The Southwest School of Landscape Archaeology

Abstract

A distinctive school of landscape archaeology is emerging in the American Southwest. The Southwest School, as here defined, has its roots in a unique set of historical relationships among archaeologists, ethnographers, indigenous people, and an intoxicating physical setting that has long provided scholarly inspiration. The most significant contribution of this school, however, is the manner in which it has begun to engage Native American intellectuals, not as data to be studied, but as interlocutors with distinct epistemological stances who have their own contributions to make toward the theorization of cultural landscapes generally. As such, the Southwest School stands poised to offer an important alternative to the more widely read landscape approaches currently popular in British archaeology.