This comprehensive, fully illustrated Companion answers the need for an in-depth archaeology reference that provides authoritative coverage of this complex and interdisciplinary field. The work brings together the myriad strands and the great temporal and spatial breadth of the field into two thematically organized volumes. In twenty-six authoritative and clearly-written essays, this Companion explores the origins, aims, methods and problems of archaeology. Each essay is written by a scholar of international standing and illustrations complement the text.

This comprehensive, fully illustrated Companion answers the need for an in-depth archaeology reference that provides authoritative coverage of this complex and interdisciplinary field. The work brings together the myriad strands and the great temporal and spatial breadth of the field into two thematically organized volumes. In twenty-six authoritative and clearly-written essays, this Companion explores the origins, aims, methods and problems of archaeology. Each essay is written by a scholar of international standing and illustrations complement the text.

* Provides a comprehensive survey of contemporary thinking in biological, social and cultural anthropology and establishes the interconnections between these three fields. * Useful cross-references within the text, with full biographical references and suggestions for further reading. * Carefully illustrated with line drawings and photographs. 'The Companion Encyclopedia of Anthropology is a welcome addition to the reference literature. Bringing together authoritative, incisive and scrupulously edited contributions from some three dozen authors. The book achieves an impressive breadth of coverage of specialist areas.' - Times Higher Educational Supplement 'Recommended for all anthropology collections, especially those in academic libraries.' - Library Journal 'This is a marvellous book and I am very happy to recommend it.' - Reference Reviews

A Companion to Archaeology features essays from 27 of the world’s leading authorities on different types of archaeology that aim to define the field and describe what it means to be an archaeologist. Shows that contemporary archaeology is an astonishingly broad activity, with many contrasting specializations and ways of approaching the material record of past societies. Includes essays by experts in reading the past through art, linguistics, or the built environment, and by professionals who present the past through heritage management and museums. Introduces the reader to a range of archaeologists: those who devote themselves to the philosophy of archaeology, those who see archaeology as politics or anthropology, and those who contend that the essence of the discipline is a hard science.

The Encyclopedia of Historical Archaeology is a ground-breaking compendium of information about this ever-growing field. Concentrating on the post-1400 period as well as containing generic explanations of historical archaeology where needed, the encyclopedia is compiled by over 120 experts from around the world and contains more than 370 entries covering important concepts and sites.

James Delle has solved a number of problems in Caribbean archaeology with An Archaeology of Social Space. He deals with most of the problems by using historical archaeology, and clearly implicates Ameri canist prehistorians. Although this book is about coffee plantations in the Blue Mountains area of Jamaica, it is actually about the whole Caribbean. Just as it is about all archaeology, not only historical archaeology, it is also a book about colonialism and national inde pendence and how these two enormous events happened in the context of eighteenth and nineteenth century capitalism. The first issue raised appears to be an academic topic that has come to be known as landscape archaeology. Landscape archaeology considers the planned spaces around living places. The topic is big, comprehensive, and new within historical archaeology. Its fundamen tal insight is that in the early modern and modern worlds everything within view could be made into money. Seeing occurs in space and from 1450, or a little before, everything that could be seen could, potentially, be measured. The measuring-and the accompanying culture of record ing called a scriptural economy-became a way of controlling people in space, for a profit. Dr. Delle thus explores maps, local philosophies of settlement, town dwelling, housing, and the actual condition of plantations and their buildings now, so as to describe coffee-Jamaica from 1790-1860.

Margarita Diaz-Andreu offers an innovative history of archaeology during the nineteenth century, encompassing all its fields from the origins of humanity to the medieval period, and all areas of the world. The development of archaeology is placed within the framework of contemporary political events, with a particular focus upon the ideologies of nationalism and imperialism. Diaz-Andreu examines a wide range of issues, including the creation of institutions, the conversion of the study of antiquities into a profession, public memory, changes in archaeological thought and practice, and the effect on archaeology of racism, religion, the belief in progress, hegemony, and resistance.

Many dryland regions contain archaeological remains which suggest that there must have been intensive phases of settlement in what now seem to be dry and degraded environments. This book discusses successes and failures of past land use and settlement in drylands, and contributes to wider debates about desertification and the sustainability of dryland settlement.

This book explores the ways in which past cultures have been used to shape colonial and postcolonial cultural identities. It provides a theoretical framework to understand these processes, and offers illustrative case studies in which the agency of ancient peoples, rather than the desires of antiquarians and archaeologists, is brought to the fore.

Divided into four distinct sections and drawing across various disciplines, this volume seeks to reappraise the place of archaeology in the contemporary world by providing a series of essays that critically engage with both old and current debates in the field of public archaeology.