Richard M. Leventhal - Böcker

The dynamic discourse stimulated by 78 magnificent objects created by Native Americans over the years, now housed in the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, and the responses of contemporary Native Americans to those objects forms the core of this book. As seen in these vibrant pages, the Museum is not a place of dead objects from the past. It is, rather, a place of people and ideas about human societies and cultures, a place of living, active objects, a place where the present can connect to the past. The volume editors frame important issues and concepts-the nature of Native American identity in the past and present, indigenous sovereignty, the active destruction of Native American cultures and languages over the past half-millennium, along with their perseverance and strength to survive, and, finally, the power of ancestors. As Richard M. Leventhal, the Museum's Williams Director, notes in his Foreword, the Native American scholars and artists who contribute to this book are assisting the Museum in its attempt to become a more integral part of today's world. It is the preservation of ideas embodied within objects from the past and present that allows for the representation and strength of Native American identity.

Theory and Practice in Mediterranean Archaeology: Old World and New World Perspectives brings together leading scholars from the Old World and the Americas to discuss some of the most pressing issues facing archaeology today. These topics include archaeology and text, the future of large-scale archaeological fieldwork at individual sites, interpretation and preservation of archaeological sites and landscapes, past trajectories and new approaches to regional survey, and debates surrounding landscape and settlement archaeology. Essays by Old World archaeologists provide an overview of these themes, as well as a history of research over the last hundred years. These scholars review the major successes and shortcomings of that work, identifying critical issues that determine and define the field. These essays serve as a springboard for discussion and response by archaeologists working in the Americas and in other parts of the world. The combination of an Old World focus with responses from New World archaeologists provides a uniquely broad assessment of contemporary archaeological theory, methods, and practice throughout the world.