Embattled Excavations
American national self-invention is fundamentally entwined with cultural constructions of American “prehistory” – the human presence on the continent since the earliest arrivals at least 16,000 years ago. Embattled Excavations offers exemplary readings of the entanglements between reconstructions of...
Saved in:
| Main Author: | |
|---|---|
| Format: | Online |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
Waxmann Verlag
2021
|
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://directory.doabooks.org/handle/20.500.12854/74503 |
| Tags: |
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
|
| _version_ | 1869515991411589120 |
|---|---|
| author | Mackenthun, Gesa |
| author_browse | Mackenthun, Gesa |
| author_facet | Mackenthun, Gesa |
| author_sort | Mackenthun, Gesa |
| collection | Directory of Open Access Books |
| description | American national self-invention is fundamentally entwined with cultural constructions of American “prehistory” – the human presence on the continent since the earliest arrivals at least 16,000 years ago. Embattled Excavations offers exemplary readings of the entanglements between reconstructions of the American deep past and racialist ideologies and legal doctrine, with continental expansionism and Manifest Destiny, and with the epistemic and spiritual crisis about the origins of mankind following nineteenth-century discoveries in the fields of geology and evolutionary biology. It argues, from a decolonial perspective, that popular assumptions about the early history of settlement effectively downplay the length and intensity of the Indigenous presence on the continent. Individual chapters critically investigate modern scientific hypotheses about Pleistocene migrations; they follow in the tracks of imperial and transatlantic adventurers in search of Maya ruins and fossil megafauna; and they triangulate colonial and transcultural reconstructions of the events leading to the formation of Crater Lake (Oregon) with previously ignored Indigenous traditions about the ancient cataclysm. The examples show a deep-seated colonial anxiety about America’s foreign pre-colonial past, evinced by popular archaeology’s nervous silencing of Indigenous knowledge – a condition now subject to revision due to a growing Indigenous presence in the discursive field. |
| format | Online |
| id | doab-20.500.12854ir-74503 |
| institution | Directory of Open Access Books |
| language | eng |
| publishDate | 2021 |
| publishDateRange | 2021 |
| publishDateSort | 2021 |
| publisher | Waxmann Verlag |
| publisherStr | Waxmann Verlag |
| record_format | ojs |
| spelling | doab-20.500.12854ir-745032024-03-29T08:06:32Z Embattled Excavations Mackenthun, Gesa American Studies; New American Studies; American Isthmus; settler colonial studies; history of science; postcolonial studies; decolonial studies; Colonialism; colonial discourse analysis; ciritical empire studies; Fossils; Archaeology bic Book Industry Communication::J Society & social sciences::JH Sociology & anthropology::JHM Anthropology::JHMC Social & cultural anthropology, ethnography bic Book Industry Communication::H Humanities::HB History::HBL History: earliest times to present day::HBLH Early modern history: c 1450/1500 to c 1700 thema EDItEUR::J Society and Social Sciences::JH Sociology and anthropology::JHM Anthropology::JHMC Social and cultural anthropology thema EDItEUR::N History and Archaeology thema EDItEUR::3 Time period qualifiers::3M c 1500 onwards to present day American national self-invention is fundamentally entwined with cultural constructions of American “prehistory” – the human presence on the continent since the earliest arrivals at least 16,000 years ago. Embattled Excavations offers exemplary readings of the entanglements between reconstructions of the American deep past and racialist ideologies and legal doctrine, with continental expansionism and Manifest Destiny, and with the epistemic and spiritual crisis about the origins of mankind following nineteenth-century discoveries in the fields of geology and evolutionary biology. It argues, from a decolonial perspective, that popular assumptions about the early history of settlement effectively downplay the length and intensity of the Indigenous presence on the continent. Individual chapters critically investigate modern scientific hypotheses about Pleistocene migrations; they follow in the tracks of imperial and transatlantic adventurers in search of Maya ruins and fossil megafauna; and they triangulate colonial and transcultural reconstructions of the events leading to the formation of Crater Lake (Oregon) with previously ignored Indigenous traditions about the ancient cataclysm. The examples show a deep-seated colonial anxiety about America’s foreign pre-colonial past, evinced by popular archaeology’s nervous silencing of Indigenous knowledge – a condition now subject to revision due to a growing Indigenous presence in the discursive field. Published 2021-11-26T10:12:24Z 2021-11-26T10:12:24Z 2021-10-15 book 9783830943860 https://directory.doabooks.org/handle/20.500.12854/74503 eng Cultural Encounters and the Discourses of Scholarship image/jpeg Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International https://www.waxmann.com/buch4386 https://www.waxmann.com/buch4386 Waxmann Verlag 10.31244/9783830993865 10.31244/9783830993865 73f853dd-22eb-4606-af25-819fc9d6debf 9783830943860 11 240 open access |
| spellingShingle | American Studies; New American Studies; American Isthmus; settler colonial studies; history of science; postcolonial studies; decolonial studies; Colonialism; colonial discourse analysis; ciritical empire studies; Fossils; Archaeology bic Book Industry Communication::J Society & social sciences::JH Sociology & anthropology::JHM Anthropology::JHMC Social & cultural anthropology, ethnography bic Book Industry Communication::H Humanities::HB History::HBL History: earliest times to present day::HBLH Early modern history: c 1450/1500 to c 1700 thema EDItEUR::J Society and Social Sciences::JH Sociology and anthropology::JHM Anthropology::JHMC Social and cultural anthropology thema EDItEUR::N History and Archaeology thema EDItEUR::3 Time period qualifiers::3M c 1500 onwards to present day Mackenthun, Gesa Embattled Excavations |
| title | Embattled Excavations |
| title_full | Embattled Excavations |
| title_fullStr | Embattled Excavations |
| title_full_unstemmed | Embattled Excavations |
| title_short | Embattled Excavations |
| title_sort | embattled excavations |
| topic | American Studies; New American Studies; American Isthmus; settler colonial studies; history of science; postcolonial studies; decolonial studies; Colonialism; colonial discourse analysis; ciritical empire studies; Fossils; Archaeology bic Book Industry Communication::J Society & social sciences::JH Sociology & anthropology::JHM Anthropology::JHMC Social & cultural anthropology, ethnography bic Book Industry Communication::H Humanities::HB History::HBL History: earliest times to present day::HBLH Early modern history: c 1450/1500 to c 1700 thema EDItEUR::J Society and Social Sciences::JH Sociology and anthropology::JHM Anthropology::JHMC Social and cultural anthropology thema EDItEUR::N History and Archaeology thema EDItEUR::3 Time period qualifiers::3M c 1500 onwards to present day |
| topic_facet | American Studies; New American Studies; American Isthmus; settler colonial studies; history of science; postcolonial studies; decolonial studies; Colonialism; colonial discourse analysis; ciritical empire studies; Fossils; Archaeology bic Book Industry Communication::J Society & social sciences::JH Sociology & anthropology::JHM Anthropology::JHMC Social & cultural anthropology, ethnography bic Book Industry Communication::H Humanities::HB History::HBL History: earliest times to present day::HBLH Early modern history: c 1450/1500 to c 1700 thema EDItEUR::J Society and Social Sciences::JH Sociology and anthropology::JHM Anthropology::JHMC Social and cultural anthropology thema EDItEUR::N History and Archaeology thema EDItEUR::3 Time period qualifiers::3M c 1500 onwards to present day |
| url | https://directory.doabooks.org/handle/20.500.12854/74503 |
| work_keys_str_mv | AT mackenthungesa embattledexcavations |