TAG2024

In recent years archaeologists have—in increasingly greater numbers—turned to the study of museum collections which have not traditionally been perceived as ‘archaeological’ in nature. A small flurry of studies have explored the potential of developing an archaeology of archives (Baird and McFadyen 2014; Hitchcock 2021; Hodgett 2022) or delved into the role of photographic collections in archaeology (Baird 2011; Riggs 2018). Others have turned to ethnographic collections in the search for technological analogies to understand the creation and use of artefacts, or to demonstrate “continuity of practice between ancient and modern communities” (Flexner 2022:375). At the same time, the metaphor of excavating the collection is becoming increasingly common as a framing device for positioning museum and archival collections as field sites. With this metaphor comes the suggestion that the methodological and theoretical insights of archaeology—ideas of context, assemblage and formation—can offer new approaches to the study of museum collections.

This shift towards taking museum and archival collections as subjects of research in their own right marks a significant departure from prevailing perspectives on the relationship between museums and archaeology. As Stevenson (2022) notes, museum archaeology is often misconstrued as being limited to the pragmatic storage and display of excavated and fully processed assemblages, or dismissed as relevant only to antiquarian ‘collecting’ practices in the nascent years of archaeology. And yet, the growing realisation that museums are not neutral spaces has led to a new focus in museum studies on interrogating ‘hidden histories’—unearthing the stories and people whose presence has been erased through museum documentation practices. It is here that archaeologists are uniquely positioned to assist these efforts; using their expertise in giving voice to the past through the interpretation of material culture in situations where written records are absent or cannot be relied upon.

This session invites papers that consider the question what does an archaeology of museum collections look like? This may involve—but is not limited to—new methodological or theoretical approaches to studying collections, exploring collections that have not previously been considered ‘archaeological’ in nature, recovering ‘hidden histories’ through archaeological methods, or using museum collections as potent sources for writing histories of the discipline.

2:00pm | Creation of an 'excavation stratigraphy': reusing archived data to excavate new details of cultural sequences | Heidi J. Miller

2:15pm | Excavating archival traces in the archaeological record: the case of the North-East house at Knossos | Renee Trepagnier

2:30pm | Concealing and revealing the secret museum: the British Museum's Secretum, 1865-1898 | Helen Wickstead

2:45pm | Bronze in the time of cholera: poverty, disease, antiquarianism and Victorian prehistory | Martyn Barber

2:45pm | Discussion | Alice Stevenson

3:25pm | Archaeological epehemera in historic collections: excavating drawers in the Petrie Museum | Lisa Randisi

3:40pm | Egyptological dealers? Reconsidering the business of Egyptian Archaeology and the supply of museum objects | Dan Potter

3:55pm | Making the Museum' and the archaeology of the Pitt Rivers Museum collections | Beth Hodgett

4:10pm | Excavating intimacy: the Mortimer Archive and collection, Hull and East Riding Museum | Melanie Giles

4:25pm | Discussion | Alice Stevenson

Full paper abstracts available here:
https://tag2024.wordpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/tag-2024-session-abstracts-1.pdf