Comparative ethnography
nSuch ideas are hardly new;
indeed the organising principles of the
Pitt-Rivers Museum in Oxford were intended to demonstrate
something of the kind. Pitt-Rivers used Polynesian
war-clubs to illustrate the point and certainly island
societies are ideal for showing gradual change
without confounding areal influences.
nWhat is
new is the potential for an interpretative framework,
that can combine the insights of archaeology with the
results of linguistics.
nBefore considering how this
might work, it is useful to backtrack and consider
the practices of ethnographers early in the
twentieth century, particularly those of the
German-Swedish school.