Imperialism, Internationalism, and Archaeology in the Un/Making of the Middle East

Abstract

ABSTRACTArchaeological materialities and imaginaries have been deeply entwined in colonial rivalries and struggles for self‐determination that have lasting legacies across the Middle East. Neoimperial ambitions and conflict over territory, religion, oil, and antiquities have similarly been accompanied by heritage claims and the rhetoric of high cultural humanism. Throughout the twentieth century, foreign occupation and military adventurism emboldened archaeological elites, including Hogarth, Kenyon, Lawrence, Woolley, and Bell, to implement expansive new designs for a one‐world archaeology. Whether situated in London or Jerusalem, Western archaeologists were instrumental in the colonial carve‐up that extended to historical sites, concessions, collections, and even the creation of new states, often working through international agencies, such as the League of Nations and UNESCO, under a banner of salvage and uplift. The connected histories of archaeology, espionage, and the end of empire have cast a long shadow, prompting deeper analysis of archaeologists’ role as participants and beneficiaries. It is thus timely to reconsider disciplinary histories and interventions—from the colonial era through two World Wars to recent regional conflicts with the attendant international responses—and to interrogate archaeology's century‐old ambitions and practices that are replicated in new technics of “oversight.” [espionage, war, archaeology, military‐industrial‐academic complex, Middle East]