Details

Autor(en) / Beteiligte

• Harpster, Matthew

Titel

Theoretical and methodological foundations

Ist Teil von

• Reconstructing a Maritime Past, 2023, p.40-74

Auflage

1

Ort / Verlag

United Kingdom: Routledge

Erscheinungsjahr

2023

Quelle

Alma/SFX Local Collection

Beschreibungen/Notizen

• Whereas the previous chapter argued that an alternative to the prevailing culture-history interpretive approach in maritime archaeology is necessary, this chapter establishes the foundation of this study's alternative - a maritime culture - around four elements. Two of these elements strongly resemble prehistoric and historical-archaeological practices in North America and northern Europe. The first is a methodology that generates a narrative of human activity using solely the material record, and the second is a more fluid perception of culture that accommodates flexible individual expressions and variations in those needs over time. As demonstrated, Westerdahl's maritime culture, which is central to this study's alternative, emerged from the intellectual history of this perspective of culture. The other two elements of this study's alternative are corollaries. The first are ideas about the human construction of place from space; in this case, a maritime landscape from a raw, unstructured environment. The second, and last, is the transformative power of the sea over people, changing individuals and their relations with others perceptually and spiritually, dynamics that can further distinguish a maritime culture from other groups elsewhere.