Format: Standard Paper Session
Organisers: Andy Rogers (University of Leicester) & Jonny Graham (University of Leicester)
Contact: ajr64@leicester.ac.uk; jag62@leicester.ac.uk
Difference has been an important theme in archaeology since the inception of the discipline, although it has been articulated and understood in a variety of ways.
Post-processualism marked a shift in which archaeologists started considering the diverse ways of being human in more detail. Amidst these developments, researchers examined markers of difference such as gender, and tackled issues of identity. In addition, postcolonial and feminist archaeologies have challenged the application of modern, western concepts to past contexts.
Nevertheless, the prevailing understanding of difference in archaeology has been one that exists between terms, acting as a measure of what one thing lacks that the other has. Recently, however, archaeologists utilising posthumanist and new materialist frameworks have begun to approach difference differently. Instead, archaeologists are beginning to engage with an understanding of difference proposed by Gilles Deleuze in his revolutionary Difference and Repetition: difference-in-itself. For Deleuze, difference was an affirmative force behind everything in reality, and its repetition led to the production of the new.
Despite this commitment to difference, posthumanists and new materialists are often accused by critics of reducing humans and nonhumans to being the same when employing devices such as flat ontologies. On the contrary, starting from a flat ontological position, and not predetermining humans as most important, requires a thorough engagement with difference.
In this session, we want to explore the role of difference, beyond the normative understanding defined by lack, and welcome papers that attempt to grapple with radical difference in the past or in archaeological praxis.
TAG Edinburgh 2022 