The University of Southampton
University of Southampton Institutional Repository

Rock art and ontology

Rock art and ontology
Rock art and ontology
Rock art studies are a global endeavour, with researchers working in key regions including Australia, North and South America, Africa, Asia, and Europe (particularly western Europe). Rock art scholars, like most archaeologists, participated in the epistemological debates relating to objectivity and subjectivity that took place in the 1980s and 1990s with the shift from the scientific perspective known as processualism to the interpretative perspective described as post-processualism (e.g. Taçon and Chippindale 1998). More recently, archaeologists have begun to explore ontological questions, and rock art scholars have been slower to engage with these debates (with some honourable exceptions e.g Dowson 2009; Creese 2011; Robinson 2013; Porr and Bell 2012). This paper reviews recent ontological debates in archaeology, and examines how ontology has been discussed in rock art studies. Ultimately, the review argues that a critical awareness of ontological issues forces rock art scholars to fundamentally reconsider their sub-discipline.
0084-6570
167-181
Jones, Andrew
3e8becff-0d46-42eb-85db-2dd4f07e92a3
Jones, Andrew
3e8becff-0d46-42eb-85db-2dd4f07e92a3

Jones, Andrew (2017) Rock art and ontology. Annual Review of Anthropology, 46, 167-181. (doi:10.1146/annurev-anthro-102116-041354).

Record type: Article

Abstract

Rock art studies are a global endeavour, with researchers working in key regions including Australia, North and South America, Africa, Asia, and Europe (particularly western Europe). Rock art scholars, like most archaeologists, participated in the epistemological debates relating to objectivity and subjectivity that took place in the 1980s and 1990s with the shift from the scientific perspective known as processualism to the interpretative perspective described as post-processualism (e.g. Taçon and Chippindale 1998). More recently, archaeologists have begun to explore ontological questions, and rock art scholars have been slower to engage with these debates (with some honourable exceptions e.g Dowson 2009; Creese 2011; Robinson 2013; Porr and Bell 2012). This paper reviews recent ontological debates in archaeology, and examines how ontology has been discussed in rock art studies. Ultimately, the review argues that a critical awareness of ontological issues forces rock art scholars to fundamentally reconsider their sub-discipline.

Text
Rock art and Ontology revised - Accepted Manuscript
Restricted to Repository staff only
Request a copy

More information

Accepted/In Press date: 17 July 2017
e-pub ahead of print date: 21 July 2017
Published date: October 2017

Identifiers

Local EPrints ID: 412574
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/412574
ISSN: 0084-6570
PURE UUID: 63175927-57ee-4494-a58e-9c2b13b4d49a

Catalogue record

Date deposited: 21 Jul 2017 16:31
Last modified: 15 Mar 2024 15:20

Export record

Altmetrics

Download statistics

Downloads from ePrints over the past year. Other digital versions may also be available to download e.g. from the publisher's website.

View more statistics

Atom RSS 1.0 RSS 2.0

Contact ePrints Soton: eprints@soton.ac.uk

ePrints Soton supports OAI 2.0 with a base URL of http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/cgi/oai2

This repository has been built using EPrints software, developed at the University of Southampton, but available to everyone to use.

We use cookies to ensure that we give you the best experience on our website. If you continue without changing your settings, we will assume that you are happy to receive cookies on the University of Southampton website.

×