The materiality of serial practice
Subtitle: a microarchaeology of burial
By: Fredrik Fahlander ; [English revision, Niel Tomkinson].
Series: GOTARC.; no. 23
Publisher: Dept. of Archaeology, Göteborg University
Published: 2003
Place of publication: Göteborg
Language: eng
Number of pages: 200
First sentence: In 1998, a local farmer decided to construct a simple dirt road to the 
top of the Tambouria hill. It was constructed according to local 
practice, simply by letting a bulldozer cut through the rocks and 
soil, zigzagging up the slopes and making a rough, but flat enough, 
surface for pickup trucks or jeeps to pass. It is a fast but brutal 
method, with little concern for the natural and cultural landscape, 
that leaves a long, winding, open scar on the hillside. In the scarp of 
the road in the lowermost area of Tambouria, slabs of stone are now 
visible, along with smaller concentrations of bones and non-diag- 
nostic potsherds. With or without knowledge of its past use, the 
road was laid out straight through an ancient cemetery. 
Some decades earlier, one or two ancient cist graves had been 
recorded at the site. They were typical cist graves, constructed of 
rough stones forming a rectangular cavity and sealed by one or two 
larger slabs of stone. Such constructions are well known in the area 
and elsewhere with no particular reference in time or space. The 
graves were plundered many years ago and any bones or artefacts 
have long gone. In their current state, they have not been regarded 
as significant and have thus received little attention from the local 
heritage management. Now those burials have gone, destroyed by 
the new, ‘constructed’ road. Instead, however, a number of previ- 
ously unknown graves are visible in the scarp or as depressions in 
the road. In closer examination, traces of their original constructions 
could be identified. In one case, a small (20x20 cm) hole in the scarp
made it possible to look right through into an almost undisturbed 
cist grave, including a complete human skeleton. Despite efforts to 
seal the grave, it was found ruined by animals on being revisited a 
year later. In one sense, the destruction of the ancient graves is a 
tragic case of ignorance by the part of the landowner which also re- 
veals gaps in the local cultural heritage management. Some 
information about burial practices of an ancient social formation is 
lost forever. From another point of view, the careless construction of 
the road presents a case of ‘free’ information that could be retrieved 
only by expensive excavation.
Description: Abstract (English)
The main concern of the thesis is the question of how to deal with matters of social heterogeneity in prehistory. A social reading of psychoanalytic theory of e.g. Jacques Lacan suggests that social heterogeneity generally is more likely than homogeneity in most social formations. It is therefore argued that the past is difficult to understand in a hermeneutical sense of the term. As an alternative approach, a general theory of social practice and materialities, a microarchaeology, is outlined. Departing from Jean Paul Sartre’s concept of seriality, it is argued that social practice is generally performed in close relation to materialities. The microarchaeological approach focuses on executed practice, that is, those actions that actually were performed. Such practice is argued to be subject to both individual agency and to more general ‘structural’ elements. From such a perspective, there is thus no need to make awkward dichotomous distinctions between, for instance, individual and structure, or emic vs. etic perspectives.
The potential of the microarchaeological approach is exemplified by two different sets of data: The Neolithic graves of Ajvide, Gotland, Sweden and the graves of Asea and Tegea in Arcadia, Greece. The first study aims to discuss social heterogeneity and corporeal subjectivation/subjection. It is argued that the so-called Pitted Ware Culture (GRK) expressed great social variability and demonstrated several significant transformations, rather than comprising a homogeneous ‘culture’. The second study concerns the place of graves in the local ‘cultural’ and ‘natural’ landscape. It is suggested that the sites chosen for burial generally depend on a matrix of structurating parameters that involves a range of aspects such as memory, ‘natural’ features, material circumstances, as well as notions of visibility and invisibility, etc. Some structurating parameters may work in concert but may also be overruled by other parameters. There can thus not be a question of simple relationships between, for instance, the places of habitation and the places of burials.
 
Key words: Microarchaeology, social theory, social practice, landscape, graves, Ajvide, Asea, Tegea, corporeality, Neolithic, GRK, Pitted Ware Culture.

Full text available: http://www.mikroarkeologi.se/publications/ffavh.htm
Notes: Thesis (Ph. D.)--Göteborg University, 2003.