12th September 2011, 12:31 PM
makapanman Wrote:Drifting away from things we can do as practical exercies or as a classroom based workshop.
Well perhaps not so much. Understanding the basic building blocks of what a site is, is basic archaeological "theory" ( without moving into the realms of higher "theory"). Surprisingly however, I have met numerous early practitioners (undoubtedly was one) having difficulty fighting their way out of the maze of local matrices, to see that the "story" is perhaps not necessarily so complicated, and is dominated by a few really key relationships ( or not, depending on the site...). And part of the problem, is that they are not seeing the 'big picture": construction, occupation, re-construction,.....abandon, d?molition.....etc , - wood for trees. Practical exercises - off the top of head - would be, to provide a significant data set : have the students draw the matrix, attribute construction, occupation etc to the matrix, give the students the dating material, and get them to tell the diachronique story of the site.