Archaeology, Ritual, Religion

by Timothy Insoll

The archaeology of religion is a much neglected area, yet religious sites and artefacts constitute a major area of archaeological evidence. Timothy Insoll presents an introductory statement on the archaeology of religion, examining what archaeology can tell us about religion, the problems of defining and theorizing religion in archaeology, and the methodology, or how to 'do', the archaeology of religion.

This volume assesses religion and ritual through a range of examples from around the world and across time, including prehistoric religions, shamanism, African religions, death, landscape and even food. Insoll also discusses the history of research and varying theories in this field before looking to future research directions. This book will be a valuable guide for students and archaeologists, and initiate a major area of debate.

Genres: Archaeology, Nonfiction, Religion

208 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2004

Reviews

[Jeffrey · Rating 4 out of 5]

Before I start with the book, I want to start with a little background about myself. I have absolutely no training or familiarity with archeology, anthropology, or any related field or subfield. Before this Sunday I had never heard the terms processualism, post processualism, cognitive processualism, or archaeological phenomenology, and I still don't understand any of them beyond the first two lines of their Wikipedia entries. Even having read the case studies I don't feel like I'm any closer to understanding what Yoruba is, and Dogon still sounds like an old god out of H.P. Lovecraft (Dagon). The only times I've encountered archeology, it was far removed from any primary source, usually in books meant for popular consumption about the historicity of Jesus, say by Bart Ehrman for example. All I have is sort of a general impression that the rules of evidence are somewhat loosened the further back in the record you go, owing to the fact that the record becomes more and more sparse (depending of course on climate and environmental conditions that may make it more or less likely for material to survive).

So when I read "Archaeology, Ritual, Religion" by Timothy Insoll and his sustained and vociferous criticism of archeology of religion I'm left questioning if the whole field of study is hopeless. He describes problematic and misapplied terminology, which anyone familiar with first year religious studies should hopefully be familiar with, and if that was the end of it I wouldn't be terribly concerned. But Insoll asserts that archeologists tend to treat anything 'odd' as if it were ritual or religion, and that's when they even consider religion seriously and not ignore it entirely or take it as a secondary, leading to othering. Archeologists also project themselves and their own understandings of the world back into the past, creating understandings that reflect the contemporary culture and not necessarily the culture of study. This is the insider/outsider problem taken to a new extreme by massive periods of time separating the archeologist from their subject of study, never mind the obvious cultural differences. Archeologists apparently also fall prey to particularisms, both focusing on the certain scales of analysis (e.g. individual vs. community), and on certain cultural elements (e.g. burial). They also force the data to fit their frameworks, ignore interdisciplinary approaches, let past colonialist (and often racist) approaches still sometimes sneak into the discourse, misapply ethnographic (and other forms of) evidence, and draw all sorts of unwarranted conclusions.

To these problems Insoll, who does say at the end of the book that he wants to dismantle the existing approaches to archeology of religion, offers no solutions except a general call to admit that the past is far more complex than usually admitted and that it is like exploring other dimensions because of it's sheer foreignness. It all comes out sounding like there's no way to ever get even a broad strokes general understanding of the distant past. It's all incredibly frightening and disheartening. How much should I really rely on what I've been taught about the Indus Valley (Harappan) Civilization? What about all that talk of shamanism when dealing with African or Native American religion? Is what I've been taught about ancient Chinese ancestor worship remotely accurate? How would I even know?

Moreover, being a complete unfamiliar with archeology, Insoll's work is seems so incredibly caustic that I also wonder if he's treated his sources fairly. Surely there must be a reason to think the 'Stone Face' from El Juyo (Figure 3) really is a stone face (half lion, half human) and not simply an act of pareidolia by Freeman and Gonzalez. Is it really fair to say it's just an archeological "Face on Mars"? I don't know and I don't know how I'd evaluate the claims (either pro or con). I also wonder if the sources selected for criticism are a representative sample of archeology. Could there be some degree of cherry-picking (conscious or unconscious) going on? Again I don't know.

If nothing else, the book really does reinforce my understanding that all history is interpretive reconstruction, and a site of contention.

[Cathy Graham · Rating 3 out of 5]

Thought provoking analysis of various archeological approaches to religion. I felt the case studies could have been expanded. Good notes and bibliography.

[Alexandru Sovaiala · Rating 2 out of 5]

The book itself it’s very bad and outdated. Myth ritual and the oral gives a much better perspective upon the same topic.

[Jay Fisher · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book read like the introduction of a dissertation. The author had clearly digested the bibliography but the writing style created entirely too much work for the reader. Moreover there were stylistic ticks that really annoyed me. It is not possible to "literally broaden" someone's mind. Unqualified "this"-es ran roughshod over the text in a way that would make Plato blush. I wish the author had taken care to write clear prose rather than publishing prolifically and repeatedly citing himself. There were some interesting points here and there.

[Gaoming]

good book