Archaeologies of the Mediterranean

Friday 14 April – Saturday 15 April 2023

Joukowsky Institute for Archaeology and the Ancient World
Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island

Full Program | Speakers and Discussants | Abstracts

 

Mediterranean Archaeology sits at an often complex intersection of the fields of Archaeology, Classics, Anthropology, History, and Art History. While several of these fields, in particular Classics and Anthropology have begun periods of significant critical self-reflection that explicitly question their present and future, Mediterranean Archaeology is doing so in a more fragmented manner. This lack of coherence may perhaps be ascribed to institutional fragmentation, in particular in US academia, but it can also be traced to its intricate location at the intersection of multiple academic traditions. As a result, Mediterranean archaeology has struggled to identify its own priorities and find its own voice for challenging traditional narratives and approaches and, as a result, risks being subsumed by adjacent disciplines with louder voices, despite many possible valuable contributions.

In light of these challenges, and especially considering the rapid pace of developments in archaeological methods and theory, the time is ripe to consider both the state of our field at this moment in time and to discuss where it can and should go in the future. Nearly every facet of Mediterranean Archaeology may be questioned and, indeed, we must do so in order to guarantee the continued relevance of our subject in both the ancient and modern worlds.

Brown University’s Joukowsky Institute for Archaeology and the Ancient World will host a conference titled State of the Field 2023: Archaeologies of the Mediterranean on April 14-15, 2023. This meeting builds on a tradition of ‘State of the Field’ workshops hosted by the Joukowsky Institute since 2011 that reflect upon current trends in archaeological practice. This year’s conference discusses the place of Mediterranean Archaeology in the modern world in North America, Europe and the Mediterranean. We intend to examine academic traditions and assumptions as well as contemporary institutional and political structures that frame our theoretical and methodological engagement with the material culture of the ancient Mediterranean and adjacent regions in order to ensure that the field maintains relevance into the future.

This conference will be held in person on the campus of Brown University, and is free and open to the public. No registration is required.

Although the conference will not be offered online in a hybrid format, we plan to film the proceedings and make as many of the talks as possible available for viewing online several weeks after the conference’s conclusion.

Full Program | Speakers and Discussants | Abstracts

 

See the Call for Papers here:
https://sites.brown.edu/archaeology/2022/12/20/sotf2023-cfp.