HINSON AND BARBORA]ANULIKOVA
Archaeology and nation building: A view from Iran
4
RANA DAROOGHEH
Understanding metaphors in sustaining cultural landscapes within traditional societies in Australia and Zimbabwe
17 28
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Book Reviews
Medieval Childhood: Archaeological Approaches
186
By D.M. Hadley and K.A. Remer
]ANAMARiKovA-KUBKOVA, PAVLA TOMANOVA, AND KATAR.iNA VALovA
We are not looking for gold: On archaelogy as a myth
REVIEWED BY LESLIE QUADE
43
The Archaeology and Ethnography of Central Africa
191
By James Denbow
MIRIAM E. DOMINGUEZ
'It's all magical and made up, really': Negotiating between academic and alternative narratives of British Prehistory
56
REVIEWED BY CHRIS WINGFIELD
Wonderful Things: A History ofEgyptology 1: From Antiquity to 1881
ELIZABETH PRATI
By Jason Thompson
The child in the copper pail: Canadian Plateau child burials and regionally entrenched archaeological myths
71
CHRISARNETI AND CELIA NORD
Lost tribes, Old World settlers, and the archaeology of North America
195
REVIEWED BY NICKY NIELSEN
The Cambridge World Prehistory 86
PEREGRINE GERARD-LITTLE
Demaratus Debunked: The problem with using historical texts over archaeological evidence in creating technological time lines
199
By Colin Renfrew and Paul Bahn REVIEWED BY DON P. O'MEARA
99
ANDREW CARROLL
Forthcoming issues
Finding homelands: Excavating myth and identity from East to West
207
ll5 Available back issues
MEGHAN BOWE, LIZ COHEN, AND HYUN KYUNG LEE
Reclaiming the streets: The role of archaeology in deconstructing the myths of contemporary society
172
EDITED BY BENJAMIN HINSON
ASHTON SINAMAI
Struggle for identity in the Czech and Slovak Republics: The myths of Magna Moravia and the Pfemyslid State
Pyramids, dragons and whores: (Post)colonial myths and metafictions in the ''.A Song of Ice and Fire" novels by G. R. R. Martin
209
135
RACHAEL KIDDEY AND PAUL GRAVES-BROWN
Archaeological imagery in children's television. How archaeology reinforces innocence and authority
148
TRUDIE COLE
Separating artefacts from fiction: using museum education and outreach to increase archaeology's relevance and impact in society
160
TRISHA BIERS AND SARAH-JANE HARKNETI
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CROWEST, R. 1999. Multisensory Interpretation and the Visitor Experience. Dissertation submitted in partial fulfihnent of the requirements of the Degree ofMA in Heritage Interpretation. St Mary's: Strawberry Hill, University of Surrey.
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Pyramids, dragons and whores: (Post)colonial myths and metafictions in the~~ Song of Ice and Fire'' novels by G. R. R. Martin
DCMS. 2000. The Learning Power ofMuseums: a vision for museum education. London: DCMS. DEPARTMENT FOR EDUCATION 2013. National curriculum in England: history programmes ofstudy.
UrosMatic
HMSO.www.gov.uk/government/publications/national-curriculmn-in-england-historyprogrammes-of-study#key-stage-2, accessed on 5th October 2015. DUDLY, S. 2013. Museum Materialities: objects, engagements, interpretations. London: Routledge. HANNAN, L., DuHs, R. AND CHATIERJEE, HJ. 2013. Object Based Learning: a powerful pedagogy for higher education. In A. Beddington, J. Boys and C. Speight (eds). Museums and Higher
Institutfur Agyptologie und Koptologie Westfalische Wilhelms-Universitat Munster
[email protected]
Education Working Together: Challenges and Opportunities. Farnham and Burlington: Ashgate, 159-168.
futroduction and background
HEIN, G. 1998. Learning in the Museum. London. Routledge. HOOPER-GREENHILL, E. 1992. Museums and the Shaping ofKnowledge. London. Routledge. HOOPER-GREENHILL, E. 1999. The Educational Role of the Museum. 2nd edition. London. Routledge. KING, C. 1973. Stig of the Dump. Puffin Books: Middlesex. MARTIN, D. 1996. Outreach Special. Journal ofMuseum Practice 3: 38-39. MOSER, S. 2010. The Devil is in the Detail: Museum Displays and Creation £Knowledge. Museum
Anthropology 33 (1): 22-32. MULHEARN, D. 2014. Class struggles: museums face up to the challenges of the new curriculum.
Museums Journal, November2014: 20-23. OFFICE FOR STANDARDS IN EDUCATION, CHILDREN'S SERVICES AND SKILLS (OFSTED), 2011.
History for all: History in English Schools 2007/10. Reference number 090223. SPENCE, C. 2007. Making Sense of Touch: a multisensory approach to the perception of objects. In Pye, E. (ed.). The Power of Touch: Handling Objects in Museums and Heritage Contexts. Left Coast Press. INC:Walnut Creek, 45-61. SCHOOL CURRICULUM AND ASSESSMENT AUTHORITY ( SCAA). 1995. A Guide to the National
Curriculum for Staff ofMuseums, Galleries, Historic Houses and Sites. http:/ /www.gem.org.uk/ res/ advice/ball/ res_lfo.php, accessed on 5th October 2015.
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Mythology; ancient or not1 can only have historical foundations1 because myth is a type of speech chosen by history that cannot possibly evolve from the 'nature' of things (Barthes 1972: 108). It needs real-life coordinates. Archaeology has often searched for the historical foundation of myths (e.g. Troy) 1 but also given foundations to others (e.g. Nation States). Since the use of the past is a socio-political action in the present (Shanks and Tilley 1987\ archaeology is crucial for questioning the use of the past for constructing contemporary myths. This paper is an archaeology ofa fantasyworld1 in the sense that it digs out its origins and (re)constructs it; it looks for the real-life coordinates of its narrative. The fantasy world in question is the one of A Song of Ice and Fire by G.R.R. Martin1 written in a series of five already published ( 1996-2011) and two more planned books. Additional sources for this paper are the recently published The World of Ice and Fire: The Untold History ofWesteros and the Game of Thrones (Martin et al. 2014) and the to-date filmed episodes of the television series Game of Thrones (HBO 2011-2014). The aim of this paper is not just to provide a list of past societies which inspired Martin's fantasy world. It is more the combination and setting of these real-life coordinates which inspired him that will be explored1 as it is their contextualization which created his fantasy world and simultaneously what a (post)colonial mythology is. It shall be argued that elements of our own world and its past1 viewed in a specific way by Martin (Caroll 2014) 1 created a series of colonial hybrids. The term 'colonial hybrid' will be used to describe the 'chimeras' made of these elements1 with the goal of colonial fixity (Bhabha 1994: 98; Said 1977: 203-204). Thus1 the term colonial hybrid1 as NOVEMBER 2015
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understood in this paper, is radically opposite to the 'postcolonial hybrid'. A postcoloni:U hybrid implies the emergence of novel identity forms out of the social encounter in the so called 'third space' with a potential for the non-expected and unpredictable, but also for tension and exercise of power, including individuals, groups but also materialities (Fahlander 2007: 15-16; Cornell and Fahlander 2007: 1-4). Moreover, the postcolonial hybrid does not allow retracing of elements which constitute it, exactly because it represents a novel form emerging from the encounter of these elements and not from their fusion. Unlike in the case of the postcolonial hybrid (Bhabha 1994: 112), the elements forming part of the colonial one are easily retraceable and it will be argued that this is done in order to fix the Other. 'Fixing the Other' is a colonial strategy of representation which is considered either to have acquired, or to be, reality (Said 1977: 73 ). In this sense the epic-fantasy and science fiction genres are not just an escape into a mythical realm, but a device with which we can engage with some of the central problems of the period in which specific works are written (Liebherr 2012). This is because ideology is found exactly where we do not expect it; where it appears as non-ideology, its own opposite (Zizek 2009: 39). The fundamental dimension of ideology is a social reality whose existence implies the non-knowledge of its participants as to its essence, in a sense that it is not so much a false consciousness, an illusory representation of reality; but rather that the reality itself is to be conceived as ideological (Zizek2008: 15). Subsequently, this paper will analyse the context of these colonial hybrids in Martin's 'metafictioll, a term with which a clear allusion is made to the 'metanarrative' of Jean-Frans;ois Lyotard (1984). Additionally, it is a plea to continue criticising grand narratives, because the moment we argue that something is just fun and escapism, we are in the centre of ideology (Zizek 2008, 2009). The main arguments of the paper will be primarily illustrated with the orientalist notion of the East in Martin's fantasy world. This is because of the fact that orientalism is still present as long as some groups (such as academics) remain critically aware of it (Chakrabarty 2000: 28). It will also be argued that as long as our fictions are colonial, our realities are far from being in any sense postcolonial.
'Ihe Hybrid Landscape ofEssos Umberto Eco argued that new worlds are not simply discovered. This is because we ARCHAEOLOGICAL REVIEW FROM (AMBRIDGE
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travel with 'background books' (previous notions of the world) which tell us what are we supposed to discover and how to interpret it (Eco 1996). Thus, as the map itself is a colonial apparatus par excellence (Johnson 2007: 87), the first step in deconstructing the colonial metafictions of A Song of Ice and Fire is to gaze upon the maps and landscapes of its world.
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