Escaping from the pen?

Abstract

First of all, congratulations to Nick Overton and Yannis Hamilakis for an excellent and stimulating paper, made all the better for including two considered and rich case studies. Though in no way an animal-bone specialist, I find myself in general agreement with their approach, which attempts to persuade zooarchaeologists of the value of engaging further with particular trends within theory in archaeology (and other disciplines) from the last decade or so. It is with the implications of relational archaeologies that I particularly wish to engage: I concur with the authors that zooarchaeology (and other subfields), as well as archaeology more generally, could benefit from challenges to anthropocentrism, whether expressed in ontological or other forms, and ultimately produce more holistic as well as more diverse pasts. My comments are thus more an exploration of some of the issues raised in this paper than a commentary upon the contents per se.