Ethnoarchaeology
qEthnoarchaeology
represents an attempt to infuse
more interpretative life into prehistory, using contemporary ethnographic data to propose likely meanings for archaeological finds.
qThus, if
we find pots are decorated using certain
techniques in the present using tools which may be perishable and thus invisible in the archaeological record, it is a reasonable assumption that similar tools could have been used in the past.
qBut the
important point about most ethnoarchaeology
is that its fieldwork in the present is
driven by archaeological questions, notably
deriving from ceramics and metalworking
and its use of ethnography is therefore
highly selective.
