Peopling the Past

Abstract

The post-processual agenda of “peopling the past” is essentially a project that tries to humanize the past by reaching the persons absent in cultural-historical and processual archaeology. On the way towards a more human past, the past has in a very literal sense become a “foreign country” by extensive use of analogies. The use of analogies makes it possible to go beyond Western reasoning and explore the “difference” of, for example, European prehistory. This practice does, however, pose intricate questions concerning heritage and intellectual property. With the emergence of categories such as “cultural knowledge,” heritage has entered the field of intellectual property. In this article, I wish to explore the relationship between the use of analogies and intellectual property by asking if immaterial heritage can be viewed as property, can analogies be repatriated?