{"title":"Credibility, civility, and the archaeological dig house in mid-1950’s Egypt","authors":"W. Carruthers","doi":"10.1177/1469605318824689","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"This article argues that forms of civility governing who possessed the credibility to carry out archaeological fieldwork in Egypt changed during the post-Second World War era of decolonization. Incorporating Arabic sources, the article focuses on the preparation of a dig house used during an excavation run by the Egyptian Department of Antiquities and the University Museum of the University of Pennsylvania at the site of Mit Rahina, Egypt, in the mid-1950s. The study demonstrates how the colonial genealogies of such structures converged with political changes heralded by the rise of Egypt's President Nasser. Preparing the dig house, Euro-American archaeologists involved with the excavation had to abide by social norms practiced by the Egyptians who had recently taken charge of the Department of Antiquities. Given that these norms often perpetuated older hierarchies of race, gender, and class, however, the article questions what the end of colonialism actually meant for archaeology in Egypt and elsewhere.","PeriodicalId":46391,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Social Archaeology","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.6000,"publicationDate":"2019-01-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1177/1469605318824689","citationCount":"1","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Journal of Social Archaeology","FirstCategoryId":"98","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1177/1469605318824689","RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"历史学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"ANTHROPOLOGY","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 1
Abstract
This article argues that forms of civility governing who possessed the credibility to carry out archaeological fieldwork in Egypt changed during the post-Second World War era of decolonization. Incorporating Arabic sources, the article focuses on the preparation of a dig house used during an excavation run by the Egyptian Department of Antiquities and the University Museum of the University of Pennsylvania at the site of Mit Rahina, Egypt, in the mid-1950s. The study demonstrates how the colonial genealogies of such structures converged with political changes heralded by the rise of Egypt's President Nasser. Preparing the dig house, Euro-American archaeologists involved with the excavation had to abide by social norms practiced by the Egyptians who had recently taken charge of the Department of Antiquities. Given that these norms often perpetuated older hierarchies of race, gender, and class, however, the article questions what the end of colonialism actually meant for archaeology in Egypt and elsewhere.
期刊介绍:
The Journal of Social Archaeology is a fully peer reviewed international journal that promotes interdisciplinary research focused on social approaches in archaeology, opening up new debates and areas of exploration. It engages with and contributes to theoretical developments from other related disciplines such as feminism, queer theory, postcolonialism, social geography, literary theory, politics, anthropology, cognitive studies and behavioural science. It is explicitly global in outlook with temporal parameters from prehistory to recent periods. As well as promoting innovative social interpretations of the past, it also encourages an exploration of contemporary politics and heritage issues.