Indian Archaeology and Postmodernism: Fashion or Necessity?

Ajay Pratap

doi:10.5334/aa.12318

Abstract

This paper begins by considering the origins and trajectory of growth of Indian Archaeology, from an Antiquarian stage, through to its present state, which may best be described, positioned between cultural historical, Positivist and Post-positivist approaches. The school of archaeological thought informed by Positivist Philosophy has been called variously as the New Archaeology, Hypothetico-Deductive Archaeology, and more lately as Processual Archaeology (Paddayya, 1990). The school of Indian Archaeology influenced by the Philosophy of Post-positivism or Postmodernism are called variously as the New New Archaeology and Postprocessual Archaeology. This paper traces the growth of Indian Archaeology through its various stages such as Antiquarianism, Indology, Colonial Archaeology, Modern Archaeology, the New Archaeology and now the Postprocessual Archaeology. It seeks to estimate chiefly the impact of the Postprocessual applications in Indian Archaeology.

Highlights

We may tentatively characterize the broad paradigmatic development of Indian Archaeology (Table 1) in the following way: Antiquarianism Speaking of the antiquarian and Indological traditions of Indian Archaeology, it would be pertinent to mention the role of the Asiatic Society of Bengal which was established by Sir William Jones at Kolkata in 1784 (Kaul, 1995)
To conclude, the impact of postmodernism and its related ideas on Indian archaeology has been that we have stopped thinking of archaeological material culture as a passive entity
More importantly, such narratives may be accessed through the methods of scientific inquiry and through social theory, as discussed

Summary

Ajay Pratap*

This paper begins by considering the origins and trajectory of growth of Indian Archaeology, from an Antiquarian stage, through to its present state, which may best be described, positioned between cultural historical, Positivist and Post-positivist approaches. The school of Indian Archaeology influenced by the Philosophy of Post-positivism or Postmodernism are called variously as the New New Archaeology and Postprocessual Archaeology. This paper traces the growth of Indian Archaeology through its various stages such as Antiquarianism, Indology, Colonial Archaeology, Modern Archaeology, the New Archaeology and the Postprocessual Archaeology. It seeks to estimate the impact of the Postprocessual applications in Indian Archaeology

Introduction

Colonial archaeology

Conclusion