Archaeology is a brand!

Abstract

I couldn’t resist it, ‘sure, all archaeological digs in the UK take place over three days, it’s the law’. The man stood at the bar, evidently surprised to learn of this. Working in a London pub for four years brings you face-to-face with the state of archaeology in popular culture and the ubiquity of Time Team. I needed a change from the stock reply that, ‘not all archaeologists have beards and funny jumpers, they spend years analysing finds before publishing their results to less public recognition than I get for unblocking the gents’. Cornelius Holtorf (more than any other contemporary academic) comes closest to understanding such an exchange. His ability to combine the perspective from in front of the TV with that from the ivory tower remains a rare skill. It is apt, therefore, that he should follow up From Stonehenge to Las Vegas with further examination of the meaning of archaeology in contemporary popular culture. A prerequisite of such a task is an understanding of contemporary popular culture itself. What exactly constitutes contemporary popular culture? Reality TV? Football? Urban music? Computer games? Celebrity gossip magazines? The Internet? It is all of these and more. Are they understood by academics? Unlikely. The majority come from a generation for whom ‘text’ will never be a verb. Worse still, from an intellectual environment in which, thanks to the pervasive influence of Baudrillard, Derrida and other purveyors of what Dawkins calls ‘haute francophonyism’, the status of ‘text’ is elevated beyond that of reality. However, at first sight the signs are encouraging as Holtorf continues with the informal style that marks out his books for either ridicule or reverence. This word deserves more of the latter than the former. From the start you know this is going to be something a bit different. He has not followed Stephanie Moser, Ian Russell et al. (and there are numerous alii) onto the postmodernist representation bandwagon. Instead Holtorf has invented his own bandwagon. The book begins by explaining the ways in which archaeology might appeal to popular culture, and how Holtorf has gone about studying the subject (focusing on the UK, Germany and Sweden). We are then offered a peek at the author’s travel journal as he visits the UK (at least that part which is on the East Coast Mainline and no further north than York), taking in sights like Flag Fen and chatting to people at the York Archaeological Trust. Holtorf then examines archaeology in the mass media, primarily television and newspapers. Next the author reviews existing surveys that have examined the public’s attitude towards archaeology. He finds there is an almost universal appetite for excavation, along with an appreciation of the role of television in informing the public about