Flooded Pasts: UNESCO, Nubia, and the Recolonization of Archaeology

by William Carruthers

Flooded Pasts examines a world famous yet critically underexamined event―UNESCO's International Campaign to Save the Monuments of Nubia (1960–80)―to show how the project, its genealogy, and its aftermath not only propelled archaeology into the postwar world but also helped to "recolonize" it. In this book, William Carruthers asks how postwar decolonization took shape and what role a colonial discipline like archaeology―forged in the crucible of imperialism―played as the "new nations" asserted themselves in the face of the global Cold War. As the Aswan High Dam became the centerpiece of Gamal Abdel Nasser's Egyptian revolution, the Nubian campaign sought to salvage and preserve ancient temples and archaeological sites from the new barrage's floodwaters. Conducted in the neighboring regions of Egyptian and Sudanese Nubia, the project built on years of Nubian archaeological work conducted under British occupation and influence. During that process, the campaign drew on the scientific racism that guided those earlier surveys, helping to consign Nubians themselves to state-led resettlement and modernization programs, even as UNESCO created a picturesque archaeological landscape fit for global media and tourist consumption. Flooded Pasts describes how colonial archaeological and anthropological practices―and particularly their archival and documentary manifestations―created an ancient Nubia severed from the region's population. As a result, the Nubian campaign not only became fundamental to the creation of UNESCO's 1972 World Heritage Convention but also exposed questions about the goals of archaeology and heritage and whether the colonial origins of these fields will ever be overcome.

Genres: History

336 pages, Hardcover

Published December 15, 2022

Reviews

[Layla Ren · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book offers a social history of archaeological knowledge, examining the period from the late nineteenth century—under British colonial administration—to the construction of the Aswan High Dam under Nasser in the 1970s. Drawing extensively on museum and academic archives, it traces international experts’ archaeological work on Nubian sites threatened by inundation, as well as the forced displacement of Nubian communities. I picked it up after visiting Abu Simbel and the Temple of Philae in Egypt.

In my view, a topic of this scale and significance ultimately requires engaging directly with Nubians themselves through fieldwork and oral history, rather than relying solely on the perspectives of archaeological experts. Depending almost entirely on the latter makes the book rather dull, as it largely amounts to close readings of successive documents. While this approach is understandable given the author’s disciplinary background in archaeology, it feels insufficient to fully sustain such a major question.