Book manuscripts
setName: label: See more items in
content: Lewis R. Binford Papers
unitdate: label: Date
content: 1962-2010, undated
dataSource: label: Archival Repository
content: National Anthropological Archives
identifier: label: Identifier
content: NAA.2022-18, Series 8
objectType: label: Type
content: Archival materials
arrangement: label: Arrangement
content: This series is arranged by monograph chronologically. Titles for monographs which the files relate to are titled in brackets.
scopecontent: label: Scope and Contents
content: This series consists of manuscript material related to published and unpublished monographs written by Binford. This includes Binford's 1964 unpublished dissertation from U-M, concerned with complex systems of early North American settlers. Subsistence Ecology of Hunter-Gatherers is an unpublished monograph, considered by Binford as his initial hunter-gatherers book. There are two versions written five years apart, one in 1973 and another version in 1978. These manuscripts are the basis for Constructing Frames of Reference, published nearly 20 years later. This book was shelved by Binford as it lacked the data required to understand how hunter-gatherer systems were organized. In Pursuit of the Past, published in 1983 as the result of his European lecture tour, is a reflection on his theories and approaches based on his fieldwork in South Africa, Europe, Australia, and Alaska. The materials in this series related to this book consist of lecture transcripts. 

The Combe Grenal manuscript was intended as a collaborative effort with Francois Bordes. Both archaeologists were involved in the excavations at Combe Grenal in the 1960's and engaged in friendly disagreements. This book planned to focus on Bordes' study of stratigraphy, geology, and stone tool typology, while Binford worked with site structure and taphonomy. Bordes' sudden death in 1981 re-energized Binford's efforts to publish their findings at Combe Grenal. The Combe Grenal manuscripts found in this series are from the 1980's and are re-worked from Binford's fieldwork gathered in the late 1960's. The manuscript was blocked in French courts and never saw publication.

Binford's last monograph, unpublished at the time of his death, and simply referred to as "New Book," focused on site structure and interpreting data gathered from his previous work on hunters-gatherers: Constructing Frames of Reference. Additionally, there are partial manuscripts from Constructing Frames of Reference, Debating Archaeology, and Nunamiut Ethnoarchaeology.