
































Theory Can Be Fun, or How We Learn from the Past in 14 Easy Chapters 

Review by Thomas F. Brunton

Archaeological Theory in a Nutshell

by Adrian Praetzellis

Left Coast Press, 2015

This book is easy to read, practical and funny.

This book is about archaeological theory and post-modernism.

Aren’t the above sentences contradictory? Not necessarily, and the author of Death by Theory (2011)

once again sets  out to entertain us with the aim of demystifying archaeological theory.  He does it

because he thinks one of the goals of archaeology is to “democratize the past.” I think he succeeds in

his aim and prepares us to attain the goal.

Is the book perfect? No, its brevity by its nature leaves things out. He oversimplifies and generalizes in

the early chapters (he admits it) but he makes up for some of it later.

In Chapter 1, he discusses the problems with theory books including TLDR (Too Long Didn’t Read),

which doesn’t describe this book – most chapters are about ten pages long. This, the longest chapter,

includes discussion of how archaeology works and the history of archaeological theory. The rest of the

book is brief and organized.

Each of the remaining chapters starts out with a “What is _____?” and then an example. The overview

often seems too brief but the examples are usually very helpful in illustrating how the theory has been



applied archaeologically. There is a ‘sum up,’ ‘Questions to Discuss’ and ‘Things to Read’ at the end of

each chapter.

• The ‘sum up’ often has some interesting insight into the discussion.

• There are too many Questions to Discuss at the end of several chapters for class room use and

they are not numbered. In general they are more thought provoking than ‘prove you read the

assignment.’

• Things to Read includes important stuff but there may be too many to be useful to beginners.

There is a glossary, which is perhaps the most useful part of the book. And TWO indexes. So it seems

like a text book, but doesn’t read like one. It could be used in an undergraduate course, but it can also

be read by graduate students, the educated public and out-of-touch academics.

Chapter 2 covers neoevolutionism with a good discussion of teleology. He leaves out any discussion of

Darwinian Archaeology – genes and memes as in Shennan (2002)

Chapters 3 and 4 are on Marxist and Critical Theory which I think go together. Praetzellis simplifies

Marx in the beginning but deals better with his example of the Ludlow Massacre; just as Marx provides

a thicker description in the 18th Brumaire (1852) then he does in his more theoretical works.

Chapter 5 Postcolonialism is where the book really starts to shine – giving an intelligible voice to the

‘post …’ theorists. And archaeology is able to give a voice to the subaltern. Chapters 6 and 7 give

voices  to  other  neglected groups.  The chapter  on feminist  archaeology gives  a  quick  overview of

feminism,  perhaps  too  quick.  He  leaves  out  some  of  the  depth  as  well  as  the  disagreement  and

controversy. The example for this section is What This Awl Means by Specter (1993). Praetzellis says it

is great archaeology but many archaeologists don’t see it that way, like the reaction to Ruth Tringham’s

house story (1991). The sum up is better. It includes the “add women and stir” metaphor and ends with

a discussion of agency

Just as feminists don’t just dig up women, Queer Theory is not digging up homosexuals. According to

Praetzellis, it is a way for archaeologists to think way outside the box, making the familiar strange and

the strange normal.



Chapters  8  and 9 cover  Structuralism and its  descendants Agency,  Structure and Structuration.  He

defends structuralism despite its faults (Deetz was a mentor) and provides a simplified version of the

agency and structure theories. But where is Bourdieu and Practice Theory?

Chapter 10 Transgressive Archaeologies and Chapter 11 Archaeological Biography are both ways of

communicating archaeology outside the normal academic mode. He made up these categories and they

go along with Queer Theory and feminist story telling. It is a different way of telling the story of the

past, just as science is a way of telling the most likely story (Feder 1999).

Chapter 12 Phenomenology and Chapter 13 Materiality discuss different ways of trying to understand

what it felt like back then. Praetzellis comes up with the great metaphor that phenomenology is like

method acting.

Chapter 14 The Next Big Thing, or Where Do We Go From Here? Not the death of theory or some new

paradigm shift  because the creation myths  of  Binford and then Hodder  are  just  that,  myths.  Most

archaeologists  were  not  doing  either  one,  partly  because  most  in  the  US  are  CRM  (contract)

archaeologist.

He thinks to the future will be a more practical use of theory, no overt theory or pick and choose what

theory or viewpoint fits. For the consumer this might mean more readable and people oriented texts.

Chapter  15  is  what  he  calls  a  ‘Postmodern  Phrasebook.’ It  is  an  archeology  theory  glossary  –

potentially the most used part of the book. Although a few words, like reify and praxis, were in the text

but not in the glossary.

Conclusions.

This book led me to a new understanding of some things I thought I understood and it cleared up some

misconceptions. But it left out some things I think are important. I had more complaints about the

sections I knew more about and was more satisfied with the sections I was unfamiliar with. I assume

that readers with different interests than mine would discover the same phenomenon.



Praetzell is clearly sympathetic to many of the fringe or post-modern theories, but that may be why he

writes so well about them. Often people can’t explain theories that they don’t agree with, or understand

very well. My notes had the repeating phrase – thought provoking.

Demystifying and democratizing? Yes as in plain, easy to understand language.

References Cited

Deetz, James F.

1996. In Small Things Forgotten: An Archaeology of Early American Life. Anchor Books, New York.

Feder, Kenneth.

1999. Frauds, Myths and Mysteries: Science and Pseudoscience in Archaeology, 3rd edn. Mountain

View, CA: Mayfield.

Marx, Karl

2008 [1852].  The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte.  Rockville,  MD: Wildside Press. Also

available at https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1852/18th-brumaire/ch01.htm 

Praetzellis, Adrian

2011.  Death by Theory: A Tale of Mystery and Archaeological Theory.  AltaMira Press, Lanham,

Massachusetts

Shennen, Steven

2002. Genes, Memes and Human History: Darwinian Archaeology and Cultural Evolution. Thames

& Hudson.

Spector, Janet

1993.  What  This  Awl Means:  Feminist  Archaeology  at  a  Wahpeteton  Dakota Village.  Minnesota

Historical Society Press, St. Paul.

Tringham, Ruth

1991. Households with Faces: the Challenge of Gender in Prehistoric Architectural Remains. In Joan

Gero  and  Margaret  (Eds.)  Engendering  Archaeology:  Women  in  Prehistory (pp.  93–131).  Basil

https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1852/18th-brumaire/ch01.htm


Blackwell, Cambridge, Massachusetts.  

Thomas F. Brunton has done fieldwork in the US, England, Denmark and Sweden. He has been an

adjunct and a shovel bum.  He currently lives in Sweden where he has been volunteering for the Bjäre

Härads Hembygdsförening, and also being a student again at Akademi Båstad. His research interests

include  the  interactions  of  ethnicity  and  gender,  the  origins  and  maintenance  of  inequality,  the

archaeology of work and the landscape.

© 2015 Thomas F. Brunton


